The Importance of William Adams: The English Samurai

[Music] [Music] throughout the history of medieval japan few foreigners were ever able to embed themselves into japanese society and become significant figures renowned throughout time one such figure was yasuke an african-born warrior who traveled to japan alongside jesuit missionaries where he would later end up becoming a samurai in service to none other than the first great unifier ora nobunaga himself in recent years yasuke has become a very popular figure as his story has begun to spread and take hold of new audiences however yasuke is not the only foreigner who was ever given the prestigious title of samurai another very important figure to arrive in japan during the later years of the sengokujidai was an englishman who too would one day be granted the rank of samurai this man as many of you may already know was william adams adam's story has been told much throughout the years famously through the novel shogun by james clavell which also was made into a popular miniseries but also through various other books documentaries and videos here on youtube yet while there is a romanticism that often gets carried with tales of his exploits being a shipwrecked european stranded on the shores of a strange new world only to later become an integral figure to the ruling samurai regime much of what makes him so significant often gets lost between the pages so what i hope to do here in this video is talk more about the real importance behind william adams and highlight what really makes his time in japan so important for the evolution of the country and before we go any further i also need to mention that this video is made once again with the help of author and professor thomas lockley of nihon university in tokyo previously mr lockley and i worked together to put out a video on the story of yasuke being that lockley co-authored one of the best known books about him titled african samurai the true story of a legendary black warrior in feudal japan which i will leave a link to down in the description however thomas lockley is also an expert on the topic of william adams and is a member of the william adams club which is dedicated to preserving the great mariner's memory he has lent much of his expertise to helping flesh out the information in this video so i want to give a huge thanks to him for being a part of this so with that said let's dive back into the past and talk about the englishman who would become a samurai born in 1564 the life of william adams prior to his coming to japan was one of seafaring at a young age he found himself as an apprentice to a shipbuilder and later even served as a master of supply aboard an english vessel during the 1588 invasion attempt of the spanish armada against england indeed throughout much of his life he found himself at odds against the major forces of iberia who were funded with rivers of precious metals plundered from the americas it is important to remember that both spain and portugal were some of the most powerful forces in europe at this time at first he would face the spanish and later find himself as a pilot aboard a dutch trade vessel named the lifta on a mission to japan via the magellan strait where the dutch who as protestants often found themselves allied to england had been competing with the trade empire that was portugal his expedition would depart in 1598 adams would never see europe again this voyage would prove to be an incredibly perilous one not only were the other vessels accompanying him lost at sea but along the way while making stops along the coast of south america the mission was often met with hostility when dealing with the natives with the situation turning abysmal the surviving ships were forced to depart from south america and make for their original main objective to head for japan where they could acquire goods to trade with in the east indies japan had only been reached by europeans around 60 years prior yet for the past decades it was the portuguese who had really been the main european country to have any presence there portuguese trading hubs dotted all along kyushu as japan had become an integral part of the portuguese trade efforts in the east indies after a long and hard trip across the ocean adam's ship alone finally limped into site of japan by april of 1600 many of his crew by this point were starving severely ill feeble and suffering from scurvy along with other ailments it is even said that not many of them could even stand they had made landfall in bungo province at a place called uzuki in an area under the current rule of the otomo clan and although he and the surviving crew of the lifta were met with relative kindness from the locals it was not long before local samurai forces showed up to inspect the situation with the samurai was a jesuit missionary who could perhaps act as a translator being a jesuit immediately put him at odds with adams who as an english protestant made the two of them natural enemies it is said that the missionary quickly petitioned the samurai to execute adams and his crew claiming them to be pirates although a more devious nature to why he would want to be rid of atoms was likely the case as a larger reason was that the jesuits wanted no protestant presence in japan as they wanted to maintain their monopoly however several factors led to adams being spared being that he and his crew did not attack