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

by Samuel Hawley

  Chapter 21: Meanwhile, in Manila…

  [557] Gomez Perez Dasmarinas to Hideyoshi, June 11, 1592, in Blair and Robertson, vol. 8, 266-267.

  [558] Hideyoshi to Gomez Perez Dasmarinas, no date, ibid., vol. 9, 123-124.

  [559] Comment made by Don Luis Perez Dasmarinas before a council of war in Manila on April 22, 1594, ibid., vol. 9, 125.

  [560] Don Luis Perez Dasmarinas to Hideyoshi, no date (the letter would have been written around April 20 or 21, 1594), ibid., vol. 9, 126- 130.

  Chapter 22: “You, Hideyoshi, are hereby instructed…to cheerfully obey our imperial commands!”

  [561] Yu Song-nyong, 195; Sonjo sujong sillok, vol. 4, 94-95 (8/Sonjo 28; Sept. 1595).

  [562] Sonjo sujong sillok, vol. 4, 98 and 102 (1 and 4/Sonjo 29; Feb. and May 1596); Aston, 41-42.

  [563] Steichen, 199-200.

  [564] Huang, “Lung-ch’ing,” 571.

  [565] Hulbert, vol. 2, 26.

  [566] Yu Song-nyong, 196-197; Han Chi-yun, “Haedong yoksa,” in Saryoro bonun, 211.

  [567] This follows Berry, 216.

  [568] Ibid., 228-229.

  [569] Hideyoshi to O-Ne, 5/3/Bunroku 2 (April 6, 1593), in Boscaro, Letters, 51.

  [570] Elison, “Hideyoshi,” 337-338, note 75.

  [571] Hideyoshi to O-Ne, no date (1594-95?), Boscaro, Letters, 67.

  [572] Elison, “Hideyoshi,” 244.

  [573] Hideyoshi to Yodogimi, 25/?/? (Nov. or Dec. 1593); no date (1594?); and 8/12/Keicho 2 (Jan. 15, 1598), in Boscaro, Letters, 62, 69, and 72.

  [574] “Daddy” (Hideyoshi) to Lord Hiroi (Hideyori), 7/?/? (1594-95?), ibid., 70.

  [575] Hideyoshi to Lord O-Hiroi, 2/1/Keicho 1 (Jan. 31, 1596), ibid., 70.

  [576] “Daddy” to Lord O-Hiroi, 17/?/? (1595-96?), ibid., 70-71.

  [577] “Daddy Taiko” to Hideyori, 3/5/Keicho 2 (June 17, 1597), ibid., 71.

  [578] “Daddy” to Hideyori, 2/12/Keicho 2 (Jan. 9, 1598), ibid., 72.

  [579] Hideyoshi to Lord Chunagon (a title granted to Hideyori in 1598), 20/?/Keicho 3 (summer 1598), ibid., 73.

  [580] Luis Frois, “The Second Epistle of the deathe of the Quabacondono,” in Berry, 221.

  [581] Steichen, 179-180.

  [582] Frois, “Second Epistle,” in Berry, 219.

  [583] Hideyoshi to Kyoto Governor Maeda Gen’i, 11/12/Bunroku 1 (Jan. 14, 1593): “Because the problem of numazu is so important for the construction of Fushimi, I would like to have the castle constructed in such a way that it will be hard to attack from the numazu” (Boscaro, Letters, 48).

  [584] Dening, 263-264; Sansom, 363.

  [585] Han Chi-yun, “Haedong yoksa,” in Saryoro bonun, 211-212; Yu Song-nyong, 197; Elisonas, “Trinity,” 284-285.

  [586] Imperial patent of investiture from the Wanli emperor to Hideyoshi, in Kuno, vol. 1, 335-336.

  [587] Imperial edict from the Wan-li emperor to Hideyoshi, ibid., 336-339.

  [588] An early 18th-century English translation of Luis Frois’ account, in Cooper, Rodrigues, 116.

  [589] Steichen, 202.

