XXV Moekims

The XXV Moekims (Vijfentwintig Moekims, “Twenty-Five Mukims”) — in Van Heutsz’s spelling also Sagi XXV or de Sagi’s XXV — was the sagi (confederation) of twenty-five mukim (parish) units lying south of the Atjeh-rivier between the III Moekims and the XXII Moekims, entirely conquered by Pel’s first offensive sweep of early February 1876. Borel notes that “de geheele Sagie der XXV Moekims bevond zich in onze macht” — the entire Sagie of the XXV Moekims was in our power — after the operation. In Van Heutsz’s 1893 tract De onderwerping van Atjeh, the XXV Moekims is also the third chapter of the Van der Heijden conquest — the Sagi whose September 1879 reconnaissance fixed the geheel Groot-Atjeh of the dagorder’s declaration, and the territory of the post-1884 resistance’s fragmentation under the panglima sagi XXV Tjoet Abas.

The conquest

The conquest of the XXV Moekims was the closing sweep of the first part of Pel’s winter offensive of 1875–1876. From Toeram, which bordered the gebied of Toekoe Bait of the XXII Moekims, the Dutch had made an inval (inroad) into the III Moekims on 3 February 1876, driving the enemy out of Atoeh after a heeten strijd. The next day, 4 February 1876, the colonne continued noordoostelijk: Lamrong and Lamsajoen were conquered, along with Kajoe Leh, Lambaroe and Pager Ajer Mesigit, and via Tandjoeng and Bayoer communication was opened with the Longbatta-Mesigit. On 7 February 1876 the troepen returned to K. Radja after a 10-day tocht. Total losses were five dead and 59 wounded — “betrekkelijk gering” — relatively slight. The first part of Pel’s plan was now executed; the entire Sagie of the XXV Moekims was in Dutch hands.

The demarcatie-linie

With the XXV Moekims in Dutch hands, the demarcatie-linie ran from the mouth of the Kroeng Raba on the west coast to Atoeh, then northward to Pager Ajer on the left bank of the Atjeh-rivier. The line incorporated the IV, VI and IX Moekims — conquered in the same January 1876 offensive — into a single defensive perimeter whose southern boundary was the new XXV Moekims line. The conquest was, Borel notes, proof that the Atjehneezen could not withstand a well-planned combined colonne attack — but the Atoeh catastrophe of 13 February 1876 showed that they could still punish careless Dutch columns on the marshy sawah (irrigated rice fields). After Pel’s death at Lamjoeng on 24 February 1876, Wiggers van Kerchem adopted the afwachtende houding and the demarcatie-linie became, in effect, the permanent eastern limit of the Dutch stelling — “nagenoeg onveranderd” through Borel’s writing in 1878.

Account from De onderwerping van Atjeh (Van Heutsz, 1893)

In Van Heutsz’s 1893 tract De onderwerping van Atjeh, the XXV Moekims — Sagi XXV, de Sagi’s XXV, the Sagi of twenty-five mukims — is the third chapter of the Van der Heijden conquest — the Sagi whose reconnaissance fixed the geheel Groot-Atjeh of the dagorder’s declaration. The Sagi was the constitutional unit of Groot-Atjeh — a territorial league of mukims (parish-districts) headed by a panglima sagi and collectively constituting the ancient core of the Acehnese sultanate. The three Sagi’s — the XXII, the XXV and the XXVI — were the territorial framework within which the sultan’s authority had historically been mediated. The XXV Moekims was the third Sagi reached in the September 1879 reconnaissance after the XXII (conquered in 1878) and the XXVI (conquered in 1879).

