Otokichi Yamamoto, the Castaway

2016/12/12

Fukuzawa Yukichi set out on his second overseas voyage as an interpreter (tsuji) for the mission dispatched by the Shogunate to negotiate the postponement of the opening of ports. It was in January 1862 (Bunkyu 2) by the lunar calendar that the British warship HMS Odin, carrying the mission, dropped anchor in Singapore via Hong Kong. According to Fukuzawa's "Seikoki" (Diary of a Voyage to the West), he "landed for the first time, took a carriage to an inn, and returned to the ship at night," following the three envoys (the chief envoy, vice-envoy, and censor) to a hotel. While the mission was resting at the hotel, a Japanese man suddenly requested a meeting. The man introduced himself as Otokichi.

In "Seikoki," following the sentence "Met a Japanese castaway named Otokichi at the inn," Fukuzawa recorded Otokichi's remarkable history. Let us look at Otokichi's life, just as Fukuzawa and his companions did.

Otokichi was a sailor from Onoura Village, Chita District, Owari Province (Aichi Prefecture). In 1832 (Tenpo 3), when Otokichi was 14, he boarded the Hojunmaru, which set sail from Toba Port for Edo with a large cargo, but the ship was wrecked by strong winds and high waves. The Hojunmaru drifted for 14 months before finally crossing the Pacific Ocean and washing ashore on the eastern coast of America. Three young crew members—Otokichi, Iwakichi, and Kyukichi—miraculously survived. John McLoughlin, the Chief Factor of the Hudson's Bay Company on the Pacific coast, heard the rumors and took in the three survivors, who had been protected by Native Americans. He sent them to London via the Sandwich Islands (Hawaiian Islands) and Cape Horn (the southern tip of South America). McLoughlin intended to use their repatriation to initiate trade between Britain and Japan, which was then under national isolation. During their 10-day stay in London, Otokichi and the others were forced to live on a ship on the Thames, but were allowed to go ashore for only one day to walk the streets of London. Thus, the three became the first Japanese to set foot on London soil, preceding Fukuzawa and the mission to Europe.

Afterward, the three boarded a ship again, this time rounding the Cape of Good Hope (the southern tip of Africa) toward Macau. At the time, Macau was the only port city in China (Qing Dynasty) with a European settlement. Upon arriving in Macau, the three were placed in the care of Charles Gutzlaff, a Chinese interpreter and Christian missionary, and assisted him with the Japanese translation of the Bible, a project Gutzlaff undertook to spread Christianity in Japan.

In 1837 (Tenpo 8), when the American merchant ship Morrison, carrying Otokichi and the others, entered Edo Bay, the Uraga Magistrate fired upon the unarmed ship based on the Edict to Repel Foreign Vessels (the Morrison Incident). The Morrison, which was also fired upon at its next port of call, Kagoshima, returned to Macau without allowing the castaways to land in Japan. Consequently, Otokichi gave up on returning to Japan and began his life as an immigrant.

Otokichi moved to Shanghai and, while working for the British firm Dent & Co., started a family with his wife, who was the child of British immigrants, and their three children. Otokichi achieved commercial success in Shanghai, but "having recently fallen ill, for the sake of his health" ("Seikoki"), he moved to Singapore, his wife's birthplace. This was only about 10 days before the arrival of the mission to Europe. (Reference: "Nippon Otokichi Hyoryuki" by Toru Haruna, "Kairei" by Ayako Miura)

While listening to Otokichi's story, Fukuzawa realized something. "As I observed his countenance closely, he seemed like someone I had seen before" ("Seikoki"). In response to Fukuzawa's question, Otokichi replied that he had been to Nagasaki nine years earlier on a British warship.

After the Morrison Incident, Otokichi visited Japan twice. The first time was when he arrived in Uraga and Shimoda as a Chinese interpreter named "Lin Atu" aboard the British warship HMS Mariner. The second time was in the intercalary seventh month of 1854 (Kaei 7 / Ansei 1), when he landed in Nagasaki as an interpreter for the British Far East Fleet. By the time of the Nagasaki arrival, the Convention of Kanagawa had already been signed between the Shogunate and Commodore Perry of the United States, and Japan was beginning to open its doors. Therefore, Otokichi no longer hid his identity and attended the meeting between the British commander and the Nagasaki Magistrate as an interpreter.

Meanwhile, it was in February of the same year that Fukuzawa had headed from Nakatsu to Nagasaki to study Dutch at the suggestion of his older brother, Sannosuke. Rumors of the British fleet's arrival in Nagasaki and the interpreter Otokichi likely spread throughout the city. Crowds of onlookers rushed to catch a glimpse of the British mission and Otokichi as they landed for negotiations. And among them was Fukuzawa.

At that time, the officials in Nagasaki tried to take Otokichi back as a Japanese citizen, but Otokichi refused the offer, saying he could not abandon his wife and children in Shanghai. Rejecting his only opportunity to return home since his shipwreck, Otokichi returned to Shanghai.

