The Imjin War: Japan's Sixteenth-Century Invasion of Korea and Attempt to Conquer China

by Samuel Hawley

  The farce finally came to an abrupt and almost comic end at a banquet Hideyoshi hosted the following day. The taiko appeared resplendent in his new Chinese crown and robes, the garb of a vassal king presented to him by the envoys. Some forty of his daimyo, including Konishi Yukinaga, were arrayed before him in similarly colorful scholarly robes, the large crest on the front of each indicating the court rank Beijing had granted to them. Sitting opposite were the Ming envoys, Yang and Shen, backed by members of their delegation. The Korean envoy, Hwang Sin, was once again barred from the proceedings and forced to wait outside. The affair proceeded amiably enough, with toasts and smiles and entertainments. Hideyoshi then retired to a summer house on the palace grounds and summoned his attending priests, including Saisho Shotai, an expert on written Chinese, to translate the weighty documents from the Wanli emperor into words he could understand.

  This was the moment of truth Konishi Yukinaga had for so long feared. He previously had urged Saisho to soften any language in the documents likely to offend the taiko. Whatever Saisho’s response may have been to Konishi, when the time came to translate he was scrupulously honest. What followed must surely rank as one of the greatest diplomatic blunders of all time; the thunderous bursting of a bubble of misunderstanding that had been allowed to grow for the past three years.

  “You, Toyotomi Hideyoshi,” the priest intoned,

  have risen in the island country and have learned how to revere Chung Kuo [China]. You have sent an envoy to the West in order to express your admiration of us and your devotion to us.... Your reverence and obeisance have been sincerely expressed.... With our special grace, we hereby invest you as “King of Japan.” The imperial patent of this investiture is hereby conferred upon you. You are now in our imperial favor; our imperial coronet and robes are herewith sent over the sea to you.... You, Hideyoshi, are hereby instructed to comply with our commands and to stand ready to fulfill your obligations to our throne as a loyal subject. You are also instructed reverently to conform with the imperial desire and to maintain your everlasting existence by following the imperial guidance and by cheerfully obeying our imperial commands![586]

  The priest then took up the second document, the imperial edict. It began by reprimanding Hideyoshi for his aggression in Korea, “a nation that has strictly adhered to her tributary duties and obligations to our throne.” The Ming now understood, however, that Hideyoshi had done so because he wanted to become a vassal of China, and felt that Korea was preventing him from conveying his petition. But “[n]ow that you have realized with regret how serious was your error,” the document continued, “you have withdrawn your troops” and have “reverently prepared in written form your former petition and have presented it to our court.” Beijing therefore was prepared to grant his request and accept him as a vassal. The honor was granted, however, with limitations. First, Hideyoshi must withdraw the last of his forces from Korea; “not a single Japanese shall be permitted to remain.” Second, he must promise never to invade that country again. And third, he and his successors must agree never to seek the trade privileges with China that were normally due a tributary state. If Hideyoshi ignored this final ruling and attempted to send ships uninvited, “our coast guards may fail to differentiate between a jewel and a stone and may mistake tribute-bearing ships from Japan for pirate vessels,” and so destroy them. “You shall not deviate from our instructions,” the edict concluded, “but you shall reverently obey and adhere to our imperial command.”[587]

  Almost every line in these two documents was a slap in Hideyoshi’s face. He had dispatched his armies overseas not to submit to the Ming, but to conquer them. While this lofty objective had proved beyond his reach, he nevertheless expected to come away from the invasion of Korea with something to show for his efforts, a portion of that peninsula perhaps, a handful of important hostages, a princess from Beijing, something he could use to aggrandize his name and make the war seem worthwhile. But this arrogantly worded patent of investiture and condescending edict—this was nothing but an insult designed to humiliate him, a written assertion that he had lost the war. In a towering rage, he tore off his Chinese robes and threw his crown to the floor. According to Luis Frois, the taiko “flew into such a Passion and Rage, that he was perfectly out of himself. He froth’d and foam’d at the Mouth, he ranted and tore till his Head smoak’d like Fire, and his Body was all over in a dropping Sweat.”[588]

