The First Sumatran expedition, which featured the Battle of Quallah Battoo (

Aceh Aceh ( ), officially the Aceh Province ( ace, Nanggroë Acèh; id, Provinsi Aceh) is the westernmost province of Indonesia. It is located on the northernmost of Sumatra island, with Banda Aceh being its capital and largest city. Granted a s ...

: Kuala Batèë,

Indonesian Indonesian is anything of, from, or related to Indonesia, an archipelagic country in Southeast Asia. It may refer to: * Indonesians, citizens of Indonesia ** Native Indonesians, diverse groups of local inhabitants of the archipelago ** Indonesia ...

: Kuala Batu) in 1832, was a

punitive expedition A punitive expedition is a military journey undertaken to punish a political entity or any group of people outside the borders of the punishing state or union. It is usually undertaken in response to perceived disobedient or morally wrong beh ...

by the

United States Navy The United States Navy (USN) is the maritime service branch of the United States Armed Forces and one of the eight uniformed services of the United States. It is the largest and most powerful navy in the world, with the estimated tonnage ...

against the village of

Kuala Batee Kuala Batee is a district in Southwest Aceh Regency, Aceh, Indonesia Indonesia, officially the Republic of Indonesia, is a country in Southeast Asia and Oceania between the Indian and Pacific oceans. It consists of over 17,000 islands, inc ...

, presently a

subdistrict A subdistrict or sub-district is an administrative division that is generally smaller than a district. Equivalents * Administrative posts of East Timor, formerly Portuguese-language * Kelurahan, in Indonesia * Mukim, a township in Brunei, In ...

in Southwest Aceh Regency. The

reprisal A reprisal is a limited and deliberate violation of international law to punish another sovereign state that has already broken them. Since the 1977 Additional Protocol I to the Geneva Conventions (AP 1), reprisals in the laws of war are extreme ...

was in response to the massacre of the crew of the

merchantman A merchant ship, merchant vessel, trading vessel, or merchantman is a watercraft that transports cargo or carries passengers for hire. This is in contrast to pleasure craft, which are used for personal recreation, and naval ships, which are us ...

''Friendship'' a year earlier. The frigate and its crew defeated the local uleëbalang (ruler)'s forces and bombed the settlement. The expedition was successful in stopping Sumatran attacks on U.S. shipping for six years until another vessel was plundered under different circumstances, resulting in a

Second Sumatran expedition The Second Sumatran expedition was a punitive expedition by the United States Navy against inhabitants of the island of Sumatra. After Malay warriors or pirates had massacred the crew of the American merchant ship ''Eclipse'', an expedition of ...

in 1838.

Background

The island of Sumatra is renowned as an excellent source of

pepper Pepper or peppers may refer to: Food and spice * Piperaceae or the pepper family, a large family of flowering plant ** Black pepper * ''Capsicum'' or pepper, a genus of flowering plants in the nightshade family Solanaceae ** Bell pepper ** Chili ...

, and throughout history ships have come to the island to trade for it. In 1831, the American merchantman ''Friendship'' under Captain Charles Endicott had arrived off the chiefdom of Kuala Batu in order to secure a cargo of pepper. Various small trading boats darted back and forth along the coast trading pepper with the merchant ships waiting offshore. On 7 February 1831, Endicott and a few of his men went ashore to purchase some pepper from the natives when three

proa Proas are various types of multi-hull outrigger sailboats of the Austronesian peoples. The terms were used for native Austronesian ships in European records during the Colonial era indiscriminately, and thus can confusingly refer to the do ...

s attacked his ship, murdered ''Friendship''s first officer and two others of her crew, and plundered its cargo. Endicott and the other surviving members of his crew managed to escape to another port with the assistance of a friendly native chief named Po Adam. There they enlisted the help of three other merchant captains who agreed to help him recover his vessel. With their help, Endicott managed to retake his ship and eventually sailed back to

Salem, Massachusetts Salem ( ) is a historic coastal city in Essex County, Massachusetts, located on the North Shore of Greater Boston. Continuous settlement by Europeans began in 1626 with English colonists. Salem would become one of the most significant seaports tr ...