The September 1879 reconnaissance

The September 1879 reconnaissance of the XXV Moekims was the operational complement to the XXVI Moekims campaign that had culminated in the tocht naar Selimoen. The Commandant van het Indische leger visited Atjeh in the same month of September 1879 — the month that produced the dagorder of 5 September 1879 — and confirmed, in his report to the Regeering, that the entire Groot-Atjeh had been brought under Dutch authority. Van Heutsz quotes the Commandant’s report on pages 19–20 of the 1893 tract:

“Een feit toch is het, dat ik geheel Groot-Atjeh, voor zoover het door ons bezet is, heb doorkruist; in de XXII Moekims tot onzen uitersten wachtpost Djerir, in de XXVI Moekims tot Kroeng Kali in het Noorden, tot Tjot Lepong in het Oosten, en in de XXV Moekims tot Kroeng Raba” (It is indeed a fact that I have traversed all of Groot-Atjeh, as far as it is occupied by us; in the XXII Moekims as far as our outermost sentry-post Djerir, in the XXVI Moekims as far as Kroeng Kali in the north, as far as Tjot Lepong in the east, and in the XXV Moekims as far as Kroeng Raba).

The XXV Moekims was thus the third Sagi the Commandant reconnoitred, and Kroeng Raba — the south-western anchor of the Pel coastal line of 1875 — was the limit of the reconnaissance. The Commandant’s personal report of the reconnaissance — hoezeer slechts vergezeld door een twaalftal cavaleristen, nergens een schot gehoord of een gewapend Atjeher gezien heb (although accompanied only by a dozen cavalrymen, he had nowhere heard a shot or seen an armed Atjehnese) — was the empirical proof that the XXV Moekims, like the XXII and XXVI, had been substantively conquered and not merely formally declared.

The XXV Moekims and the Kroeng Raba limit

The Kroeng Raba limit of the September 1879 reconnaissance is, in Van Heutsz’s diagnosis, doubly significant. First, Kroeng Raba was the south-western anchor of Generaal Pel’s 1875 coastal line — the line begrepen tusschen Kroeng Raja en Kroeng Raba that Pel had prescribed for the occupation of the coastal strip of Groot-Atjeh. The Commandant’s reconnaissance to Kroeng Raba was thus the operational completion of the Pel line — the extension of Dutch authority from the coastal strip into the interior Sagi whose south-western edge the line had been designed to seal. Second, Kroeng Raba was, in Van Heutsz’s later narrative, the western anchor of the Gleh Loedah pass — the pass through which the Westkust route from Kemala entered the IV Moekims Kroeng Raba of Groot-Atjeh. The Commandant’s reconnaissance thus fixed the XXV Moekims’ south-western limit at the very pass that, in Van Heutsz’s diagnosis of the post-1884 cajoleering-decade, would have to be closed to seal Groot-Atjeh from the Westkust.

The XXV Moekims after the 1884 Concentratie

The Van der Heijden conquest of the XXV Moekims did not, however, extinguish the Atjehnese resistance in the Sagi. After the 1884 Concentratie withdrawal, the XXV Moekims — like the rest of Groot-Atjeh — was abandoned to the geconcentreerde stelling of Kota Radja. The post-1884 resistance in the XXV Moekims is, in Van Heutsz’s narrative, the territory of the panglima sagi XXV and the bendehoofden of the VI and IX Moekims. Van Heutsz records the post-1884 bendehoofden of the IX Moekims (Sagi XXV): In de IX Moekims (Sagi XXV). Tengkoe Kota Karang, zijn zoon Tengkoe Mat Saleh en Habib Samalanga (In the IX Moekims [Sagi XXV]. Tengkoe Kota Karang, his son Tengkoe Mat Saleh and Habib Samalanga). The IX Moekims, a sub-federation within the XXV, was thus the territory of three of the principal bendehoofden of the post-1884 resistance, and the panglima sagi XXV Tjoet Abas — een man die zich zeer weinig met staatszaken bemoeit (a man who concerned himself very little with state affairs) — was the Sagi-head whose passivity had allowed the hoeloebalangs of the various moekims to be, in Van Heutsz’s diagnosis, elk in hun gebied, zoo goed als onafhankelijk (each in their territory, virtually independent).