  Hideyoshi’s initial reaction was by all accounts so extreme that for a moment the very lives of the Chinese and Korean envoys were in danger. The monks present at the reading of the investiture documents managed to calm him somewhat by pointing out that China was the fount of the world’s civilization and learning and that it had been customary since ancient times for neighboring states to receive investiture from it, just as the taiko had himself now done. Indeed, they said, Hideyoshi had received a great honor with this investiture, for it was an indication that China recognized his greatness and achievements. While these words of flattery succeeded in taking the edge off the taiko’s rage, he remained very angry, and sent out word to the foreign emissaries that they were to leave Japan at once, and that he would give them no reply to deliver to Beijing. Ming envoy Yang Fangheng and his Korean counterpart Hwang Sin accordingly gathered up their delegations and immediately departed.

  Hideyoshi’s wrath next turned on those daimyo he considered responsible for orchestrating the whole embarrassing affair. Konishi Yukinaga was in the greatest peril, for he had been at the forefront of negotiations with the Chinese. It was only thanks to the intercession of members of Hideyoshi’s inner circle, including his concubine Yodogimi, that Konishi was not now ordered to take his own life. Hideyoshi was reminded that, although Konishi had assumed the most active role in negotiations, other daimyo bore equal responsibility for the outcome, in particular Otani Yoshitsugu, Mashita Nagamori, and Ishida Mitsunari, the three men appointed together with Konishi as the taiko’s personal representatives. If Konishi were to be punished, others therefore would have to be punished as well.[589] The duplicity of the Chinese may also have been pointed to as having unwittingly led Konishi astray. In the end Hideyoshi merely removed Otani, Mashita, and Ishida from their posts and ordered Konishi to return to Korea with his army, where after a few months in the taiko’s bad graces he was forgiven and his reputation restored.

  It took the Ming envoys a full month to get clear of Japan. First they had to travel hundreds of kilometers back to Nagoya on the island of Kyushu, then they were forced to wait on into November for the weather to turn favorable enough to attempt the sea crossing to Pusan. During this time Hideyoshi, either on his own or due to the persuasion of others, came to accept that there was little to be gained by sending the envoys away in such a brusque manner and resuming his quarrel with China. A messenger was therefore sent after the retreating delegation bearing presents and a note from Hideyoshi stating that he had no argument with Beijing. While he regarded the offer of investiture as an insult, the document read, “I intend to put up with it.” What Hideyoshi would not put up with was peace with Korea. For years the Koreans had prevented Japan from establishing good relations with China, he claimed. They were in fact wholly to blame for the war. And now, after Hideyoshi had magnanimously released the two Korean princes, the Seoul government had refused to send them to him to express their thanks as he had requested, but instead insulted him by dispatching a lowly official. This he would not accept. To seek redress from the Koreans for the harm they had done and the insults delivered, Hideyoshi was once again gathering his armies to reinvade their land.[590]

  Korean envoy Hwang Sin was by this time in the depths of despair. The threat of a second invasion does not seem to have bothered him as much as his inability to deliver King Sonjo’s letter to Hideyoshi and thus complete his mission. At a meeting at their joint camp in Nagoya, Hwang poured out his heart to Ming envoy Yang Fangheng, saying that it would be better for him to die than to return to Seoul with the king’s letter still i
n hand. Yang tried to calm the distraught official, urging him to return to Korea with the Chinese as soon as the weather permitted. “Hideyoshi would not accept your letter,” Yang reasoned. “So if you return to your country and give it back to your king, there should be no trouble. It is only natural that you should do this.” Hwang replied that this was easy for Yang to say, for he had successfully delivered his documents and thus could not be accused of failing to do his duty. “But I did not receive any sign of submission from Hideyoshi,” Yang countered. “So in fact I have been no more successful than you.”[591]