. Upon reaching Salem there was a general public outcry against the massacre and in response President

Andrew Jackson Andrew Jackson (March 15, 1767 – June 8, 1845) was an American lawyer, planter, general, and statesman who served as the seventh president of the United States from 1829 to 1837. Before being elected to the presidency, he gained fame a ...

dispatched the frigate under Commodore John Downes to punish the natives for their treachery. The Dutch expedition on the west coast of Sumatra of 1831 by the

Royal Netherlands East Indies Army The Royal Netherlands East Indies Army ( nl, Koninklijk Nederlands Indisch Leger; KNIL, ) was the military force maintained by the Kingdom of the Netherlands in its colony of the Dutch East Indies, in areas that are now part of Indonesia. T ...

was in response to the incident and served as an excuse to annex parts of the

Aceh Sultanate The Sultanate of Aceh, officially the Kingdom of Aceh Darussalam ( ace, Keurajeuën Acèh Darussalam; Jawoë: كاورجاون اچيه دارالسلام), was a sultanate centered in the modern-day Indonesian province of Aceh. It was a majo ...

Battle

''Potomac'' reached Kuala Batu on 5 February 1832. Here Downes met Po Adam who advised him that the local uleëbalang would in no way be partial toward paying compensation for the attack on ''Friendship''. Commodore Downes then decided to disguise his ship as a Danish merchantman in order to keep the element of surprise in his favor. The disguise worked so well that when a party of

Malays Malays may refer to: * Malay race, a racial category encompassing peoples of Southeast Asia and sometimes the Pacific Islands ** Overseas Malays, people of Malay race ancestry living outside Malay archipelago home areas ** Cape Malays, a communit ...

boarded ''Potomac'' attempting to sell a cargo of pepper they were, much to their surprise, detained so as not to alert Kuala Batu of the real identity of ''Potomac''. Downes then sent a reconnaissance party to scout out the defenses of the port, but this was repulsed by the Malays. In addition to the three proas in the harbor, at least five forts were found to be guarding the town with the majority of them near the coastline. Downes ordered a detachment of 282

marines Marines, or naval infantry, are typically a military force trained to operate in littoral zones in support of naval operations. Historically, tasks undertaken by marines have included helping maintain discipline and order aboard the ship (ref ...

and bluejackets into the ship's boats, some of which had been equipped with a few of ''Potomac''s lighter cannon. It was from these boats that the sailors and marines of ''Potomac'' burnt the Malay vessels in Kuala Batu's harbor and assaulted the town's forts while support from the guns of ''Potomac'' herself were used to suppress the fire coming from the Malay forts. The later-day

musket A musket is a muzzle-loaded long gun that appeared as a smoothbore weapon in the early 16th century, at first as a heavier variant of the arquebus, capable of penetrating plate armour. By the mid-16th century, this type of musket graduall ...

s the Americans used were far superior to the outdated

matchlock A matchlock or firelock is a historical type of firearm wherein the gunpowder is ignited by a burning piece of rope that is touched to the gunpowder by a mechanism that the musketeer activates by pulling a lever or trigger with his finger. Befo ...

weapons of the Malays, but the natives fought fiercely and the fighting devolved into hand-to-hand combat in which one of the uleëbalang commanding the forts was killed along with about 150 other warriors. Only two Americans died during the attack and another eleven sailors and marines suffered injuries. After the coastal forts fell, the remaining Malays fled toward the rear of the town where another fort lay, but instead of engaging the last remaining fort the Americans attacked the town itself. Large scale

looting Looting is the act of stealing, or the taking of goods by force, typically in the midst of a military, political, or other social crisis, such as war, natural disasters (where law and civil enforcement are temporarily ineffective), or rioting ...

and pillaging occurred with a range of plunder being looted from the town as well as many civilians slain. Downes later ordered his men to return to the ship and bombarded the fifth fort as well as the town until its surviving leaders agreed to surrender, killing another 300 natives in the process.

Aftermath

The remaining uleëbalang begged for mercy and Downes informed them that if any American ships were attacked again the same treatment would be given to the perpetrators. Other uleëbalang from nearby states also sent delegations to the ship pleading that Downes spare them from the same fate as Kuala Batu. Downes left the area to continue his journey eventually circumnavigating the globe, stopping at Hawaii and entertaining that nation's king and queen aboard his vessel. Although some criticism arose from the fact that Downes did not attempt to negotiate a settlement by peaceable means, the general public was satisfied with his response and no action was taken against him. The troubles with Kuala Batu were not over though; in 1838 another ship was attacked and its crew massacred. True to Downes' word the

under George C. Read bombarded Kuala Batu and attacked the village of Muckie.

Citations

References

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External links