  [590] Ryocho Heijo Roku; Chosen Seibatsu-ki; Razan Hideyoshi-ju, in Stramigioli, 114-115; Sonjo sujong sillok, vol. 4, 112-113 (9/Sonjo 29; Oct. 1596); Han Chi-yun, “Haedong yoksa,” in Saryoro bonun, 211-212.

  [591] Sin Kyong, “Chaejo bonbangji,” in Saryoro bonun, 213-215.

  [592] Sonjo sujong sillok, vol. 4, 114-115 (12/Sonjo 29; Jan.-Feb. 1597).

  [593] Aston, 52-53; Sonjo sujong sillok, vol. 4, 120 (2/Sonjo 30; March-April 1597).

  [594] Imperial edict of the Wanli emperor, in Kuno, vol. 1, 169-170.

  [595] Edict by Hideyoshi, 20/11/Keicho 1 (Jan. 8, 1597), in Antonio de Morga, Sucesos de las Islas Filipinas (Mexico, 1609), in Blair and Robertson, vol. 15, 122-123.

  [596] George Elison, Deus Destroyed (Cambridge, Mass.: Harvard University Press, 1973), 135-139; Boxer, Christian Century, 237-239.

  [597] Father Martin de Aguirre to Antonio de Morga, Lieutenant Governor of Manila, Jan. 28, 1597, in Morga, Sucesos, in Blair and Robertson, vol. 15, 124-125.

  [598] Hideyoshi to Francisco Tello, Governor of the Philippines, in Boxer, Christian Century, 169.

  [599] Morga, Sucesos, in Blair and Robertson, vol. 15, 128.

  Chapter 23: The Arrest and Imprisonment of Yi Sun-sin

  [600] Sonjo sujong sillok, vol. 4, 85 (12/Sonjo 27; Jan. 1595); Sonjo sillok, vol. 14, 75-76 (1/12/Sonjo 27; Jan. 10, 1595).

  [601] Sonjo sillok, vol. 18, 160-161 (26/6/Sonjo 29; July 21, 1596).

  [602] Ibid., vol. 19, 153 (21/10/Sonjo 29; Dec. 10, 1596).

  [603] Ibid., vol. 19, 205-207 (7/11/Sonjo 29; Dec. 25, 1596).

  [604] Yi Hyong-sok, vol. 2, 992.

  [605] Yi Won-ik, Ori-jip, quoted in Yi Pun, 221-222. Yi Sun-sin writes of Yi Won-ik’s visit in his diary, 19-29/8/Ulmi (Sept. 22-Oct. 2, 1595), in Nanjung ilgi, 172-174.

  [606] Yu Song-nyong, 201; Cho Kyong-nam, “Nanjung chapnok,” in Saryoro bonun, 230.

  [607] Sonjo sujong sillok, vol. 4, 119-120 (2/Sonjo 30; Mar. 1597).

  [608] Yu Song-nyong, 202.

  [609] Sonjo sillok, vol. 20, 108-109 (23/1/Sonjo 30; Mar. 10, 1597).

  [610] Ibid., vol. 20, 127-130 (27/1/Sonjo 30; Mar. 14, 1597).

  [611] Ibid., vol. 20, 154-155 (4/2/Sonjo 30; Mar. 21, 1597); Yi Jae-bom, 120-121.

  [612] Sonjo sillok, vol. 20, 240 (4/3/Sonjo 30; April 19, 1597); Yi Pun, 222-224.

  [613] Yi Pun, 224; Yu Song-nyong, 201-202.

  [614] The most complete English-language accounts of Yi Sun-sin’s downfall can be found in Jho Sung-do, 178-186, and Park Yune-hee, 189-195.

  [615] Diary entry for 1/4/Chongyu (May 16, 1597), Yi Sun-sin, Nanjung ilgi, 257.

  [616] Choi Du-hwan gives a day-by-day breakdown of Yi’s journey south in “Chukgoja hamyon sallira.”: Chungmugong Yi Sun-sin gyore-rul kuhan myonoh 88 kaji (Seoul: Hakminsa, 1998), 220.