  In the end Hwang took Yang’s advice and returned to Korea with the Ming delegation. As expected, he fell in for a good deal of criticism in Seoul for his failure to deliver the king’s letter, and was demoted as punishment. For many, however, both the failure of Hwang’s mission and Hideyoshi’s rude behavior toward the Chinese and Korean envoys merely confirmed what they knew all along: that Hideyoshi should never have been trusted and that it had been a mistake to try to negotiate with him. It was in fact generally believed by the Koreans that the past three years of negotiation had been merely a ploy by the Japanese to get the Chinese army out of Korea so that they could launch a second attack. It was even suggested that Hideyoshi’s insulting treatment of the Chinese envoys was a cunning strategy to anger the Ming emperor into precipitously sending an invasion fleet against Japan that the Japanese could ambush and destroy. King Sonjo himself was of this opinion—he had sent an envoy to Japan only because the Chinese had pressured him to do so—and thus was not surprised or sorry about the failure of Hwang’s mission. He summoned the harried envoy to an audience where he was thanked for his efforts and rewarded with gifts.[592]

  * * *

  Envoy Yang Fangheng and Vice-Envoy Shen Weijing attempted to depict their mission as successful upon their return to Beijing. Toyotomi Hideyoshi, they declared, had accepted investiture with appropriate humility and thanks. Their story did not hold up for long. The absence of any sort of official letter from Hideyoshi, only tribute presents that subsequently were proved to have been purchased by the envoys themselves, put their account in serious doubt. Intelligence from sources in Korea, followed by a request from King Sonjo for military support to resist a second Japanese invasion, entirely discredited the two men.

  The whole story of the mission when it came out was regarded by all as a national disgrace. Any talk of peace with Japan was now anathema. The barbarian Hideyoshi’s unprecedented rejection of the honor of vassalage was considered an affront of such magnitude that the only possible response was to raise a second army and drive him into the sea. This shift in sentiment spelled doom for those who had formerly been most prominently in support of peace. Envoy Yang confessed all and was summarily dismissed from office. Vice-Envoy Shen Weijing continued to assert until the bitter end that the whole botched affair was a misunderstanding and that peace still could be restored. He hurried back to Korea to sort things out, and then allegedly attempted to defect to the Japanese side when events began to turn against him. He would be arrested and sent back to Beijing before he could make good his escape, and was subsequently executed for treason. His wife and children were sold into slavery to further expunge his sin.[593]

  As for Minister of War Shi Xing, the most prominent supporter of peace negotiations since 1593 and the man who had entrusted Shen with the task to such disastrous effect, the initial feeling was that he should be sentenced only to exile. At this juncture the Wanli emperor overcame his usual inertia to issue an edict demanding something more severe:

  During the entire period of peace negotiations with the outside barbarian nation Japan, Shi Xing deceived his lord and disgraced his state. You, State Ministers, in the trial of his case, must adhere strictly to your duty and enforce the laws of the nation. In fact, Shi has committed high treason against both the nation and the throne.... We should consider it disloyal to the throne if you should have sympathy for your former comrade and friend.[594]

  Any thoughts of mercy were thus cast aside, and Shi Xing was sentenced to death. The former minister of war died in prison before the sentence could be carried out, reportedly of starvation. His family and relations were exiled to a distant border province to live out their lives.

  * * *

  On October 20, 1596, the Spanish galleon San Felipe, bound from Manila to Acapulco with a cargo of Asian goods officially valued at one and a half million silver pesos but probably worth a good deal more, was driven ashore by foul weather onto the Japanese island of Shikoku. The local authorities were initially friendly, but would not allow the Spaniards to repair their vessel and leave without first receiving permission from the taiko. The Spaniards accordingly sent representatives to Kyoto with gifts to appeal to Hideyoshi for the release of their ship and its cargo. When they arrived in the capital, just days after the Ming envoys had been sent packing, Hideyoshi would not see them. The Franciscan priests previously sent to Kyoto from Manila by Governor Gomez Perez Dasmarinas to smooth relations with Japan also worked strenuously to secure the ship’s release, but to no avail.

