The Battle of Marudu 1845

by F.G. WHELAN

One of the most famous pirate strongholds in the history of piracy in the East Indies was at Marudu in the north of Sabah, not far from the present Langkon Estate. Most of the pirates who raided from this lair were Illanuns from the Philippines and their leader was the widely-known Serip Usman. For many years Usman and Pengiran Usop of Brunei had been allies: between them they were responsible for many acts of piracy. 

Many of their victims had been sold as slaves. Pengiran Usop was highly placed at the Court of Brunei. He was a son of Sultan Omar Ali Saifudin. He displaced the heir to the throne of Brunei, Rajah Mudah Hassim, as the chief adviser to the Ruler. The partnership between Usop and Usman was well known. Rajah James Brooke of Sarawak was determined to put down piracy so that all Borneo people could live in peace and trade freely. 

He was a friend of Rajah Mudah Hassim and knew that the Brunei prince was just as eager as he to free the Borneo waters from this menace. He also knew that Pengiran Usop, backed by Serip Usman, was working against Hassim and succeeding in turning the Sultan against him. Brooke had an official position with the British Government as Confidential Adviser in Borneo and in 1845 he visited Singapore and had long talks with Admiral Sir Thomas Cochrane, the naval Commander-in-Chief, about suppressing piracy. Cochrane agreed to visit Borneo and deal with piracy there as soon as he could.

Cochrane’s fleet arrived off Brunei on August 8th, 1845 and was the biggest ever seen off the Borneo coast. The flagship was H.M.S. Agincourt  and with her were H.M.S. Vestal and H.M.S. Daedalus and two other sailing ships, Cruiser and Wolverine . Steamships in the squadron were H.M.S.Vixen and the Honourable East India Company’s paddle steamers, Pluto and  Nemesis .The Admiral and Rajah Brooke with a strong body of sailors id marines (soldiers carried on board naval ships steamed up the Brunei River in Vixen, Pluto and Nemesis to call on the Sultan. 

Sir Thomas made it clear that he had come to deal with piracy, but he added that he would also deal with any trouble-makers in Brunei. Pengiran Usop knew who Cochrane meant. Cochrane then with-drew to the Pluto but he later charged Usop with enslaving two Indian sailors from a British ship.

The Admiral said these were British subjects and the treaty between Britain and Brunei had been broker He said that the Sultan must punish Usop.The Sultan replied that he was not strong enough to punish Usop and that the British should do this.Usop set about putting the defences of his house in order, loading his cannon and preparing his weapons. He was not going to give in without a fight.He stayed at home all that night and all next morning. 

In the afternoon Cochrane moved up his teamers to a position where they could fire on Usop’s house. He landed his marine and then called on the Pengiran to surrender. When the time for surrender had passed without sign from Usop, Cochrane ordered a gunner to fire a warning round over the house. Usop returned the fire.

The Pengiran realized he had no chance, so he fled and his house fell to the advancing marines. It was found to contain a large supply of gunpowder,so perhaps Usop preferred flight to being blown up with his own magazine. The Brunei nobles refused to help themselves to his property. Usop had been in many tight corners before and had come through safely, so perhaps they were wise. 

The common folk, however, had no such worries and Usop’s mansion was thoroughly looted. Cochrane had no more interest in the matter and sailed off to Marudu to deal with the other member of the partnership,Serip Usman.The Pengirans were right. Within two days of the departure of the British fleet Usop reappeared at the head of two hundred men. He attacked the town of Brunei but loyal forces under Pengiran Bedrudin strongly opposed him and there was some fierce fighting. Usop’s forces retreated and Bedrudin’s men gave chase. Usop’s wives, children and all his remaining goods fell into the hands of the Bruneis but he himself escaped.. 

By now he was an outlaw and he took refuge along with his brother in Kimanis where he was the ruler. The Penghulu of Kimanis could not do anything else but receive his lord, but he knew that Usop was an outlaw and he was very unhappy.His misery was soon increased by the arrival in Kimanis of a messenger bearing instructions from the Sultan of Brunei, Rajah Mudah Hassim and Pengiran Bedrudin. These instructions ordered the Chief to put Pengiran Usop to death. The poor Penghulu must have felt like the mouse who was chosen to hang a bell on the cat’s neck. 

His main problem was how to carry out his orders. It would have been easy perhaps to take a long shot at Usop and finish him off that way, or poison his rice or use some other trick but the Chief knew this would not do. Usop would have to be strangled with a silk cord as befitted a prince of royal blood. If he were not, the Chief himself would be put to death —  and not with a silken cord. Usop knew the danger he was in and he and his brother took turns at guarding each other. One stood ready with a drawn kris while the other ate, bathed or slept. 

The Penghulu waited for nine long anxious days.On the tenth day Usop was taking his turn guarding his brother, who was at his bath. He stood on the landing-stage on the river bank, kris in hand. Usop was, a heavy smoker of tobacco. He had a cheroot but no light. He jerked his head at the Penghulu,ordering him to bring a light. The Chief brought a piece of firewood which was barely glowing at the end and held it out to Usop. Usop tried to light his cheroot but failed. With no thought in mind but that of getting a smoke he put down his kris and took the brand from the Penghulu, meaning to blow on it to revive the spark. Too late he realized he was unarmed. The Penghulu seized him and the others standing around laid hands on his brother.In due course the silken cord came into play and half of the partnership was no more. But the other remained, by far the more dangerous.