  [617] Diary entry for 16/4/Chongyu (May 31, 1597), Yi Sun-sin, Nanjung ilgi, 261.

  PART 5: THE SECOND INVASION

  [618] Giles, 158.

  Chapter 24: “Water, Thunder, and Great Disaster”

  [619] The seventh and concluding item in Hideyoshi’s orders launching the second invasion of Korea, recorded in the Chosen ki (Korean Record) of samurai Okochi Hidemoto, in George Elison, “The Priest Keinen and His Account of the Campaign in Korea, 1597-1598: An Introduction,” in Nihon kyoikushi ronso: Motoyama Yukihiko Kyoju taikan kinen rombunshu (Kyoto: Shinbunkaku, 1988), 28.

  [620] Yi Hyong-sok, vol. 2, 1725.

  [621] Ibid., 1723.

  [622] Dening, 253.

  [623] The bibyonsa refused to accept the letter when it arrived in Seoul (Sonjo sillok, vol. 20, 154 [1/2/Sonjo 30; Mar. 18, 1597]).

  [624] Han Chi-yun, “Haedong yoksa,” in Saryoro bonun, 224; Sonjo sillok, vol. 20, 99 (21/1/Sonjo 30; Mar. 8, 1597).

  [625] Park Yune-hee, 197.

  [626] According to Murdoch, 355, Hideyoshi’s “commanders had asked for supplies from Japan, and had pointed out that if these were not forwarded they would have to wait till the grain ripened in Korea; but Hideyoshi, in consistent adherence to the maxim of subsisting the war in the enemy’s country, had ordered his generals to wait till harvest-time.”

  [627] Palais, Confucian Statecraft, 85.

  [628] Samuel Dukhae Kim, 99-102 and 116.

  [629] Sonjo sillok, vol. 20, 154 (1/2/Sonjo 30; Mar. 18, 1597).

  [630] Yu Song-nyong, 204.

  [631] Goodrich, vol. 1, 331. Yang Chae-suk quotes the figure of 80,000 Ming troops mobilized for Korea by the end of 1597 (Imjin waeran, 312).

  [632] Huang, “Lung-ch’ing,” 576; Kuno, vol. 1, 170-171.

  [633] Huang, “Lung-ch’ing,” 572.

  [634] Sonjo sillok, vol. 21, 163-164 (21/5/Sonjo 30; July 5, 1597).

  [635] Ibid., vol. 21, 172-173 (25/5/Sonjo 30; July 9, 1597).

  [636] Yu Song-nyong, 204; Sonjo sujong sillok, vol. 4, 125 (5/Sonjo 30; June/July 1597).

  [637] Sonjo sujong sillok, vol. 4, 1
20 (2/Sonjo 30; Mar./April, 1597); Han Chi-yun, “Haedong yoksa,” in Saryoro bonun, 226.

  [638] Yu Song-nyong, 205; Sin Kyong, “Chaejobongbangji,” in Saryoro bonun, 233.

  [639] Diary entry for 8/5/Chongyu (June 22, 1597), Yi Sun-sin, Nanjung ilgi, 267-268.

  [640] Ibid., 267.

  [641] Diary entry for 12/5/Chongyu (June 26, 1597), ibid., 269.

  [642] Sansom, 360-361.

  [643] Sonjo sillok, vol. 21, 250-253 (14/6/Sonjo 30; July 27, 1597).

  [644] Yu Song-nyong, 206; Sonjo sillok, vol. 21, 237 (11/6/Sonjo 30; July 24, 1597).

  [645] Sonjo sillok, vol. 21, 298-299 (28/6/Sonjo 30; Aug. 10, 1597).

  [646] Diary entry for 17/6/Chongyu (July 30, 1597), Yi Sun-sin, Nanjung ilgi, 280.

  [647] Sonjo sujong sillok, vol. 4, 125 (6/Sonjo 30; July/Aug., 1597).