The VI Moekims of the Sagi XXV

The VI Moekims — the sub-federation of the Sagi XXV that lay to the west of the Dutch geconcentreerde stelling — was, in Van Heutsz’s diagnosis, the gewichtigste (most important) of the sub-federations of the XXV for the post-1884 security of the line. Van Heutsz records the VI Moekims: Van deze moekims zijn voor ons met het oog op onze geconcentreerde stelling, de VI Moekims, die ten Westen, en de IX Moekims die ten Zuiden aan onze linie grenzen, de gewichtigste (Of these moekims, with a view to our concentrated stelling, the VI Moekims, which border our line to the West, and the IX Moekims, which border it to the South, are the most important). The VI Moekims was headed, in Van Heutsz’s narrative, by T. Nanta Setia Radja — vroeger een onzer geduchtste vijanden, thans zeer oud, blind, afgeleefd en wonende te Lampisang in de kloof van Beradin (formerly one of our most feared enemies, now very old, blind, decrepit and living at Lampisang in the kloof of Beradin) — whose hoeloebalang office had, by 1893, passed in effect to his son-in-law T. Oemar, the buitengewoon slimme vogel (extraordinarily cunning bird) whose slimme marriage-alliances and pepertuine possessie made him, in Van Heutsz’s diagnosis, the principal gevaarlijk sujet of the post-1884 VI Moekims.

Significance (Van Heutsz account)

The XXV Moekims’s significance in Van Heutsz’s 1893 tract rests on its being the closing chapter of the Van der Heijden conquest — the Sagi whose September 1879 reconnaissance fixed the geheel Groot-Atjeh declaration — and the opening chapter of the post-1884 resistance’s fragmentation — the Sagi whose panglima’s passivity allowed the bendehoofden of the IX Moekims to operate independently under the religious-political authority of Tengkoe di Tirou.

Account in du Croo’s Generaal Swart (1943)

Teukoe Oemar had been appointed oelèëbalang of Leupoeëng in the XXV Moekims by Deijckerhoff before his installation as Panglima Prang Besar in September 1893. Swart was relieved of the government of the sub-division on 17 July 1902 and charged instead with that of Poelò Raja.

Nineteenth-Century Historiography & Campaign Analysis

Military Leadership and Combat History

The XXV Moekims was led by prominent war commanders including Teuku Imam Lueng Batoh (Toekoe Iman Longbattah) and Teuku Lampasei. Following the Capture of the Aceh Kraton on 24 January 1874, Teuku Lampasei initially sent letters of submission to General J. van Swieten, contributing to the optimistic predictions of the General van Swieten War Telegrams.

However, resistance led by Teuku Imam Lueng Batoh and his lieutenant Panglima Mah Saleh soon resumed. Throughout 1874 and 1875, warriors from the XXV Moekims defended bentengs at Lemboe and Longbattah, engaging in continuous guerrilla warfare against Dutch occupation garrisons.

Account in Hooijer’s De verlaten posten in Groot-Atjeh (1897)

The XXV Moekims were the sagi of Groot-Atjeh formed by the territory standing under the influence of Toekoe Djohan together with that of Toekoe Nja Mohammad, head of the IX Moekims, and the first district to be cleared of the Moslemin under the Dutch alliance policy of 1893.

Clearance and its consequences

Hooijer wrote that once Toekoe Djohan, supported by the Dutch, had cleared of enemies both the territory under his own influence and that of Toekoe Nja Mohammad — ‘t welk te zamen de XXV Moekims vormde — the result obtained was so favourable, and the rest in the cleared terrain so general, that the Governor of Atjeh and Dependencies proceeded on 1 September 1893 to attempt the same in the terrain outside the eastern part of the Dutch line, by permitting Toekoe Nja Banta, the friendly head of the sagi of the XXVI Moekims, to open the struggle against the Moslemin there as well.

Hooijer contrasted the ease of Oemar’s work in the XXV Moekims with the difficulty he later met in the XXVI Moekims: in the latter had hij niet dien invloed op de bevolking, die het hem in de XXV Moekims zoo gemakkelijk had gemaakt de Moslemin te verdrijven.

