Anglo-Japanese relations
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This page describes the history of the relationship between the United Kingdom and Japan. This began in 1600 with the arrival of William Adams (Adams the Pilot, Miura Anjin) on the shores of Kyūshū at Usuki in Ōita Prefecture. During the Sakoku period (1641-1853) there were no relations, but the treaty of 1854 saw the resumption of ties which, despite the hiatus of the Second World War, remain very strong in the present day.
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[edit] Chronology of Anglo-Japanese relations (Nichi-Ei kankei 日英関係)
- 1587. Two young Japanese men named Christopher and Cosmas travelled on a Spanish galleon to California, where their ship was seized by Thomas Cavendish. Cavendish brought the two Japanese with him to Great Britain, where they spent around three years, before going again with him on his last expedition to the South Atlantic. They are the first known Japanese to have set foot in England.
- 1600. William Adams, a seaman from Kent, was the first Briton to arrive in Japan. Acting as an advisor to the Tokugawa Shogun, he was renamed Miura Anjin, granted a house and land, and spent the rest of his life in his adopted country.
- 1605. John Davis, the famous English explorer, was killed by Japanese pirates off the coast of Thailand, thus becoming the first Englishman to be killed by a Japanese.[1]
- 1832. Otokichi, Kyukichi and Iwakichi, castaways from Aichi Prefecture, crossed the Pacific and were shipwrecked on the west coast of North America. The three Japanese became famous in the Pacific North West and probably inspired Ranald MacDonald to go to Japan. They joined a trading ship to the UK, and later Macau. One of them, Otokichi, took British citizenship and adopted the name John Matthew Ottoson. He later made two visits to Japan as an interpreter for the Royal Navy.
- 1854. October 14. The first limited Anglo-Japanese Friendship Treaty [1] between the United Kingdom and Japan was signed by Admiral Sir James Stirling and representatives of the Tokugawa shogunate (Bakufu).
- 1858. August 26. The Anglo-Japanese Treaty of Amity and Commerce was signed by Lord Elgin for the United Kingdom and representatives of the Tokugawa shogunate for Japan.
- 1861. July 5. The British legation in Edo was attacked and Laurence Oliphant was wounded.
- 1862. September 14. The Namamugi Incident occurred within a week of the arrival of Ernest Satow in Japan.
- 1863. Bombardment of Kagoshima by the Royal Navy. (Anglo-Satsuma War).
The Chōshū Five go secretly to England.
- 1864. Bombardment of Shimonoseki by the United Kingdom, France, the Netherlands and the USA.
- 1872. The Iwakura mission visited the United Kingdom as part of a diplomatic and investigative tour of the United States and Europe.
- 1873. The Imperial College of Engineering opened with Henry Dyer as principal.
- 1891. The Japan Society of London is founded by Arthur Diosy.
- 1894. The Anglo-Japanese Treaty of Commerce and Navigation [2] abolishing extraterritoriality in Japan for British subjects with effect from July 17, 1899 was signed in London on July 16.
- 1902. The Anglo-Japanese alliance was signed in London on January 30.
- 1905. The alliance was renewed and expanded.
- 1912. The alliance was renewed.
- 1914 Japan joined World War I as the United Kingdom's ally under the terms of the alliance and captured German-occupied Qingdao.
- 1921 Arrival in September of the Sempill Mission in Japan, a British technical mission for the development of Japanese Aeronaval forces.
- 1923 The Anglo-Japanese alliance was officially discontinued on August 17 after U.S. pressure and other factors brought it to a close.
- 1941. Japan enters World War II as an enemy of the British Empire.
- 1951. Treaty of San Francisco - the peace treaty in which Anglo-Japanese relations were normalised. One condition of the treaty was Japan's acceptance of the judgments of the Tokyo War Crimes Tribunal (Article 11).
- 1978 Beginning of the BET scheme (British Exchange Teaching Programme) first advocated by Nicholas Maclean [3]
- 1987 JET (Japan Exchange and Teaching) program starts when the BET scheme and the Fulbright programs are merged.
- 2001 The year-long "Japan 2001" cultural-exchange project saw a major series of Japanese cultural, educational and sporting events held around the UK.
See also the chronology on the British Embassy website in Tokyo.