  [648] Yu Song-nyong, 206; Cho Kyong-nam, Nanjung chapnok, quoted in Yi Chae-bom, 154.

  [649] Park Yune-hee, 198.

  [650] In the court discussions preceding Won’s reappointment to naval commander in March of 1597, King Sonjo observed that “Won Kyun is brave, but he doesn’t think much. It we reappoint him to Kyongsang naval command, who will control him and prevent him from charging at the Japanese precipitously?” (Sonjo sillok, vol. 20, 129 [27/1/Sonjo 30; Mar. 14, 1597]).

  [651] Sadler, “Naval Campaign,” 202.

  [652] This account of the Battle of Chilchonnyang is based on accounts in Sonjo sillok, vol. 22, 26-27 (22/7/Sonjo 30; Sept. 3, 1597); Sonjo sujong sillok, vol. 4, 126 (7/Sonjo 30; Aug./Sept., 1597); Yu Song-nyong, 205-207; Park Yune-hee, 198-200; Jho Sung-do, 190-191; Aston, 55-56.

  [653] Yu Song-nyong, 207.

  [654] Cho Kyong-nam, “Nanjung chapnok,” in Saryoro bonun, 237.

  [655] Hideyoshi to Kato Yoshiaki, Todo Takatoro, and others, 13/9/Keicho 2 (Oct. 23, 1597), in Cho Chung-hwa, Dashi ssunun imjin waeran-sa (Seoul: Hakmin-sa, 1996), 133-137.

  [656] Sadler, “Naval Campaign,” 202.

  [657] Sonjo sillok, vol. 22, 27-31 and 33 (22/7/Sonjo 30; Sept. 3, 1597); Sonjo sujong sillok, vol. 4, 126 (7/Sonjo 30; Aug./Sept., 1597).

  [658] Diary entries for 16 and 21/7/Chongyu (Aug. 28 and Sept. 2, 1597), Yi Sun-sin, Nanjung ilgi, 290-291 and 293.

  [659] Diary entry for 18/7/Chongyu (Aug. 30, 1597), ibid., 292. A map of Yi’s journey listing dates, distances, and every stop along the way appears in Choi Du-hwan, Chukgoja, 235.

  [660] Diary entries for 2~3/8/Chongyu (Sept. 12~13, 1597), Yi Sun-sin, Nanjung ilgi, 295-296.

  Chapter 25: The Japanese Advance Inland

  [661] The seventh and concluding item in Hideyoshi’s orders to his commanders, recorded in the Chosen ki (Korean Record) of samurai Okochi Hidemoto, in Elison, “Keinen,” 28.

  [662] Hideyoshi’s instructions to Inspector General Ota Kazuyoshi, ibid., 28.

  [663] Elisonas, “Trinity,” 290-291.

  [664] Yi Hyong-sok, vol. 2, 1728.

  [665] Griffis, Corea, 130.

  [666] This account of the Battle of Namwon is based mainly on Yu Song-nyong, 212-215 (Yu’s account is based on eyewitness testimony from Kim Hyo-ui, one of the few survivors of the battle.); Sin Kyong, “Chaejobonbangji,” in Saryoro bonun, 238-241; Sonjo sujong sillok, vol. 4, 127-128 (9/Sonjo 30; Oct. 1597); Yang Jae-suk, Imjin waeran, 321-325; Aston, 56-57; Hulbert, vol. 2, 32-33.

  [667] Okochi Hidemoto, Chosen ki, in Turnbull, Samurai Invasion, 194.

  [668] Keinen, Chosen nichinichi ki, in Yang jae-suk, Imjin waeran, 324-325.

  [669] Turnbull, Samurai Invasion, 196.

  [670] Okochi Hidemoto, Chosen ki, in Cho Chung-hwa, Paro chapun, 111. According to a Japanese soldier captured on November 3, about one hundred Japanese were killed in the Battle of Namwon (Sonjo sillok, vol. 22, 198 [2/10/Sonjo 30; Nov. 10, 1597]).