  The reason for Hideyoshi’s recalcitrance was that he had decided to keep the San Felipe’s valuable cargo, first to reconstruct his earthquake-shattered castle at Fushimi and second to help fund his planned reinvasion of Korea. He thus sent his representative Mashita Nagamori south to Shikoku to seize the vessel and imprison its passengers and crew. It was a heavy financial blow for the Spanish in Manila, for their livelihood depended on the annual galleon carrying Oriental silks and ceramics and spices to Mexico to be sold for silver coins. And more was to come. On December 8 the Kyoto residence of the Spanish Franciscans was surrounded and six priests and several Japanese converts taken prisoner. One month later they were sentenced to death. “Inasmuch as these men came from the Luzones,” read Hideyoshi’s edict, “from the island of Manila, in the capacity of ambassadors, and were allowed to remain in the city of Miaco [Kyoto], preaching the Christian religion, which in former years I have strictly forbidden: I order that they be executed together with the Japanese who embraced their religion.”[595]

  Hideyoshi’s reasons for issuing this edict remain a matter for speculation. According to the most straightforward account, when Mashita Nagamori arrived on Shikoku to take possession of the San Felipe, the ship’s pilot showed him a map of the far-flung possessions of King Philip II, presumably to impress on him that Spain was a major power and not to be trifled with. How had Spain managed to conquer so many lands? Mashita asked. The pilot’s reply was horribly ill-judged. First the priests go in, he said, and convert the people to their religion. Then the soldiers follow and subdue them. This assertion of Christian missionaries serving as a fifth column, preparing foreign lands for conquest from within, confirmed what for the Japanese was a longstanding suspicion and prompted Hideyoshi to act. He initially intended to launch a wholesale pogrom and execute everyone professing the faith, but was eventually persuaded to confine his edict to the newly arrived Franciscans in Kyoto, excluding the Jesuits mainly because they were essential intermediaries in the trade with Macao.

  The Jesuits would later claim that the Franciscans brought this trouble on themselves with their strident, impolitic behavior. There seems to be some truth in this. The Jesuits, having been active in Japan since 1549, were more familiar with the country and its ways. They possessed excellent linguistic skills, which allowed them clearer communication and understanding and, thanks to their focus on the upper classes (they reasoned that if they converted the elite the poor would naturally follow), ties with powerful daimyo that they were able to use to their advantage. The Franciscans, on the other hand, were newcomers to Japan. They did not know much about the language and society and, ministering mainly to the lower classes, had few influential Japanese friends. They were not willing to take the advice of the more seasoned Jesuits, however, particularly the suggestion that they be cautious in their work. They insisted on going about in their distinctive Franciscan cassocks and proselytizin
g in open defiance of Hideyoshi’s 1587 anti-Christian edict, and they scoffed at the Jesuits for their circumspection and for disguising themselves in Buddhist robes. It was through this reckless behavior, the Jesuits claimed, that the Franciscans sealed their fate.

  The Franciscans for their part would attribute the coming tragedy to a Jesuitical plot to drive them out of Japan. There may be some truth in this as well, for a fierce rivalry existed between the Jesuits and Franciscans, a rivalry that was national as well as sectarian, the Jesuits hailing mainly from Portugal and the Franciscans from Spain. Portugal at this time was a part of the Spanish Empire, but resented its subsidiary role and continued to regard Spain as an overseas trading rival. The Jesuits especially were tied up in this mercantile tug-of-war, serving as intermediaries in the Black Ship trade between Nagasaki and Portuguese Macao, and were not eager to see trade links develop between Japan and Spanish Manila. This, coupled with disagreements over missionary practice and proprietary rights, ensured that relations between the two sects were less than cordial, and may have led the Jesuits to make anti-Franciscan statements to important Japanese friends. The Japanese, meanwhile, were only too glad to fuel the rivalry between the two orders and in turn between Portugal and Spain, for from greater foreign rivalry came better opportunities for trade.[596]

  The road to execution for the twenty-six condemned Christians—six Franciscan priests, seventeen local converts, and three Japanese Jesuit lay brothers included by mistake—began with the slitting of their noses and ears, and a ride on oxcarts through the streets of Kyoto, Osaka, and Sakai to expose them to public ridicule. They were then transported southwest to the port of Nagasaki on the island of Kyushu, the main entrepôt for Japanese commerce with the outside world. Here, on February 5, 1597, they were affixed to crosses with iron staples at their throats, wrists, and ankles, and slowly tormented to death. Their bodies were left hanging there for many weeks, until only the bones remained. These were spirited away by local Christians and preserved as holy relics.