the local populace but were also very sickly rather the samurai took an interest in these suspicious newcomers and instead of killing them confiscated their ship and belongings detained the crew and sent adams specifically to osaka adams knew that hostile european forces had a presence in japan but he must have been surprised at just how quickly he ran into them but whatever the case his new objective must have been to survive and escape at this point in time osaka castle was home to toyotomi hideyori the sun and heir to the second great unifier toyotomi hideyoshi who had died just two years prior in 1598. the young hideyori was at this time destined to one day assume his father's role atop the country but as you may know there were those who wanted to instead seize power from him leading this opposition was none other than tokugawa yayasu the mightiest daimyo in all of japan ieyasu although putting up a face of support for the child hideori actually had a grand scheme to soon usurp him and become the new ruler of japan and there were a great many reasons why ieyasu wished to do this in many ways he sought as a means to reshape the country forging a more stable and secure nation that would not be influenced by outside powers or also fall back into another period of endless chaotic warfare that japan was just coming out of thus when this outlander adams arrived in osaka ieyasu was quick to begin meeting with him and learning about who he and these strange new foreigners were yayasu took a specific interest in atoms questioning him on a wide range of topics such as politics and technology as well as religion and while we can see that stories often point to yayasu's later interest with adams as a shipbuilder we cannot ignore that ieyasu must have also been interested in what adams had to say about the portuguese and jesuit missionaries who had become so common in japan over the past several decades in fact it is even said that they had misled the japanese into believing that europe was unified under one catholic christian religion adam's presence was highly inconvenient for them it was no secret that many daimyo were becoming leery of western influence specifically that spread through christianity by jesuit missionaries roughly a decade prior toyotomi hidayoshi after seeing the devastation that christian converted samurai and commoners had caused to native institutions all across kyushu forbade his retainers to follow the christian faith but even then by 1597 we also saw how hideyoshi still opposed to christianity had 26 christians both european and japanese tortured and executed in a very public fashion this was due to continued franciscan missionary work which went against hideyoshi's orders among other things iyasu saw adams as an invaluable intelligence asset against the rising influence of the portuguese and jesuits being not only enemies with the portuguese but also a protestant adams was an outside perspective who was able to see through the truth and lies that the catholic portuguese and jesuits had brought with them and used to embed themselves into japanese society and politics over the past decades adams was a key which could be used in ending european meddling in japanese affairs and was something ieyasu was very interested in if his upcoming gamble to seize the country paid off which it did by october it was here at the great battle of sekigahara that tokugawa ieyasu defeated the toyotomi loyalist ishida mitsunari and swept aside most resistance to his authority three years later in 1603 ieyasu would be officially proclaimed the new shogun military leader of all japan victory was his during this time adams and his crew remained in japan under the watchful eyes of the tokugawa clan and it was here adams would be commissioned by ieyasu to help instruct japanese troops on gunnery and other western military tactics later he would even help construct japan's first western style ships it appears his work in service to the tokugawa clan is what finally earned the trust of ieyasu leading to him and adams becoming more cordial as he would even take the place of ieyasu's official interpreter replacing that jesuit padre who had previously occupied that position by 1605 it appears that the remaining survivors of the lifta were allowed to leave japan yet adams himself was denied it is clear adams had a desire to leave japan as well being that he had a wife and two children back home in england yet no matter how hard he tried ieyasu just saw him as too invaluable to simply let leave atoms was one of yayasu's lenses with which he could view and understand the european world and while many stories such as james clavell's shogun paint adams as a shipwrecked prisoner to iayasu who simply wished to escape back home it appears what really happened was instead that adams took to his new life in japan rather well ieyasu did much to make adam's life comfortable in japan granting him various rights giving him a thief to govern over with solid income and many servants with which to attend to him and his land he was even gifted swords by ieyasu and was in time remarried to a highborn woman named oyuki adams would even go on to have two more children with her it was around 1605 that we can see adams finally transition into someone who actually bore the status of samurai when yayasu would officially grant him the title of hatamoto a high-ranking retainer in direct service