The sea which separates Japan from the Korean peninsula narrows on the south to a strait divided by the island of Tsushima into two channels of nearly equal width. Tsushima had, for centuries, been the Japanese outpost in this part of the empire. To reach the island from the Japanese side was always an easy and safe task, but in the fifty-six-mile channel that separates Tsushima from the peninsula of Korea an invading flotilla had to run the risk of an attack by Korean warships.* The army assembled at Nagoya totalled over three hundred thousand men, whereof some seventy thousand constituted the first fighting line and eighty-seven thousand the second, the remainder forming a reserve to meet contingencies. The question of maritime transport presented some difficulty, but was solved by the expedient of ordering each maritime feudatory to furnish two large ships for every hundred thousand koku of the fief's assessment, and their crews were obtained by compelling each fishing village to furnish ten sailors for every hundred houses it contained. These were not fighting vessels but mere transports. Fighting men to the number of ninety-two hundred were, however, distributed among the ships, and were armed with match-locks, bows, and swords. The problem of commissariat was very formidable. This part of the enterprise was entrusted solely to Asano Nagamasa, minister of Justice, one of the five bugyo,—that is to say, five officials called administrators, in whose intelligence and competence Hideyoshi placed signal reliance. In the records of the Asano family it is stated that an immense quantity of rice was shipped at the outset, but that on landing in Korea the army found ample supplies of grain in every castle throughout the peninsula. Nevertheless, the problem of provisions ultimately became exceedingly difficult, as might well have been predicted.
*See the Encyclopedia Britannica, 11th edition; article "Japan," by
Brinkley.
PLAN OF CAMPAIGN
As for the plan of campaign, it was precisely in accord with the principles of modern strategy. The van, consisting of three army corps, was to cross rapidly to Fusan on the south coast of the peninsula, whence a movement northward, towards the capital, Seoul, was to be immediately commenced, one corps marching by the eastern coast-road, one by the central route, and one by the western. "Thereafter the other four corps, which formed the first fighting line, together with the corps under the direct orders of the commander-in-chief, Ukita Hideiye, were to cross for the purpose of effectually subduing the regions through which the van had passed; and, finally, the two remaining corps of the second line were to be transported by sea up the west coast of the peninsula, to form a junction with the van which, by that time, should be preparing to pass into China over the northern boundary of Korea, namely, the Yalu River. For the landing-place of these re-enforcements the town of Pyong-yang was adopted, being easily accessible by the Tadong River from the coast. In later ages, Japanese armies were destined to move twice over these same regions, once to the invasion of China [in 1894], once to the attack of Russia [in 1904], and they adopted almost the same strategical plan as that mapped out by Hideyoshi in the year 1592. The forecast was that the Koreans would offer their chief resistance, first, at the capital, Seoul; next at Pyong-yang, and finally at the Yalu, as the approaches to all these places constituted positions capable of being utilized to great advantage for defensive purposes."*
*Encyclopaedia Britannica, 11th edition; article "Japan," by
Brinkley.
THE MARCH TO SEOUL
On the 24th of May, 1592, the first army corps (18,700 men), under the command of Konishi Yukinaga, crossed unmolested to the peninsula. So little did the Koreans anticipate an invasion that the earliest intelligence they had of the advent of the invaders was furnished by the commandant of Fusan, who happened that day to be hunting on Deer Island at the entrance to the harbour, and who sighted the approach of the hostile flotilla. On the 25th, Konishi's troops carried the castle of Fusan by storm, after a brave resistance by the garrison, and, on the 27th, the same fate befell another and stronger fortress lying three miles inland and garrisoned by twenty thousand picked soldiers. Four days after the landing of Konishi's army, the second corps (20,800 strong), under Kato Kiyomasa, reached Fusan, and immediately took the east-coast road, according to the programme of campaign.
Thenceforth, however, it was really a race between the two armies as to which should form the van. At the pass of Cho-ryung a reunion was effected. This position offered exceptional facilities for defence, but owing to some unexplained reason no attempt was made by the Koreans to hold it. A few miles further north stood a castle reckoned the strongest fortress in the peninsula. Konishi and Kato continued the combination of their forces as they approached this position, but, contrary to expectation, the Koreans fought in the open and the castle fell without difficulty. Thereafter, the two corps separated, Kato taking the westerly road and Konishi the direct route to Seoul. In short, although the two generals have been accused of crippling themselves by jealous competition, the facts indicate that they co-operated effectively as far as the river Imjin, where a strenuous effort to check them was expected to be made by the Koreans.
From the landing place at Fusan to the gates of Seoul the distance is 267 miles. Konishi's corps covered that interval in nineteen days, storming two forts, carrying two positions, and fighting one pitched battle on the way. Kato's corps, travelling by a circuitous and more arduous road but not meeting with so much resistance, traversed the distance between Fusan and the capital in four days less. At Seoul, with its thirty thousand battlements and three times as many embrasures, requiring a garrison ninety thousand strong, only seven thousand were available, and nothing offered except flight, a course which the Royal Court adopted without hesitation, leaving the city to be looted and partially destroyed, not by the Japanese invaders but by the Korean inhabitants themselves.
The King did not halt until he had placed the Imjin River between himself and the enemy. Moreover, as soon as he there received news of the sack of the city, he renewed his flight northward and took up his quarters at Pyong-yang. It was on the 12th of June that the Korean capital fell, and by the 16th four army corps had assembled there, while four others had effected a landing at Fusan. After a rest of fifteen days, the northern advance was resumed from Seoul, with the expectation that a great struggle would take place on the banks of the Imjin. The conditions were eminently favourable for defence, inasmuch as the approach to the river from the south was only by one narrow gulch, whereas, on the northern side, lay a long, sandy stretch where troops could easily be deployed. Moreover the Japanese had no boats wherewith to negotiate a broad and swiftly flowing river. During ten days the invaders remained helpless on the southern bank. Then the Koreans allowed themselves to be betrayed by the common device of a simulated retreat. They crossed in exultant pursuit, only to find that they had been trapped into an ambush. Konishi and Kato now again separated, the former continuing the direct advance northward, and the latter taking the northeastern route, which he ultimately followed along the whole of the coast as far as Kyong-sang, whence he turned inland and finally reached Hai-ryong, a place destined to acquire much importance in modern times as the point of junction of the Kilin-Korean railways.