Japan/Britain: Navigator William Adams (24 September 1564 - 16 May 1620), known in Japanese as Miura Anjin and the first Englishman to visit Japan, meets Shogun Tokugawa Ieyasu in 1600. Engraving by William Dalton (1821-1875), 1866. Commissioned as a pilot for a Dutch fleet in 1598, William Adams sailed to the East Indies [Indonesia] via Cape Horn in South America, to trade silver for spices in the Moluccas, or obtain silver in Japan as a secondary option. Blighted severely by mutiny, scurvy, starvation and murder, Adams' fleet was much diminished when it reached Kyushu in April 1600.
Commissioned as a pilot for a Dutch fleet in 1598, William Adams sailed to the East Indies [Indonesia] via Cape Horn in South America. The expedition was prior to those of the Dutch and British East India companies, but the objective was similar—to trade their cargo for silver in South America, which was to be exchanged for nutmeg, mace, pepper and cloves in the Moluccas. A secondary option was to obtain silver in Japan. Blighted severely by mutiny, scurvy, starvation and murder, Adams' fleet was much diminished when it reached Kyushu in April 1600. The Portuguese Jesuits did their best to dissuade the shogun from trading with the Dutch, but Ieyasu ignored their pleas and welcomed Adams into the fold, allowing him to trade, and inviting him to work as a naval architect. Adams married a local woman and never returned to Europe. He died in Japan aged 55 in 1620. Fondly remembered in Japan as 'Anjin-sama', Adams was the inspiration for the character of John Blackthorne in James Clavell's bestselling novel 'Shogun'.
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Photo credit: © Pictures From History / Alamy / Afripics
License: Licensed
Model Released: No
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