Serip Usman was not very worried by the news that Admiral Cochrane was sailing towards his stronghold. He had faced danger before. Like many other pirate leaders he was a kebal. A kebal was a man who had undergone certain magic rites.These meant that he had to go to a lonely spot in the forest, clad in all his war gear and remain there for three days and three nights in fasting and prayer. If at the end of this time the prayers were answered, the man fell into a trance and heard secret words. After that he could not be hurt or killed by shot or thrust of steel. He was invulnerable. 

Usman had not a very clear idea of the forces he was up against and like many other warriors in Borneo at this time he put too much faith in forts and strong-points. Usman’s headquarters were on what was then called the Marudu River — now the Langkon —  which runs into the southern shore of Marudu Bay.(Admiral Cochrane called it the Maloodoo River.)The position was chosen with great care about five miles from the bay at a place where the river makes a sharp bend, so that any attacking forces would be under the guns of the stronghold before they realized it was there. The river runs roughly from south to north. On the western side (the left bank) and just behind the bend, a tributary stream flows in,making a small headland. Usop built a fort on this. On the eastern side (the right bank) he built another fort, larger and stronger. The forts were supported by a floating platform on the western side(the left bank) on which were placed some guns to make a floating battery. Two hundred yards from the forts Usman built a barrier, or boom, across the river. The boom was made of great tree trunks fastened together with slabs of iron. Round all that was bound a ship’s iron cable which was fastened at either end to a tree on the river bank.

There was noway through the boom except a very narrow passage on the right bank which would barely allow a small canoe to pass. Many guns were sighted on the boom.The armament was four eighteen-pounders, two twelve-pounders, and three nine-pounders. This was very strong indeed. There were about twenty small brass cannon in the forts and small arms like rifles, muskets and pistols for Usman’s regular troops, who were all experienced soldiers. The force was about one thousand strong and had ten commanders. With all this strength in men and arms Usman could hardly be blamed for being confident that he could beat off an attack.

If Usman was not afraid of Cochrane, then it was the same with the Admiral, who was not afraid of Usman, for when he arrived in Marudu Bay on August 17th, 1845, he decided to send only a small part of his force to attack the pirate stronghold.This numbered about five hundred and fifty,which was about the same strength as the party which attacked Pengiran Usop in his house. The attacking fleet was made up of the steam-driven ships, Vixen, Pluto and Nemesis. Cochrane was in Vixen. With the fleet went most of the boats from the squadron. On some of these boats guns were mounted. 

The attackers moved up to a position as near the mouth of the Murudu as they could.This was on the morning of August 18th, and in the  afternoon the assault force under Captain Charles Talbot, commander of H.M.S. Vestal, moved off. The force reached the mouth of the river in good order and anchored for the night just inside it.Talbot had orders to spy out Usman’s position and the strength of his troops ‘either attacking the Serip on his refusal to surrender should he feel equal to enterprise, or falling back to some suitable position while he communicated (with the Admiral)in the event of his not considering his force sufficient to guarantee success’. 

These instructions gave Talbot very wide powers and seem to show that Cochrane had little fear for Usman as an enemy. He appeared to think that five hundred and fifty men would be enough to knock him out —roughly the same number, as we have seen, which he used on Pengiran Usop’s lone house.

The next morning Talbot’s boats moved up the Marudu River to carry out Cochrane’s orders. Captain Talbot was no doubt a fine sailor and could command a ship in a sea battle with great skill, but he was no great soldier. Instead of sending a small force a head to spy out Usman’s defences he appears to have gone straight up the river in his boats,finally breaking out round the bend of the riverwhich covered the pirate’s stronghold, in full view of the forts. He halted to take in the scene. 

The banners of Usman’s Arab captains flew proudly over their positions in the forts, topped by the Serip’s own flag, a tiger on a red background. The small fort, you remember, was built on a headland where a tributary ran in. An attacking force could come at it only by water. Talbot saw this and also saw that the large fort, over which Usman’s banner flew, had a river in front of it. In fact, this was not a river at all but a wide shallow stream. 

Usman’s main fort could have been attacked by land and, as the soldiers say, his flank could have been turned. The troops could then have got through to the houses of the settlement which lay behind the defences and done great damage. Talbot did not know this and he decided that the only way to capture the stronghold was to cut a way through the boom, sweep through with his boats, land his men, and attack the forts.Why he decided to take such a great risk without sending patrols to find out the depth of the rivers or to see if they could work round behind the defences is difficult to understand. He must have known that Usman had cannon and every one of them would be trained on the boom, and that his cutting party could be shot to pieces in minutes.Talbot brought his boats up to the boom and as he did so a canoe from Usman’s fort came to meet him. 