Sources

ATJEH ‘96, door A. Kruisheer, Kapitein der Infanterie O.I.L., met 2 kaarten en 4 portretten (Weltevreden: N.V. Boekhandel Visser & Co, 1913). Instituut Kern, Leiden. OCR-filename: 20260715_163243_DLP-89-Atjeh_96_Met_2_kaarten_en4_DOORA_KRUISHEER_Kapiteinder_Infanterie_nemoretriever-ocr-v1_OCR.txt, pp. 21, 339. De Atjeh-Oorlog: Kort Overzicht van Oorsprong, Verloop en Gevolg, door J. A. Kruijt. ‘s-Gravenhage: Loman & Funke, 1896. Chapter VI (the geography of Groot-Atjeh). OCR-filename: 20260716_140310_DLP-101-De_Atjeh_oorlog_Nemotron-OCR-v2_OCR.txt, p. 30. Raffles’ Atjeh-overeenkomst van 1819, by P. H. van der Kemp, in Bijdragen van het Koninklijk Instituut voor Taal-, Land- en Volkenkunde van Nederlandsch-Indië, 6e Volgr., Deel VII (1900), pp. 159–239. Universiteitsbibliotheek Vrije Universiteit, LS.08781.

Atjeh gedurende de tweede expeditie en later, Een Oud Officier, Batavia: Ogilvie & Co., 1876, pp. 8-10, 19-22.

De onderwerping van Atjeh, door J. B. van Heutsz, Majoor der Infanterie, gewezen Chef van den Staf in Atjeh en Onderhoorigheden. ‘s-Gravenhage: De Gebroeders van Cleef; Batavia: G. Kolff en Co., 1893, esp. pp. 13, 18, 19, 20, 97, 98. OCR-filename: 20260718_105749_DLP-107-De_onderwerping_van_Atjeh_Nemotron-OCR-v2_OCR.txt.

Generaal Swart, Pacificator van Atjeh (“General Swart, Pacifier of Atjeh”), by M. H. du Croo, Colonel K.N.I.L. (retired), with the collaboration of H. J. Schmidt, Titular Colonel K.N.I.L. (retired), with a foreword by His Excellency Lieutenant-General K.N.I.L. (retired) G. K. Dijkstra (Maastricht: N.V. Leiter-Nypels, 1943), Chapter III; Extract from the service record.

Onze vestiging in Atjeh, critisch beschreven, by G. F. W. Borel, Kapitein der Artillerie. ‘s-Gravenhage: D. A. Thieme, 1878. pp. 327–329, 336–337.

De verlaten posten in Groot-Atjeh, door G. B. Hooijer, Gep. Luit.-Kolonel O. I. Leger, met 24 platen (Haarlem: De Erven F. Bohn; Batavia: G. Kolff & Co., 1897). Koninklijk Instituut voor de Tropen, Centrale Boekerij, Amsterdam. OCR-filename: 20260719_140140_DLP-134-De_verlaten_posten_in_Groot_Atjeh_Nemotron-OCR-v2_OCR.txt, pp. 16, 32.

Acknowledgement of sources. This article is a single consolidated account combining the material previously held in this entry with the account given in De verlaten posten in Groot-Atjeh (1897) by G. B. Hooijer. Dutch terminology has been rendered in English, the original Dutch being retained only in direct quotations and in bibliographic citations.

De Geconcentreerde Stelling in Groot-Atjeh, ‘s-Gravenhage: De Gebroeders Van Cleef, 1885, p. 17.

tags	place, 19th-century, aceh, aceh-war, acehnese, achehnese, administration, administrative-division, atjeh, district, groot-atjeh, moekim, mukim, region, sagi, xxv-moekims, sultanate, sumatra, seaward-sagi, dutch-occupation
aliases	25 Moekims, 25 Sagi, Dua Puluh Lima Mukim, Sagi XXV, Vijfentwintig Moekims, XXV Mukims, de Sagi's XXV, de XXV Moekims, Sagi der XXV Moekims, 25 Mukims, 25 Moekim, Twenty-five Moekims, 25 Mukim, Sagi of the 25 Moekims, Twenty-five Mukims, Sagi of XXV Mukims, XXV Mockims

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