In a.d. 1592 Taikō Sama had by one of his wives a son, whom he named Hideyori. Over this new-born heir, whom, however, many suspect of not being Taikō Sama's son, he made great rejoicing throughout the empire. He required his nephew to adopt this new-born son as his heir, although he had several sons of his own. The result of this action was a feeling of hostility between the uncle and nephew. Hidetsugu applied to Mōri, the chief of Chōsū, to aid him in the conflict with his uncle. But Mōri was too wary to enter upon such a contest with the veteran general. Instead of helping Hidetsugu, he revealed to Taikō Sama the traitorous proposition of his nephew. Hidetsugu was thereupon stripped of his office and sent as an exile to the monastery of Kōya-san in the province of Kii. A year later he was commanded with his attendants to commit hara-kiri; and with an unusual exhibition of cruelty, his counsellors, wives, and children were likewise put to death.
Hideyoshi had for a long time contemplated the [pg 209] invasion of Korea and ultimately of China. In a conversation with Nobunaga when he was about to set out on his conquest of the western provinces he is represented as saying[177]: “I hope to bring the whole of Chūgoku into subjection to us. When that is accomplished I will go on to Kyūshū and take the whole of it. When Kyūshū is ours, if you will grant me the revenue of that island for one year, I will prepare ships of war, and purchase provisions, and go over and take Korea. Korea I shall ask you to bestow on me as a reward for my services, and to enable me to make still further conquests; for with Korean troops, aided by your illustrious influence, I intend to bring the whole of China under my sway. When that is effected, the three countries [China, Korea, and Japan] will be one. I shall do it all as easily as a man rolls up a piece of matting and carries it under his arm.” He had already carried out part of this plan; he had brought the whole of Chūgoku and of the island of Kyūshū under his rule. It remained for him to effect the conquest of Korea and China in order to complete his ambitious project.
For this purpose he needed ships on a large scale, for the transportation of troops and for keeping them supplied with necessary provisions. From the foreign merchants, who traded at his ports, he hoped to obtain ships larger and stronger than were built in his own dominions. It was a great disappointment to him when he found this impossible, and that the merchants, whom he had favored, were unwilling [pg 210] to put their ships at his disposal. It is claimed by the Jesuit fathers that this disappointment was the chief reason for the want of favor with which Hideyoshi regarded them during the last years of his life. It is also advanced as one reason for his entering on the invasion of Korea, that he might thus employ in distant and dangerous expeditions some of the Christian princes whose fidelity to himself and loyalty to the emperor he thought he had reason to doubt. He was ambitious, so they said, to rival in his own person the reputation of the Emperor Ōjin, who rose in popular estimation to the rank of Hachiman, the god of war, and who is worshipped in many temples, because, while he was still unborn, his mother led a hostile and successful expedition into this same Korea.
The immediate pretext[178] for a war was the fact that for many years the embassies which it had been the custom to send from Korea to Japan with gifts and acknowledgments had been discontinued. In a.d. 1582 he sent an envoy to remonstrate, who was unsuccessful. Subsequently he sent the prince of Tsushima, who had maintained at Fusan, a port of Korea, a station for trade, to continue negotiations. After some delay and the concession of important conditions the prince had the satisfaction, in a.d. 1590, of accompanying an embassy which the government of Korea sent to Hideyoshi. They arrived [pg 211] at Kyōto at the time when Hideyoshi was absent on his campaign against Hōjō Ujimasa at Odawara. He allowed them to await his return, and even when he had resumed his residence at the capital he showed no eagerness to give them an audience. On the pretence that the hall of audience needed repairs, he kept them waiting many months before he gave orders for their reception. It seemed that he was trying to humiliate them in revenge for their dilatoriness in coming to him. It is not impossible that he had already made up his mind to conduct an expedition in any event into Korea and China, and the disrespect with which he treated the embassy was with the deliberate intention of widening the breach already existing.
Mr. Aston has given us an account of the reception which was finally accorded to the ambassadors, drawn from Korean sources, and which shows that they were entertained in a very unceremonious fashion. They were surprised to find that in Japan this man whom they had been led to look upon as a sovereign was only a subject. They presented a letter from the king of Korea conveying his congratulations and enumerating the gifts[179] he had sent. These enumerated gifts consisted of horses, falcons, saddles, harness, cloth of various kinds, skins, ginseng, etc. These were articles which the Japanese of an earlier age had prized very highly and for the more artistic production of some of which the Koreans [pg 212] had rendered material assistance. Hideyoshi suggested that the embassy should return to their own country at once without waiting for an answer to their letter. This they were unwilling to do. So they waited at Sakai whence they were to sail, till the kwambaku was pleased to send them a message for their king. It was so arrogant in tone that they had to beg for its modification several times before they dared to carry it home. The letter plainly announced his intention to invade China and called upon the Koreans to aid him in this purpose.