  [671] According to information from a Japanese officer captured by the Koreans some weeks later, Kato set out from Sosaengpo intent on beating Konishi to Namwon, but failed to do so because of the circuitous route he took (Sonjo sillok, vol. 22, 207 [3/10/Sonjo 30’ Nov. 11, 1597]).

  [672] Yu Song-nyong, 209-210.

  [673] Hideyoshi to Nabeshima Naoshige, Kato Kiyomasa, Kuroda Nagamasa, and others, 22/9/Keicho 2 (Nov. 1, 1597): “I have noted with satisfaction that the head of the governor of Kimhae was cut off by Kuroda Nagamasa, and that 353 Choson soldiers inside the fortress were killed, along with several thousand civilians in the valley below.” (Cho Chung-hwa, Dashi ssunun, 108-109.) The Japanese evidently mistook someone else’s head for that of Kimhae governor Baek Sa-rim, for Baek is known to have fled Hwangsoksansong before the battle.

  [674] Yu Song-nyong, 209-211; Sonjo sujong sillok, vol. 4, 126-127 (8/Sonjo 30; Sept.-Oct. 1597); Yi Hyong-sok, vol. 2, 1002-1003.

  [675] Ukita’s proclamation is reproduced in Cho Chung-hwa, Paro chapun, 145.

  [676] These and other “nose receipts” are reproduced, together with Korean translations, in Cho Chung-hwa, Dashi ssunun, 116-125.

  [677] Sonjo sillok, vol. 22, 93-96 (18/8/Sonjo 30; Sept. 28, 1597).

  [678] Ibid, vol. 22, 104 (24/8/Sonjo 30; Oct. 4, 1597).

  [679] Yu Song-nyong, 215; Sonjo sujong sillok, vol. 4, 128 (9/Sonjo 30; Oct.-Nov. 1597); Sin Kyong, “Chaejobonbangji,” in Saryoro bonun, 241.

  [680] Han Chi-yun, “Haedong yoksa,” in Saryoro bonun, 227.

  [681] Sonjo sujong sillok, vol. 4, 128 (9/Sonjo 30; Oct.-Nov. 1597).

  [682] Yi Hyong-sok, vol. 2, 1021-1022. Other sources, including Elisonas, “Trinity,” 287, name Kato Kiyomasa’s contingent as being the Japanese force involved in the Battle of Chiksan.

  [683] Sonjo sillok, vol. 22, 131 and 133 (8-9/9/Sonjo 30; Oct. 18-19, 1597); Sonjo sujong sillok, vol. 4, 128 (9/Sonjo 30; Oct.-Nov. 1597); Cho Kyong-nam, “Nanjung chapnok,” in Saryoro bonun, 242-243; Turnbull, Samurai Invasion, 199-200.

  Chapter 26: “Seek death and you will live; seek life and you will die”

  [684] Diary entries for 4-13/8/Chongyu (Sept. 14-23, 1597), Yi Sun-sin, Nanjung ilgi, 296-301.

  [685] Diary entries for 13, 17, 25/8/Chongyu (Sept. 23 and 27 and Oct. 5, 1597), ibid., 301, 302, and 304-305.

  [686] “T’ai Kung’s Six Secret Teachings,” in Sawyer, 65-66.

  [687] Diary entry for 12/8/Chongyu (Sept. 22, 1597), Yi Sun-sin, Nanjung ilgi, 300.

  [688] Diary entries for 19/8/Chongyu and 2/9/Chongyu (Sept. 29 and Oct. 12, 1597), ibid., 303 and 307.

  [689] Yi Sun-sin does not clearly state in his war diary the size of his fleet on the eve of the Battle of Myongryang. The most authoritative source on this is Yi’s report to Ming Commander in Chief Ma Gui, which was subsequently relayed to Seoul: “I joined with Kim Ok-chu and others and collected thirteen warships and thirty-two chotam-son [smaller scouting boats] and blocked the sea route in Haenam [southwestern Korea].” Sonjo sillok, vol. 23, 27 (10/11/Sonjo 30; Dec. 18, 1597).

