1821 - The Battle for Palembang

3: Brabant's Brigade (Bank of the Musi, East Indies, Summer 1821)

Mouth of the Musi River, Sumatra

East Indian Archipelago

1821

I hope this letter finds you well. I pray for your health and well-being every day; in harder times, I think of you and it brings me peace.

The weather had changed immensely and to our favour. The day winds coming from the sea had allowed us to advance quickly, battling the downstream current. The Musi River is majestic and grand in nature, similar to the Rhine and the Danube in mother Europa; it goes six frigates wide hence naturally had it not been for our luck, the stream would have caused serious barriers to our advance to Palembang.

My unit is to disembark soon to establish forward positions. Although I do hope that we are to arise out of this first operation unscathed, it would be unreasonable to expect that the Sultan's men, reportedly concentrated around the city, would not surrender a skirmish. Only then, will the Royal Eastern Legion's Light Company prove their worth.

Pray for us.

Lieutenant James Simpson, 13th (Royal Eastern Legion) Regiment NOIL

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The boats rocked somewhat calmly as the current that went downstream the mighty River Musi had settled down. The Dutch Expeditionary Force had gone far enough upstream. The men climbed into their boats via a set of nets, their packs on their backs, muskets slung behind their shoulders.

The bells from the ships sounded, and so did the whistles coming from the boatswains.

Sailors helped individual soldiers onto their longboats; thought it was true that their area of deployment was indeed a tropical archipelago, many men still had difficulties in swimming, some not even able to swim at all. They were, after all, a land force, trained in skirmish or for massed volleys of musket fire in lines. Drill was precise and practiced thoroughly for these men–it had to be, the mode of war was fought with how good the men followed commands–but no drill could be so perfect as to assert a proper landing from sea vessels. Amphibious operations were a particularly meticulous business–it could never be perfect no matter how much you drilled it.

Major-General Hendrik Merkus de Kock had went on to decide, based on his advisors' input, that what landings that were to be done was to shadow the operations that took place in the British Army's landing near Quebec in 1757. There, General Wolfe led his troops to victory against the French at the Battle of the Plains of Abraham, just outside the city walls, ending effectively the North American theatre of the vicious Seven Years' War with an English triumph in the New World.

As such, a small detachment of sailors, light infantry companies, pioneers, and a few Marines led by Lieutenant-Colonel Brabant would land in advance to secure a ford that was, according to intelligence reports, deemed ideal to unload half of the expeditionary force's land component at 1,200 men along with their equipment and supplies and a number of guns.

The artillery was most vital to the operation, being used to besiege the Sultan's grand fortresses, then once they were taken, to the heart of the revered city of Palembang itself. Although bombardment could be done by the Navy alone, the fear of uncertain weather, tides, and risk of fire from land, as well as being compromised to fire and bomb ketches was too high. A stable artillery emplacement on land, in turn, could wreak havoc onto the Sultan's defences regardless of time and weather.

For the men of the so-called 'Brabant's Detachment' all weapons and cartridges were to be kept dry at all costs, and so, muskets were set in between the legs while aboard the large boats, barrel facing upwards. Javanese and Banjar sailors, seconded from the chartered merchant vessels, rowed the boats onto shore, the foremen coming from their own number.