Nine years later in Singapore, Fukuzawa recalled Otokichi's appearance, which he had seen in Nagasaki, while standing before the man himself.

During his meeting with the mission, Otokichi spoke in detail about the chaos he had witnessed in China while in Shanghai, and Fukuzawa recorded it meticulously. This was the state of the Taiping Rebellion (Rebellion of the Long-Haired Rebels), a large-scale uprising by Christian believers. From Otokichi's mouth came descriptions of the British and French forces, possessing overwhelming military power, watching the war situation to seize any opportunity to subvert China without siding with either the Qing army or the rebels, and the people tossed about in the midst of the civil war. Fukuzawa likely felt a growing sense of crisis, seeing Otokichi's reliable and accurate descriptions as something that could happen to Japan in the near future. In his "Seikōki" (Record of a Voyage to the West), Fukuzawa left an exhaustive record of what he saw himself during his travels abroad, but it is rare for him to devote so much space to stories heard from others.

In Hong Kong as well, Fukuzawa had been shocked by the attitude of a British man who forcefully drove away a Chinese man trying to sell shoes. The observations gained in these two Asian port towns, which had become British colonies, combined with the overwhelming power of Western civilization he would later realize while traveling through Europe, must have influenced Fukuzawa's philosophy that civilization must first be advanced in order to maintain Japan's independence.

Sugi Magoshichiro, a samurai of the Choshu Domain who joined the mission as a servant, left a Chinese poem filled with emotion about his meeting with Otokichi: "Meeting a castaway in a foreign land / Talking together, tears fall like rain / How could he not long for home / After thirty years of hardship" ("Kankai Shishi"). It is unknown whether Fukuzawa wept upon hearing of Otokichi's life, but what can be read from "Seikōki" is Fukuzawa's attitude of trying to accurately record what he heard from Otokichi without missing a single detail. This was perhaps an attitude of recognizing Otokichi—who had been liberated from Japan's class system and had quickly become a global citizen—as an independent individual and seeking to learn much from him. On the other hand, it feels as though Otokichi visited the mission not to plead for a return to Japan, but out of a desire to use his own observations from seeing the world early on to help the delegation of his motherland, which was finally about to open its doors to the world.

The mission departed Singapore after only one night and headed for Paris via Cairo. Upon arriving in Paris, the mission received a visit from a new and unusual guest: a young man named Léon de Rosny, who had been appointed by the French government as an interpreter and liaison officer for the mission. Rosny was a great Japanophile who had taught himself Japanese and lived a Japanese-style lifestyle. Fukuzawa deepened his friendship with Rosny and was able to absorb much about "Things Western (Seiyō Jijō)" through conversations with him and his guidance. When Rosny was a student at the School of Oriental Languages, he had used the Gützlaff translation of the "Gospel of John" and the "First, Second, and Third Epistles of John" for his Japanese studies—the first Japanese translation of the Bible, which Otokichi had helped create. Part of this Bible, which begins with the unique Japanese translation "In the beginning was the Wise One," was published in Singapore in 1837, but it never reached Japan, the country that needed it most. However, Rosny had published a portion of it in Paris as "The Gospel of John and the Epistles of John" for his Japanese language research.

The mission to Europe returned home after fulfilling its mission of obtaining agreement from various European countries to postpone the opening of ports. However, the observation of the situation in Europe, which could be called their second mission, ended without being utilized in subsequent shogunate administration. During the year the mission was traveling around Europe, the Namamugi Incident occurred within Japan, and the day after their return, an arson attack on the British Legation by Takasugi Shinsaku and others from Choshu took place; the wave of anti-foreign sentiment had reached its peak. For this reason, people even hesitated to speak of what they had seen and heard in Europe. As a result, Otokichi's existence in Singapore remained only in the private records of the attendants.

It was not until the 1960s that an investigation by the Japan Bible Society revealed the existence of the three men, including Otokichi, who helped create the first Japanese translation of the Bible, and that they were sailors from Onoura, Aichi Prefecture. At the local Ryosen-ji Temple, there is a tombstone engraved with the names of 14 people, including Otokichi and others who were shipwrecked on the Hojun-maru, and the date of death was recorded as the day after they departed from Toba. In this way, Otokichi's turbulent life—from naturalizing as a British citizen in Singapore until his life came to a close in 1867—became known.

Furthermore, through the activities of the Otokichi Memorial Society established in his hometown, Otokichi's burial site in Singapore was found, and in 2005, Otokichi's remains were returned to Japan for the first time in 173 years and buried at the Ryosen-ji tombstone. In 1961, the "Monument in Honor of Iwakichi, Kyukichi, and Otokichi" was erected in a location overlooking the beach of Onoura. In October 2016, the 55th Memorial Ceremony for Contributors to the Japanese Translation of the Bible was held, and the author gave a lecture titled "Yamamoto Otokichi and Fukuzawa Yukichi" in front of the monument.