One of the Serip’s captains dressed in his war gear, scarlet coat and silk head cloth, sat in it carrying a white flag of truce. On behalf of his Chief he asked Talbot, as well he might, what was the purpose of the array of fighting men. Talbot said he had come to call on Serip Usman to surrender and hand over his stronghold. He added that he would meet Usman on the spot where they were or inside the boom, whichever he wished, but that the Serip must bring all his fighting men to the meeting. The pirate captain took this demand back to the Serip and returned to say that Usman did not agree, but he was prepared to parley with two of Talbot’s senior officers inside the fort. Talbot in answer gave Serip Usman fifteen minutes to come out and discuss surrender terms.

Talbot then prepared for action. He brought his gun boats up to the boom. In the centre he stationeda cutting party under Mr. Gibbard, an officer of the

Wolverine. The other boats, crammed with riflemen,were placed in a position where they could support the gunners with their fire, and a rocket section was emplaced on the right bank of the river ready to fire on the forts. It was a tense moment. In the forts gunners with their matches already alight crouched squinting along their pieces, trained on the boom. On high ground above the large fort a three-gun battery was prepared to open fire on Talbot and hismen. Usman and his ten captains, proud in their scarlet coats, stood watching for the next move,exposed and unafraid. The fifteen minutes went by.It was about ten in the morning.Talbot moved his axemen in on the boom.Bright steel flashed in the bright sun. The battle was on. The pirate guns crashed out. The river wascrammed from bank to bank with boats and men.The shots could not miss. Mr. Gibbard was killed. A sailor fell dead. Three men lay in one boat,badly wounded. In those days when the guns fired the force of the shot used to cause them to run back or recoil. 

Usman’s gunners do not appear to have carried out enough drill with their guns because they failed to make their pieces bear well on the boom after the recoil. After the first salvo their aim was wild. The navy returned the fire. Their gunners were better trained and the rocket men were deadly. One rocket made a direct hit on a pirate gun and killed all its crew. Small arms fire from rifle and musket was heavy, grape-shot bullets from the navy guns whistled through the air, but the pirate chiefs in their red coats encouraged their men and defied Talbot with their yells,showing no fear. 

A shot hit Usman’s flagstaff, bringing his standard down. One of his men instantly clambered up it like a monkey and coolly tied the flag to the stump while half the weapons of the enemy blazed away at him. When he was satisfied the flag was secured he leapt down unharmed. The struggle went on. For nearly an hour the axemen hacked at the boom and at last two boats loaded with marines could squeeze through. They immediately landed and attacked the battery of three nine-pounder guns.

They captured this battery and, from its height,opened a heavy fire on the large fort. The garrison broke and fled, back through the houses and on into the forest. Usman stuck to his post supported by a small gallant band of trusted followers, but a bullet pierced his neck, he fell dead and his men carried his body away: his kebal had failed. This was really the end.The gap in the boom was now wide and the naval boats crowded through. The defenders of the small fort lost heart when they saw this and turned and ran. The sailors and marines, chased after them in an unruly mob. One of the officers,Lieutenant Pascoe of  H.M.S. Vestal was disgusted at this lack of discipline among the troops.

‘On leaving the boats to advance,’ he said, ‘all was helter-skelter as going to a fair.’ The Navy had done a great deal of damage with gunfire and there were many dead and wounded. There was great confusion. Many of the sailors and marines treated the whole affair as a great skylark. Some of them nearly paid for their high jinks with lives. They grabbed the armour and finery from dead pirates and put them on them selves for a joke. Some of their mates mistook them for pirates and went for, them,cutlasses to the fore. 

The jokers managed just in time to stop their mates from killing them. This spirit of fun was still strong when later the order was given to burn and destroy the stronghold. Everyone grabbed a light and set about burning houses right, left and centre, so that several parties were nearly cut off and roasted alive. By noon it was all over and the troops took a break. They rounded up all the goats and chickens they could, roasted them in the fires that were still burning and made a meal. At two in the afternoon they set off for their ships which they reached by sundown. Between dawn and noon the stronghold of the terrible Serip Usman had fallen and the power of the Marudu pirates was broken for ever.A large quantity of arms and ammunition was captured and among the other loot were many things which proved with out doubt that Usman was a pirate. There were boxes of china, bales of cloth, manufactured goods, camphor, two ships’ bells — one marked with the name of the ship Guilhelm Ludwig and its home port Bremen (in Germany), a ship’s boat and several ships’ cables.

The attackers lost six killed and fifteen wounded but the enemies’ losses were very severe. As well as Usman, these included Serip Mohamed, the chief who parlied with Talbot. Mohamed was shot while trying to spear Mr Pascoe. Usman’s son lost his life. As could be expected, most of the dead pirates were Illanuns. The next day Talbot sent a party to make sure the stronghold was completely destroyed. Then the fleet sailed away. If ever a commander was lucky in battle it was Talbot. He made some very bad mistakes but managed still to succeed. Any commander in his senses would have sent small parties to reconnoitre(spy out) the enemy position. If he had done this he would have found that his troops could wade the river in front of the large fort and attack it, taking the pressure off the men at the boom. Luckily for him the pirate marksmen on the cannons were not well trained. Cochrane seems to have thought nothing wrong about this because in a despatch to London he praised himself for picking Talbot for the task. Nothing succeeds like success.