  [690] Yi Pun, 226.

  [691] Diary entry for 28/8/Chongyu (Oct. 8, 1597), Yi Sun-sin, Nanjung ilgi, 305-306.

  [692] Diary entry for 7 and 10/9/Chongyu (Oct. 17 and 20, 1597), ibid., 307 and 310.

  [693] Diary entry for 7/9/Chongyu (Oct. 17, 1597), ibid., 307-308.

  [694] Park Yune-hee, 211.

  [695] Diary entry for 15/9/Chongyu (Oct. 25, 1597), Yi Sun-sin, Nanjung ilgi, 311.

  [696] “Wu Tzu,” in Sawyer, 215.

  [697] Joseph Needham and Robin Yates, Science and Civilizaion in China, vol. 5, part 4, Military Technology: Missiles and Sieges (Cambridge: Cambridge University press, 1994), 42-43. The authors make the interesting point that “Whereas in the West expectation of death could lead to a loss of drive, in East Asia the same situation often led to just the opposite, a feeling of fury.”

  [698] “Wu Tzu,” in Sawyer, 220.

  [699] Yi Pun, 228.

  [700] Japanese accounts agree that Kurushima Michifusa was killed this day in the Battle of Myongryang, but assert that the body cut up by Yi Sun-sin was not his, but rather that of a ronin (masterless samurai) named Hata Shinji (Park Yun
e-hee, 213).

  [701] Diary entry of 16/9/Chongyu (Oct. 26, 1597), Yi Sun-sin, Nanjung ilgi, 312-315; Yi Pun, 227-229; Sonjo sillok, vol. 23, 27 (10/11/Sonjo 30; Dec. 18, 1597); Sonjo sujong sillok, vol. 4, 128 (9/Sonjo 30; Oct.-Nov. 1597); Park Yune-hee, 211-213; Jho Sung-do, 196-201.

  [702] Cho Chung-hwa states that no historical evidence exists to support this story of the chain, but that many people nevertheless still firmly believe it (Paro chapun, 150-151).

  [703] Kim Tae-chun, “Yi Sun-sin’s Fame in Japan,” Journal of Social Sciences and Humanities 47 (June 1978): 94.

  [704] Ibid., 95; Park Yune-hee, 18.

  [705] Diary entry for 14/10/Chongyu (Nov. 22, 1597), Yi Sun-sin, Nanjung ilgi, 322.

  [706] Yi Pun, 231.

  [707] “Wei Liao-tzu,” in Sawyer, 258. (Wei Liao-tzu, “The Book of Master Wei Liao,” was written in the latter half of the fourth century B.C.)

  Chapter 27: Starvation and Death in a “Buddha-less World”

  [708] Report of an interrogation of a soldier from Mori’s contingent, captured on November 3, in Sonjo sillok, vol. 22, 198 (2/10/Sonjo 30; Nov. 10, 1597); report of an interrogation of a Japanese officer serving under Kato Kiyomasa, in Sonjo sillok, vol. 22, 207-208 (3/10/Sonjo 30; Nov. 11, 1597). According to the latter report, Kato and Konishi had initially intended to take Seoul, but Hideyoshi forbade it. He ordered them instead to march through the southern part of Korea in the ninth month, killing everyone along the way, then return south to their coastal fortresses in the tenth month.

  [709] These “nose receipts” are reproduced in Cho Chung-hwa, Dashi ssunun, 116-119 and 125-131.

  [710] Elison, “Keinen,” 33.

  [711] Elisonas, “Trinity,” 293.

  [712] In the city of Fukuoka today there is a subway station called Tojinmachi, “Chinaman Town,” a reference to a prison camp located here during the latter part of the war. Few if any Chinese prisoners were ever kept here. The apparent misnomer stems from the fact that the Japanese tended to lump Koreans together with Chinese as tojin, “Chinamen.”