to iayasu who was allowed audiences with him eventually ieyasu is said to have proclaimed that william adams was officially dead and that he was reborn now as miura anjin miura for the name of his land at the entrance of irobe and anjin in reference to his position as a navigator this sort of also worked to make his previous wife back in england now a widow something which was irrelevant to the japanese and although they were separated and would never see each other again adams apparently tried to send her financial support for the rest of his life taking note of adam's rise the jesuits had previously attempted to sway him over to their side even promising that they could secretly smuggle adams out of japan and back to england yet adams refused adam said groan comfortable with his new life in japan not only feeling fulfilled in his duty to the tokugawa but also finding a genuine respect and admiration for the japanese people in all senses adams himself had become japanese throughout the remainder of adam's life he would become prominent in the establishment of further western trade in japan having reached out to the dutch east india company to invite them to japan and aims to break the portuguese trade monopoly he was later instrumental in bringing an english trade mission to japan as well and would even help richard cox the head of the british east india company finally convinced ieyasu to expel the portuguese jesuits from japan by 1614. it is also important to note that although adams was largely barred from returning home to england he was still sent abroad several times while in service to the shogunate working in service to the tokugawa adams would make up to four trips outside of japan to destinations in the east indies helping establish trade and reporting back on other findings to the shogun himself in 1616 his lord tokugawa ieyasu would finally pass away after a long and legendary life and although the man who had given so much to adams was now gone adams would still remain a respected member of the clan although he would understandably not nearly be as important an asset to iayasu's son and heir tohugawa hiretara who bore his own retinue of retainers adams would die in 1620 at the age of 55 leaving behind an impressive legacy as not only an accomplished man of the sea but also the first european to ever obtain the rank of samurai years later following the massive christian revolt in kyushu that would be remembered as the shimabara rebellion from 1637 to 1638 the tokugawa shogunate would finally decide to expel all portuguese from japanese shores with the dutch now the main trade influence in japan thanks in part to the work of william adams they would continue to be the only real hub of western trade coming into japan through the island of dejima in nagasaki even after the shogunate decided to restrict the borders of japan by 1639 although adams is remembered for a great many reasons one of the most important is that of the effect he personally had on expelling the jesuits and promoting dutch trade his efforts in removing the jesuit missionaries would have a profound effect on japanese religion and religious persecution going forward and were it not for his work in establishing new western trade partners the dutch may have never been allowed to remain in japan following the expulsion of the portuguese through all of this adams has become one of the most significant figures in japanese history and one of the most fascinating ones in all of world history and the evolution of trade in east asia today he is continually remembered through a variety of stories and media as i mentioned several times adams is the main focus of james clavell's shogun a fictional retelling of his coming to japan where adams is instead renamed to john blackthorne adams is also the main character of the popular action role-playing game neo which came out in 2017 you could even go so far as to say that tom cruise's character nathan algren in the last samurai draws influences from william adams especially when it comes to his relationship towards ieyasu which is sort of mirrored by cruz's relationship towards ken watanabe's character of katsumoto even though the character algrin is more heavily based on another significant foreign figure but even then through these and other stories the legacy of william adams continues to live on in fact adams continues to make headlines even up to this day as his actual remains were recently identified within the last several years thanks to advancements in science regarding genetic sequencing which were able to link to dna believed to be his similar to the story of yasuke the african samurai the important story of william adams and the impact he had on history is far from over once again i want to thank thomas lockley for helping put together this video please check out his amazing book about the real historical african samurai yasuke which you can find a link to down in the description but with that said thank you for watching and don't forget to like subscribe and ring that notification bell if you enjoyed this video and found it to be most informative

Channel: The Shogunate

Views: 145,172

Keywords: Samurai, Japan, History, Education, William Adams, foreigner, Tokugawa, Clan, Sengoku, Bushido, Honor, Katana, Portugal, England, Medieval, Exploration, discovery

Id: 9R6w1VTVafE

Length: 17min 1sec (1021 seconds)

Published: Fri Jul 09 2021