Anjin - The Life & Times of Samurai William Adams, 1564-1620: As Seen Through Japanese Eyes

by Hiromi T. Rogers

The year is 1600. It is April and Japan’s iconic cherry trees are in full flower. A battered ship drifts on the tide into Usuki Bay in southern Japan. On board, barely able to stand, are twenty-three Dutchmen and one Englishman, the remnants of a fleet of five ships and 500 men that had set out from Rotterdam in 1598. The Englishman was William Adams, later to be known as Anjin Miura by the Japanese, whose subsequent transformation from wretched prisoner to one of the Shogun’s closest advisers is the centrepiece of this book. As a native of Japan, and a scholar of seventeenth-century Japanese history, the author delves deep into the cultural context facing Adams in what is one of the great examples of assimilation into the highest reaches of a foreign culture. Her access to Japanese sources, including contemporary accounts – some not previously seen by Western scholars researching the subject – offers us a fuller understanding of the life lived by William Adams as a high-ranking samurai and his grandstand view of the collision of cultures that led to Japan’s self-imposed isolation, lasting over two centuries. This is a highly readable account of Adams’ voyage to and twenty years in Japan and that is supported by detailed observations of Japanese culture and society at this time. New light is shed on Adams’ relations with the Dutch and his countrymen, including the disastrous relationship with Captain John Saris, the key role likely to have been played by the munitions, including cannon, removed from Adams’ ship De Liefde in the great battle of Sekigahara (September 1600), the shipbuilding skills that enabled Japan to advance its international maritime ambitions, as well as the scientific and technical support Adams was able to provide in the refining process of Japan’s gold and silver.

Genres: History, Nonfiction, Japan, Asia

337 pages, Kindle Edition

Published August 1, 2016

About the author

SHOGUN... The Real Thing !
James Clavell was right ! The story of the blue-eyed samurai is extraordinary and, after seven years of research, I can say every bit as extraordinary in reality as it was in Clavella's fictional account. So, for Pilot-Major Blackthom red William Adams or Miura Anjin to give him his samurai name. He emerge as something of a hero for our times, a securer of trade deals, resourceful, ambitious, adaptable, respecting other cultures and customs.
This is my first book and, if not completely surprised, I have certainly been overwhelmed by the response from readers The uniformly 5 star reviews in Amazon uk give some indication of how this "gem of a story" has touched people. I'm not surprised because Adams packed more extreme and exotic experiences into his life than most adventurers and in a particularly turbulent period of world history. It is also self evident that, without access to the extensive Japanese sources, Western authors have not been able to tell the full story. Combining the Japanese and Western narratives, as I have done, is long overdue for what is essentially a Japanese story.
My interest in this compelling story extends unashamedly beyond the big historical themes of that period. It is my special hope that my knowledge of Japanese culture and customs in those days has enabled me to flesh out the story by picturing what it must have been like, from the clothes people wore to the food they ate, from the tidy houses and streets to their hairstyles, as well as the great castles, the battles, the executions. It has enabled me to explain some of the local behaviour Adams had to adopt, from never saying " Thank you" to any of his ninety servants, to the correct use of the miniature towel in a public bath. I have sought to reveal a little more of Adams the man. Alongside his involvement in the great affairs of state, I have been able to describe his domestic life, his love of hot-spring bathing under the stars, the real nature of his 'marriage' to Yuki and his relationships with other women.
Adams revealed very little about himself, but much can be gleaned from the accounts, official or otherwise, of the people around him-those he impressed and those he did not.
For those intrigued to know a little more about a Japanese author writing in English about an Englishman more celebrated in her own country than in his own....I was born....

Reviews

[Marquise · Rating 5 out of 5]

This! This is The Biography of William Adams you need to read.

Because author Hiromi T. Rogers isn't only Japanese herself and so knowledgeable about the culture he lived in but also because she was able to read the sources in Japanese other historians, such as Giles Milton, didn't or weren't able to due to the language barrier. Also, as she's married to a British diplomat and has lived in the UK, she has also researched "the other side" on Adams. Thus, her account is the most complete and most thorough you'll ever get.

