Chapter 1 - Conquering NNS

(a)In this period of time, there were two things that the British needed.
Firstly, they needed a new trade centre, to increase their economy.
They also needed a fleet of soldiers, in case they get attacked in India.
So, that's what made the British start their search for new places to set
foot on in South East Asia.
(b)At the same time, hundreds of kilometres away, Kedah was having some
issues with Siam and Bugis.
(c)After a King of Kedah had passed on (mangkat), a man named Sultan
Abdullah took over
.
(d)Now, the people of Kedah were not happy with this. Sultan Abdullah was not
even the son of the King.
The people said that Sultan Abdullah was not fit to be King because he
did not have royal blood (bukan anak gahara).
So the people of Kedah began fighting and they even asked help from
the Bugis to fight Sultan Abdullah and get him off the throne. All because
he did not have Kingly blood.
(e)The Siamese were trying to attack Kedah.
(f)Why? Well, initially Kedah was under the rule of the Siamese (Thailand).
When they were under this rule, they had to send something called a
o

Bunga Emas" or "Golden Flower" (direct translation) once every

three years.

(f) However, while Siam was fighting with Burma (Myanmar), Kedah had
temporarily stopped sending the Bunga Emas to Siam.
(g) After a while, Siam finally won the fight against Burma and now was even
more powerful than ever.
They quickly demanded for the Bunga Emas to be sent straight to them
immediately.
They even asked for workforce
And manpower, as if they were so arrogantly powerful.
(h)As the Kedah King felt that he was being threatened by the Siamese, he
decided not to send the Bunga Emas and stuff.
(i)On this basis, Siam got really mad and started attacking Kedah.

(j)So, Sultan Abdullah, the King of Kedah, had to do something.

What does he resort to? Well, firstly he asks help from a Firm named
Firma Jourdain and De Sullivan.
They promised to help the Sultan but they never did.
(k)Just then, a man named Francis Light knocked on the King's door.
Francis Light was a man working with the SHTI (don't misread that) or
the Syarikat Hindia Timur Inggeris(SHTI).
o These were a group of British people who were sent out by the
British government to explore the Eastern Civilisations.
(l)Francis Light signed the First Deal with Sultan Abdullah. The very first
agreement.
In the agreement, it was stated that Francis Light would assist Sultan
Abdullah when they were attacked by other powers ONLY if Sultan
Abdullah hands over Pulau Pinang to SHTI, for a pay of 30000 Spanish
Dollars a year.
(m)So, Pulau Pinang was the first place to be lost into the hands of the British.
This marks the start of the British conquering Malaysia.
(o)Not long after, the Siamese attacked Kedah.
However, SHTI didn't even bother to help. They did not stick to their
word.
They had two reasons, which were
o "They had a good relationship with the Siamese, and they don't
want to spoil that relationship."
o "The deal didn't include SHTI, it was merely between Francis Light
and Sultan Abdullah. That means we don't have to help. Sorry."
(p)Luckily, Kedah managed to get some help and fought off Siam, for now.
(q)The King of Kedah was very annoyed with SHTI who actually fooled him.
He decided that this could not sustain. SHTI had to leave the soil of
Kedah.
o Sultan Alauddin actually sent a full attack towards Pulau Pinang.
(r)However, SHTI's army was faster. They attacked the capital of Kedah and
forced Sultan Alauddin to surrender.
(s)So Sultan Alauddin finally surrendered.
The British made the Second Deal.
o The British get to keep Pulau Pinang and only need to pay 6000
Spanish dollars a year for the entire island. Quite unfair, wasn't it.

Now, the British efforts didn't end at that. They were greedy, they wanted more.
Seberang Perai
(t)You see, there was this small piece of land in Kedah, directly opposite Pulau
Pinang. The name of the area was Seberang Perai.
(u)This place seemed pretty cool to the British because it had two main things
that the British wanted.
Firstly, it had super fertile soil, for farming.
Next, it had a lot of land which could potentially be a place for an army to
help Pulau Pinang, if Pulau Pinang is ever attacked by other powers.
Logically, having such a successful trading destination, you need to have
an army nearby to guard it.
(v)A king of Kedah named Sultan Dziauddin asked help from SHTI since they
were being attacked by the Siamese.
The British were quite clever. They noticed that the Sultan of Kedah
needed help, so they decided to help, in exchange of something even
more valuable, in this case, Seberang Perai.

A wise man once said, "Fool me once, shame on you. Fool me twice,
shame on me." If only the Sultan of Kedah had listened to that wise man.

(w)Since the Sultan of Kedah was really worried and all, he decided to hand
Seberang Perai over, in exchange for safety from the warships of SHTI.
Honestly, how silly could this Sultan get? In the past, it has already been proven
that these SHTI were bad people who like to cheat when they made
agreements. So guess what? They cheated again.
(x)When Siam attacked Kedah in 1821, SHTI did not help at all.
This time, Kedah couldn't fight back. They were weak and powerless.
Finally, Siam actually managed to conquer Kedah, the King was forced to
flee and the British had a wide grin on their faces.
Why were they so happy?
o Well, a simple agreement with the Siamese (The Burney
Agreement), and Siam, being such a big and powerful power,
didn't really need Seberang Perai and Pulau Pinang. So when the
British politely asked for it, they gave it away.
The name of Seberang Perai was then officially changed to Province Wellesly.
Pulau Pinang became Prince of Wales Island.

