Samurai William: The Englishman Who Opened Japan by Giles Milton Page A
Authors: Giles Milton
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their run of good luck. “We had a wounderous storme of winde as ever I was in,” wrote Adams, “with much raine.” As the wind screeched through the rigging and the waves formed huge peaks and troughs, the men grew fearful for their safety. Their vessels were in a poor state of repair and were not built to withstand such a ferocious battering from the sea. The gale blew even harder, pitching the ships into precarious angles. Suddenly, there was a cry from the lookout on the Liefde. The Hoop had keeled over and her lights had gone out. Within seconds, her silhouette had disappeared beneath the surface.
She had vanished, swallowed in one almighty gulp of the sea. She was never seen again, and no survivors were ever found.
Adams was too preoccupied to dwell upon the loss of the Hoop. In typically stoic, understated fashion, he wrote just four words about the disaster: “We were,” he said, “very sorry.” His crew was rather more distraught, for they feared the same fate. Their only hope was that Adams could steer them through the storm.
The Liefde was now alone on an empty ocean and the men had absolutely no idea of their position. Their maps and charts were hopelessly inadequate, rendering their equipment useless, and they continued to sail in what they believed to be a northwesterly direction. “We proceeded on our former intention for Japan,” wrote Adams, “ … but founde it not, by reason that it lieth false in all the cardes and mappes and globes.” The men were by now suffering the most terrible deprivations. They were half starved, sick with scurvy, and many were troubled by acute dysentery. “Great was the misery we were in,” wrote Adams, “having no more but nine or ten able men to go or creepe upon their knees.” Sickness hit indiscriminate of rank or status, “our captain and all the rest looking every hour to die.”
Adams stopped writing any notes, and the rest of his crew also fell silent. They were too debilitated—or too ill—to put quill to paper. Toward the end of March they came within sight of an island called Una Colonna, possibly one of the desolate Bonin Islands, “at which time many of our men were sick again.” The effort of manning the ship’s boat and rowing ashore to this barren speck of land was now beyond them; after four months and twenty-two days spent crossing the Pacific, even Adams was approaching despair. He was convinced that if they did not reach land within a few days they would surely die.
On April 12, 1600, more than twenty months after setting sail from Rotterdam, Adams awoke to an almost mystical sight. There
was a mauve smudge on the horizon that grew more and more distinct as the day progressed. Adams called to his men; he stirred the sick and carried them on deck. At first he scarcely dared to believe his eyes, but he soon became convinced that they were nearing their goal.
The breezes that had been against them for so long suddenly shifted and nudged them toward land. The coastline grew closer, until the men could discern cliffs, trees, and a large cluster of temples. “So we, in safety, let fall our ancker, about a league from a place called Bungo.” Almost sixty years after Pinto, but in the very same harbor, William Adams had reached Japan.
Chapter 4
IN THE NAME OF THE FATHER
T HE LIEFDE ’S CREW was too weak to row ashore. They were racked with scurvy and dysentery and their bones ached from the lack of food. Of the twenty-four men still alive, most were unable to stand and some were on the verge of death. “There was no more but six,” wrote Adams, “besides myselfe, that could stand upon his feet.” When he saw a band of fearsome-looking Japanese heading toward the Liefde , he knew that resistance was hopeless, for none of the men had the strength to load a musket. “We suffered them to come abord of us,” he wrote, “not being able to resist them.”
The Japanese boarding party was quite unlike the “savages” and “wilde
She had vanished, swallowed in one almighty gulp of the sea. She was never seen again, and no survivors were ever found.
Adams was too preoccupied to dwell upon the loss of the Hoop. In typically stoic, understated fashion, he wrote just four words about the disaster: “We were,” he said, “very sorry.” His crew was rather more distraught, for they feared the same fate. Their only hope was that Adams could steer them through the storm.
The Liefde was now alone on an empty ocean and the men had absolutely no idea of their position. Their maps and charts were hopelessly inadequate, rendering their equipment useless, and they continued to sail in what they believed to be a northwesterly direction. “We proceeded on our former intention for Japan,” wrote Adams, “ … but founde it not, by reason that it lieth false in all the cardes and mappes and globes.” The men were by now suffering the most terrible deprivations. They were half starved, sick with scurvy, and many were troubled by acute dysentery. “Great was the misery we were in,” wrote Adams, “having no more but nine or ten able men to go or creepe upon their knees.” Sickness hit indiscriminate of rank or status, “our captain and all the rest looking every hour to die.”
Adams stopped writing any notes, and the rest of his crew also fell silent. They were too debilitated—or too ill—to put quill to paper. Toward the end of March they came within sight of an island called Una Colonna, possibly one of the desolate Bonin Islands, “at which time many of our men were sick again.” The effort of manning the ship’s boat and rowing ashore to this barren speck of land was now beyond them; after four months and twenty-two days spent crossing the Pacific, even Adams was approaching despair. He was convinced that if they did not reach land within a few days they would surely die.
On April 12, 1600, more than twenty months after setting sail from Rotterdam, Adams awoke to an almost mystical sight. There
was a mauve smudge on the horizon that grew more and more distinct as the day progressed. Adams called to his men; he stirred the sick and carried them on deck. At first he scarcely dared to believe his eyes, but he soon became convinced that they were nearing their goal.
The breezes that had been against them for so long suddenly shifted and nudged them toward land. The coastline grew closer, until the men could discern cliffs, trees, and a large cluster of temples. “So we, in safety, let fall our ancker, about a league from a place called Bungo.” Almost sixty years after Pinto, but in the very same harbor, William Adams had reached Japan.
Chapter 4
IN THE NAME OF THE FATHER
T HE LIEFDE ’S CREW was too weak to row ashore. They were racked with scurvy and dysentery and their bones ached from the lack of food. Of the twenty-four men still alive, most were unable to stand and some were on the verge of death. “There was no more but six,” wrote Adams, “besides myselfe, that could stand upon his feet.” When he saw a band of fearsome-looking Japanese heading toward the Liefde , he knew that resistance was hopeless, for none of the men had the strength to load a musket. “We suffered them to come abord of us,” he wrote, “not being able to resist them.”
The Japanese boarding party was quite unlike the “savages” and “wilde
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