The ambassadors went home with the conviction that it was Hideyoshi's intention to invade their country. At their instigation the government made what preparations it could, by repairing fortresses, and collecting troops, arms, and provisions. The country was a poor country, and had had the good fortune or the misfortune to remain at peace for two hundred years. The arts of war had been forgotten. They had no generals who could cope with the practised soldiers of Japan. Firearms which had been introduced into the military equipments of Japanese armies were almost unknown in Korea. It is true that they had been taken under the protection of China and could call upon her for aid. But China was distant and slow, and Korea might be destroyed before her slumbering energies could be aroused.
The preparations which Hideyoshi made, as was his custom, were thorough and extensive. Each prince in Kyūshū, as being nearest to the seat of war, was required to furnish a quota of troops in [pg 213] proportion to his revenues. Each prince in Shikoku and in the Main island, in like manner, was to provide troops proportionate to his revenue and his proximity to the seat of war. Princes whose territories bordered on the sea were to furnish junks and boats, and men to handle them. The force which was thus assembled at Nagoya, now called Karatsu, in Hizen was estimated at 300,000 men, of whom 130,000 were to be immediately despatched. Hideyoshi did not personally lead this force. It was under the command of two generals who were independent of each other, but were ordered to co-operate. One of these generals was Konishi Yukinaga Settsu-no-kami, whom the Jesuit fathers refer to under the name of Don Austin. From an humble position in life he had risen to high and responsible rank in the army. Under the influence of Takeyama, a Christian prince, whom the Jesuit fathers call Justo Ucondono, he had been converted to Christianity. Hideyoshi, as has been pointed out, was desirous of securing the help of the Christian princes in Kyūshū, and therefore appointed a Christian as one of the generals-in-chief. Under him were sent the contingents from Bungo, Ōmura, Arima, and other provinces where the Christian element was predominant. This division of the invading army may therefore be looked upon as representing the Christian population of the empire. The other general-in-chief was Katō Kiyomasa,[180] who had been [pg 214] associated with Hideyoshi ever since the times of Nobunaga. He was the son of a blacksmith and in a.d. 1563 he became one of Hideyoshi's retainers. He was a man of unusual size and of great personal bravery. He commanded an army collected mainly from the northern and eastern provinces, which comprised the experienced veterans of Hideyoshi's earlier campaigns. He is usually spoken of as inimical to the Christians, but this enmity probably grew up along with the ill-feeling between the two armies in Korea.
Konishi's division arrived in Korea April 13, a.d. 1592, and captured the small town of Fusan, which had been the port at which the Japanese had for generations maintained a trading post. After the arrival of Katō the two divisions marched towards the capital, reducing without difficulty the castles that lay in their way. The greatest terror prevailed among the inhabitants, and the court, with King Riyen at its head, resolved to flee into the province bordering on China. The armies reached the capital and then set out northward. The dissensions between the commanders had by this time reached such a point that they determined to separate. Katō traversed the northeastern provinces and in his course captured many Koreans of rank.
Konishi marched to the north and found the king at Pingshang on the borders of the river Taitong-Kiang. Here he was joined by Kuroda Noritaka, whom the Jesuit fathers named Condera[181] Combiendono, [pg 215] and by Yoshitoshi the prince of Tsushima, who had marched with their forces by a different route. An effort at negotiations at this point met with no success. The king continued his flight northward to Ichiu, a fortified town on the borders of China. After he left a sharp contest took place between the besiegers and defenders, which resulted in the abandonment of the town and its capture by the Japanese. The stores of grain which had been collected by the Koreans were captured with the town.
Konishi was anxious to conduct further military operations in connection with the Japanese vessels which had been lying all this time at Fusan. Directions were accordingly sent to have the junks sent round to the western coast. The Koreans picked up courage to show fight with their vessels, which seemed to have been of a superior construction to those of their enemies. They allured the Japanese boats out to sea and then turned upon them suddenly and treated them so roughly that they were glad to get back to the protection of the harbor and to give up the purpose of cruising along the western coast. The result of this little success encouraged the Koreans so much that it may be said to have been a turning point in the invasion.