A Foreign Hatamoto: How Adams Became 'Miura Anjin'

In 1605 (Keichō 10), at Edo. Tokugawa Ieyasu granted William Adams a fief of 250 koku at Hemi in the Miura District of Sagami Province (the modern Nishi-Hemi-chō in Yokosuka City, Kanagawa Prefecture).

At the same time he treated him as hatamoto, and permitted the wearing of the two swords.

The birth of the first foreign samurai in Japanese history — 'Miura Anjin.' Adams was forty-one; five years after landing in Japan.

Hatamoto is the class of samurai serving the Tokugawa shogunal house directly; ranked below daimyō.

Two hundred fifty koku is the lower-level hatamoto rank, but granting this position to a foreigner was an unprecedented exception.

Adams took 'Miura' as his surname from the name of his fief, and 'Anjin' derived from the English 'pilot' (the ship's navigator).

He was also given a residence at Nihonbashi in Edo, married the Japanese woman Oyuki, and the foundation of his life as a Japanese was arranged.

Ieyasu made use of Adams as foreign policy adviser. Japanese foreign trade up until around 1600 had been centered on southern-barbarian trade with Spain and Portugal mediated by Jesuit missionaries, but through Adams's presence the road to direct negotiations with the Netherlands and England opened.

The opening of the Dutch factory at Hirado in 1609 and the opening of the English East India Company factory at Hirado in 1613 were not realized without Adams's mediation.

It has the historical significance of adding to Japanese foreign relations the new option of relations with Protestant powers.

Making use of his knowledge of shipbuilding, Adams built Japan's first Western-style sailing ships at Itō in Izu Province (the modern Itō City, Shizuoka Prefecture) on Ieyasu's order.

An 80-ton sailing ship was completed in 1604, and a 120-ton one in 1607. The latter was used to send back Don Rodrigo and other shipwrecked Spaniards for the purpose of trade negotiations with the Spanish territory of Mexico.

A project that became the starting point of Western-style ship construction in the history of Japanese shipbuilding.

When Ieyasu died in 1616, Adams's position changed rapidly. The second shōgun Hidetada was reserved about foreign trade, and the anti-Christian policy was strengthened.

Adams continued to be involved in East India trade from Hirado, but was kept at a distance from the center of the Edo shogunate.

In 1620 he died at Hirado. He was fifty-five. Adams's position, which had depended on personal ties with Ieyasu, ended without being passed on to a successor.

The precedent of the only foreign hatamoto in Japanese history was not repeated through the rest of the Edo period.