[edit] Britons in Japan
- William Adams (Miura Anjin)
- Rutherford Alcock, diplomat
- William George Aston, consular official and Japanologist
- William Edward Ayrton, Professor of physics & telegraphy
- Felice Beato - British/Italian photographer
- Isabella Bird - Victorian traveller and author
- John Reddie Black, publisher of newspapers
- Duncan Gordon Boyes - winner of the Victoria Cross at Shimonoseki, 1864
- Richard Henry Brunton, Father of Japanese lighthouses
- Basil Hall Chamberlain, Professor and Japanologist
- Edward Bramwell Clarke, Professor who helped introduce rugby to Japan
- Josiah Conder, architect
- Hugh Cortazzi, scholar and former ambassador
- Archibald Douglas, leader of a naval mission to Japan in the early 1870s
- Henry Dyer, first principal of the Imperial College of Engineering (Kobu Daigakko)
- Lord Elgin, signed the 1858 treaty
- James Alfred Ewing, Professor
- Hugh Fraser, British minister 1889-94
- Thomas Blake Glover, Scottish trader
- Abel Gower, consul
- William Gowland, 1842-1922, Father of Japanese archaeology
- Thomas Lomar Gray, engineering professor
- Arthur Hasketh Groom, creator of the first golf course in Japan
- John Harington Gubbins, diplomat
- Joseph Henry Longford, consul and academic
- Claude Maxwell MacDonald, diplomat
- Ranald MacDonald, the first English teacher in Japan
- John Milne, Professor and Father of Seismology
- Algernon Bertram Mitford (Lord Redesdale), diplomat
- James Main Dixon (1856-1933): Scottish. Former FRSE. Taught Hidesaburo SAITO, one of the first writers of English Grammar, and Natsume Soseki, a famous novelist and ex-university professor, who disliked his style of teaching English literature. After teaching at the Imperial University of Tokyo, he moved to University of South Calfornia.
- James Murdoch - eccentric teacher, journalist, historian
- Laurence Oliphant - Secretary of Legation in 1861
- Henry Spencer Palmer - engineer and Times correspondent
- Harry Smith Parkes, diplomat
- John Perry, colleague of Ayrton at the Imperial College of Engineering, Tokyo
- Charles Lennox Richardson - slain in the Namamugi Incident
- Ernest Mason Satow, diplomat and Japanologist
- Alexander Cameron Sim - founder of Kobe Regatta and Athletic Club, introduced lemonade (ramune) to Japan.
- Admiral Sir James Stirling - signed the 1854 treaty
- Walter Weston, Rev. who publicised the term "Japanese Alps"
- William Willis, Dr.
- Charles Wirgman, editor of Japan Punch
The chronological list of Heads of the United Kingdom Mission in Japan.
[edit] Japanese in the United Kingdom
The family name is given in italics. Usually the family name comes first, but in modern times not so for the likes of Kazuo Ishiguro and Katsuhiko Oku, both well-known in the United Kingdom.
- Aoki Shuzo - diplomat, signed the 1894 treaty in London
- Hayashi Tadasu
- Inagaki Manjiro, Cambridge University graduate and diplomat
- Kazuo Ishiguro
- Iwakura Tomomi - see Iwakura mission especially
- Kikuchi Dairoku, Cambridge University graduate and politician
- Mori Arinori
- Natsume Soseki
- Katsuhiko Oku - Oxford University rugby player, diplomat in Japanese embassy in London who died in Iraq, 2003. Posthumously promoted to ambassador. See also the Oku-Inoue fund for the children of Iraq.
- Okura Kishichiro, entrepreneur
- Hisashi Owada, Cambridge University graduate, father of Princess Masako
- Suematsu Kencho, Cambridge University graduate and statesman
- Tanaka Ginnosuke, Cambridge University graduate, introduced rugby to Japan
- Togo Heihachiro - the Nelson of the East
- Yamao Yozo
[edit] Notes
- ^ Stephen Turnbull, "Fighting ships of the Fra East (2), p 12, Osprey Publishing
[edit] See also
- British Japan Consular Service
- o-yatoi gaikokujin - foreign employees in Meiji era Japan
- Foreign cemeteries in Japan
- Franco-Japanese relations
- German-Japanese relations
- Anglo-Chinese relations
[edit] External links
- A Bibliography of Anglo-Japanese relations - at Cambridge University
- The Asiatic Society of Japan - in Tokyo
- The British Association for Japanese Studies
- The British Consulate - in Nagoya
- The British Consulate-General - in Osaka
- The British Council in Japan - the cultural arm of the British government overseas
- The British Chamber of Commerce in Japan
- The British Embassy - in Tokyo
- The British Trade Promotion Office in Fukuoka (closed June 2005)
- The Cambridge & Oxford Society - founded in Tokyo in 1905
- The Daiwa Anglo-Japanese foundation - in London and Tokyo
- The Embassy of Japan - in London
- The Great Britain Sasakawa foundation - in London and Tokyo
- The Japan Society - founded in London in 1891
- The Japan-British Society - founded in Japan in 1908
- Japan-U.K. Relations at Japan's Ministry of Foreign Affairs Official Website.
[edit] Reference books
- Britain & Japan: Biographical Portraits, Volume V, edited by Hugh Cortazzi, Global Oriental 2004, ISBN 1901903486
- British Envoys in Japan 1859-1972, edited and compiled by Hugh Cortazzi, Global Oriental 2004, ISBN 1901903516