Singapore
Now the British finally have Pulau Pinang and Seberang Perai. However, it isn't
enough. What the British wanted was a successful trade destination. Pulau
Pinang was a failure. The island is apparently located too far North.
1.

A bit of Geography again, the North East Winds (Angin Monsun) blow
from November to March.
a. In this period, all the traders from China and the Eastern countries
come down towards the west.
b. They would wait in Singapore before going up the South West
winds to the Western countries.
c. This enables Singapore to become a place for the traders to wait
for the changing of the winds and do business at the same time.

How great is that?

So Singapore becomes the next target of the British. They want Singapore to be
theirs. So, how do they do it? I mean, you can't just take it away. The people
who rule Singapore would get mad. By the way, who did rule Singapore at the
time anyway?
2.

Well, it was Johor. Johor's King had power over Singapore. So how does
the British manage to get hold of Singapore? Well, simply by reigniting an
old conflict. Who is the real ruler of Johor?

3.

You see, long ago, when the King of Johor died, he had two sons,
Tengku Hussein and Tengku Abdul Rahman. Since their names are kind
of long, I'll call them TH and TAR. Well, now that's clear, now for the
story.

So the British went straight into Singapore with all their fleets.
4. A man named Stamford Raffled walked into the office of the guy in
charge, Temenggung Abdul Rahman.
5.

If you were Temenggung Abdul Rahman, and a scary British guy by the
name of Stamford Raffles with his fleet of British army come knocking on

your door, you'd probably be scared out of your wits, as was he.
6.

Being so worried of being attacked by the British, he signed the

agreement straight away saying that SHTI can set up a factory in

Singapore.

How Stamford Raffless initial plan fail ?

Again I say, Temenggung Abdul Rahman is not the big boss, he really has no
right to allow British to do such a thing. Only the King can say so. The King at
that point of time was Sultan Abdul Rahman. He did not acknowledge the
agreement between TAR and Stamford Raffles. So, the initial Raffles plan
failed.

7.

Now, Stamford Raffles was a man of many things, but he certainly wasn't
a quitter. He had sparked up a controversy of Johor. You see, after the
old King of Johor passed away, there were two sons.

8.

Like I said earlier, TH and TAR. TH was the big brother. He was
supposed to become the ruler of Johor. However, he did not attend the
"Upacara Pemakaman" or Burial Ceremony of his father.
a.

Hence, he was cast aside and TAR became King.

Stamford Raffles saw a conflict, he got interested. So, what did he do?
9.

Well, he simply made Tengku Hussein king. When Tengku Hussein was
King, he was so overjoyed that he gave away Singapore in return.
a. His name became Sultan Hussein.
b. When Stamford Raffles had Singapore, he still had to pay some
money to the King.

10.

So a third deal was then signed where an agreement was made where

Singapore goes completely to the British and they get it for free.

NNS
Well, now Pulau Pinang, Seberang Perai and Singapore are under the British.
Who's next? Well, none other than, the one place we've talked so much about in
Form 1, Melaka.

Wait a second, wasn't Melaka under the Dutch at that time? Remember?
Yes, yes it was. Not only that, Belanda also thought that Singapore was
supposed to be theirs. Now two huge Western Civilisations are fighting over
Singapore.
So how does the British make a win-win situation from this
conflict?
1.

Perjanjian Inggeris-Belanda 1824 (Persetiaan London)

a. The British make an agreement with the Dutch whereby the British
will get authority over Singapore and Melaka, and the Dutch get to
take the British island of Riau.
b. This means, all the Northern states of Malaya are officially
seperated from Indonesia, down below.
c. The Dutch are not allowed to conquer places in Malaya and the
British are not allowed to conquer places in Indonesia. That was
the deal. Seems fair enough. The deal was signed.

Now the British don't have to worry about the Dutch coming in. Excellent. They
also got hold of Melaka.

Why SHTI needs to combine Pulau pinang, Seberang Perai and

Singpore in NNS?

Ruling three places at the same time wasn't easy. You need three of everything!
To overcome this issue, the British decided to join all the three together, to form
NNS - Negeri-negeri Selat. This is just a name for the combination of the
three places.
2. There were two main reasons why this was done.
a. To standardise the ruling system and to save cost.
i. By the way, the ruler here is a Governor, known as the
Governor of NNS. This man reports to the General
Governor in India.
b. However, the main headquarters was changed from India to
London. The people at India were not very concerned about NNS.
i. They discarded it and focused on their own country, not
thinking too much about it.
ii. They even used it as a place to get rid of their prisoners.
They just didn't care.
3.

So the Headquarters of NNS was then changed to London.

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