If you, like me, liked James Clavell's novel Shogun and are enjoying the FX show with the same title, then chances are you're already fascinated by the real person that inspired the character of John Blacthorne and wonder what is fictional and what is real beyond the generalities you might've read online (there's a lot of posts and articles about the history and the person these days due to the popularity of the show, and not everything is reliable or even correct), then you can't do any better than find this book and ready yourself for a thorough and in-depth history of the man, William Adams in England and Miura Anjin in Japan, the first and only foreigner to have been made a hatamoto or lord in Japan and carry the ceremonial swords of a samurai. A high honour indeed!

And how did a mariner from Gillingham in Kent end up ennobled by Shogun Ieyasu half a world away? The answer is both simple and complex: his knowledge of sailing and shipping were essential to the Tokugawa ruler. As he put it bluntly to Adams himself: he could replace his whining courtiers and lords with other courtiers and lords, but he couldn't replace the Englishman. And Adams was indeed very useful, there's things he did for Ieyasu that helped him to and in the throne of Shogun that I hadn't heard before because our Western historians didn't tell but that Japanese historians apparently already knew. I also learnt more about Adams' personal life that I was unaware of, such as his romantic relationships (I no longer view the complaints about Mariko in the novel the same way now that I know what I know), and his fractious relationship with the East India Company, which wasn't as smooth as I had thought from Giles and other historians.

A great biography, I recommend it with no reservations. I've seen some complaints about the quality of the maps, which has some truth to it: they're not the best but they're not terrible, and in any case, it's the actual history what I was looking for, so maps aren't relevant for me personally and I think won't be for most readers either.

(P.S. - My first 5 star read from 2024, people! Phew. Will have to deem "Shogun" my good luck charm from now on, do you think?)

[Lucky · Rating 4 out of 5]

I would give 4.5 stars, but for reasons below, I shall have to settle at four.
Hiromi is the wife of a British diplomat and has travelled extensively to research this book which has provided  a number of wonderful insights,  even given the bias towards the English as a text.
The book is basically the rather extraordinary life of the hatamoto William Adams,  1564 - 1620,  written by someone who is finally familiar with the culture this tale takes place in.
An example being the explanation of how Adams was given his hatamoto title,  how cannons from the Liefde came to be used by a foreign ruler and ties up other loose ends in the list of works on Adams.
The book provides a thorough 'western scholars' approach to all countries involved which bizarrely often leaves out Japanese source material,  which material is not lacking to a Japanese audience,  but the majority of Japans book on the 'Blue eyed samurai' are unavailable in English,  omitting a great portion of the literature,  and highlights the failings of the 'western scholars' in that regard.
And the conjecture whilst rather mythology than commentary is more grounded than the works of many before on the same man,  providing more cultural understandings and bridges than any prior work attempted.
This book is also to my knowledge the most up to date publication with a great deal more about Adams than Miltons book for instance,  another decent baseline level read on the topic is  https://archive.org/details/in.ernet.....
Yet it feels like it in need of a revised second edition,  preferably in hardback as mine is very dog-eared by now.
My points of contention being :-
 - The maps are limited and some scenes like the explanation of Sekigahara while clear to me to follow,  may be more easily followed with a diagram or so on.
- The Index has been noted to be incomplete,  where for example the Dutch merchant Saantvoort is said to appear thrice,  he appears around 15 odd times in the text.
- Another review of the book notes the lack of distinction between the Franciscans and Jesuits,  which in fairness is a rather historian complaint as the average reader will gloss over that tidbit.

[lyssa c · Rating 5 out of 5]

Regardless of the unfinished index and sources, Rogers merits in understanding the difference between non-traditional, or non-Western, and Western approaches to recounting and researching the life of Samurai William Adams on her afterword. Good read and imaginative

[Chris Wells · Rating 1 out of 5]

Highly misleading particularly about the battle of Sekigahara.
No historians have recorded the possibility of Adams and the canons being in position and used at this historically critical event and to suggest Adams was there against all evidence has set distracting fantasy hares running.