Samurai William

A few weeks ago I completed another book, this one called Samurai William. This book follows the adventures of William Adams, the first Englishman to set foot in Japan.

Portrait of William Adams

Adams was a crewman on a small fleet of Dutch ships attempting to open trade with the Far East by sailing across the Pacific. The book follows their adventures across the oceans including their encounters with the "11 or 12 foot tall savages" at the southern tip of South America. According the these sailors of the time, the vast majority of the savages appeared to be cannibals.

Adams and a group of nearly dead survivors finally made it to Japan where they landed at a place on the Izu peninsula near present day Shizuoka. They became curiosities at first to shogun Tokugawa Ieyasu. But the shogun quickly realized that Adams, the anjin or pilot, was an intelligent and skilled man.

Shogun Tokugawa Ieyasu

Though not formally educated, his technical and geographic knowledge was substantial. And his ability with languages was to become a key factor in the subsequent history of Japan. William Adams, an English Protestant, eventually became the European translator for the most powerful man in Japan. He gave the Shogun new insights into the world of the Europeans (especially the ongoing war between Protestants and Catholics). Adams was so important to Ieyasu that Ieyasu even awarded him hatamoto status. Adams essentially became the equivalent of a high ranking samurai retainer to the Shogun.

But for Adams, all this was at a cost. Though given lands, honors, and a new family in Japan, the Shogun forbid William Adams from returning home to England. Adams ended up living in Japan for close to 20 years and eventually he died in Japan, never again seeing his family in England.

A couple of years after Adams’ arrival in Japan, other Englishman arrived in order to set up a trading company, which they were able to do. Adams ended up joining the English company in Hirado and the book follows much of the adventures of the company and its members.

It was an interesting book and it revealed an aspect of Japanese history that I had not read about yet, that of some of the first foreigners to visit Japan. One thing about the book, although it is a book about the life of William Adams in Japan, much of the book actually was less about him and more about the English company (factory) and its Chief Factor, Richard Cocks.

The character Blackthorne in James' Clavell's book Shogun is based on William Adams. In August, the town of Shizuoka holds a festival celebrating the event when Adams and his fellow sailors arrived in Japan near Shizuoka.

All in all it was an interesting book though and I learned more about the eventual persecutions of the Christians in Japan.