Ernest Mason Satow

The Right Honourable Sir Ernest Mason Satow GCMG, (June 30, 1843 - August 26, 1929) was a British scholar-diplomat born to an ethnically German father (Hans David Christoph Satow, born in Wismar, then under Swedish rule, naturalised British in 1846) and an English mother (Margaret, nee Mason) in Clapton, North London. He was educated at Mill Hill School and University College London (UCL).

Satow's career

Japan (1862-1883)

Ernest Satow is probably best known as the author of the fascinating A Diplomat in Japan which describes the years 1862-1869 when Japan was changing from rule by the Tokugawa shogunate to the restoration of Imperial rule. Within a week of his arrival as a young student interpreter aged 19, the Namamugi Incident (Namamugi Jiken) in which a British merchant was killed on the Tokaido took place on September 14, 1862. Satow was on board one of the British ships which bombarded Kagoshima in 1863 to punish the Satsuma clan's daimyo (Shimazu Hisamitsu) for the slaying of Charles Lennox Richardson and the refusal to pay an indemnity demanded as compensation.

Related Topics:
1862 - 1869 - Tokugawa shogunate - Restoration - Namamugi Incident - Tokaido - September 14 - Kagoshima - 1863 - Daimyo - Shimazu Hisamitsu - Charles Lennox Richardson

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In 1864 Satow was with the allied force (Britain, France, the Netherlands and the United States) which attacked Shimonoseki to enforce the right of passage of foreign ships through the narrow Kanmon Strait between Honshu and Kyushu. Satow met Ito Hirobumi and Inoue Kaoru of Choshu for the first time just before the bombardment of Shimonoseki. He also had links with many other Japanese leaders, including Saigo Takamori of Satsuma, and toured the hinterland of Japan with A.B. Mitford and the cartoonist and illustrator Charles Wirgman.

Related Topics:
1864 - France - Netherlands - United States - Shimonoseki - Kanmon Strait - Ito Hirobumi - Inoue Kaoru - Bombardment of Shimonoseki - Saigo Takamori - A.B. Mitford - Charles Wirgman

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Satow's Japanese language skills quickly became indispensable in the British Minister Sir Harry Parkes's negotiations with the failing Tokugawa shogunate and the powerful Satsuma and Choshu clans, and the gathering of intelligence. He was promoted to full Interpreter and then Japanese Secretary to the British legation, and he started to write translations and newspaper articles on subjects relating to Japan as early as 1864. In 1869 he went home to England on leave, returning to Japan in 1870.

Related Topics:
Harry Parkes - Tokugawa - Satsuma - Choshu - British

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Satow was one of the founder members at Yokohama in 1872 of the Asiatic Society of Japan whose purpose was to study the Japanese culture, history and language (i.e. Japanology) in detail. He lectured to the Society on several occasions in the 1870s, and the Transactions of the Asiatic Society contain several of his published papers. The Society is still thriving today. http://www.asjapan.org/

Related Topics:
Yokohama - 1872 - Asiatic Society of Japan - Japanology

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Siam, Uruguay, Morocco (1884-1895)

Satow served in Siam (1884 - 1887), during which time he was promoted from the Consular to the Diplomatic service, Uruguay (1889-93) and Morocco (1893-95).

Related Topics:
Siam - 1884 - 1887 - Diplomatic service - Uruguay - Morocco

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Japan (1895-1900)

Satow returned to Japan as Envoy Extraordinary and Minister Plenipotentiary on July 28, 1895, and stayed in Tokyo for five years (though he was on leave in London for Queen Victoria's Diamond Jubilee in 1897 and met her in August at Osborne House, Isle of Wight). On April 17, 1895 the Treaty of Shimonoseki (text here) had been signed, and Satow was able to observe at first hand the steady build-up of the Japanese army and navy to avenge the humiliation by Russia, Germany and France in the Triple Intervention of April 23, 1895. He was also in a position to oversee the transition to the ending of extraterritoriality in Japan which finally ended in 1899, as agreed by the Anglo-Japanese Treaty of Commerce and Navigation signed in London on July 17, 1894.

Related Topics:
Queen Victoria - Osborne House - Treaty of Shimonoseki - Triple Intervention - Extraterritoriality - Anglo-Japanese Treaty of Commerce and Navigation

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Satow was unlucky not to be named the first British Ambassador to Japan, an honour which was bestowed on his successor Sir Claude Maxwell Macdonald in 1905.

Related Topics:
Ambassador - Claude Maxwell Macdonald - 1905

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China (1900-06)

Satow served as British Minister in Peking from 1900-1906. He was active in the negotiations to conclude the Final Protocol which settled the compensation claims of the Powers after the Boxer Rebellion, and he signed the protocol for Britain on September 7, 1901. Satow also observed the defeat of Russia in the Russo-Japanese War (1904-1905) from his Peking post.

Related Topics:
Peking - 1900 - Final Protocol - Boxer Rebellion - Russia - Russo-Japanese War - 1904

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Retirement (1906-29)

In 1906 Satow was made a Privy Councillor and is listed on the Historic list of members of the Privy Council. In 1907 he was Britain's second plenipotentiary at the Second Hague Peace Conference.

Related Topics:
Privy Council - Historic list of members of the Privy Council - 1907 - Second Hague Peace Conference

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In retirement (1906-1929) at Ottery St Mary in Devon, England he wrote mainly on subjects connected with diplomacy and international law. In Britain he is less well known than in Japan, where he is recognised as perhaps the most important foreign observer in the Bakumatsu and Meiji periods.

Related Topics:
1906 - 1929 - Ottery St Mary - Diplomacy

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Satow's extensive diaries and letters (the Satow Papers, PRO 30/33 1-23) are kept at the Public Record Office at Kew, West London in accordance with his last will and testament. Many of his rare Japanese books are now part of the collection of Cambridge University Library.

Related Topics:
Public Record Office - Cambridge University Library

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Satow was never able as a diplomat serving in Japan to marry his Japanese common-law wife, Takeda Kane, by whom he had two sons, Eitaro and Hisayoshi. The Takeda family letters, including many from Satow to and from his family, have been deposited at the Yokohama Archives of History at the request of Satow's granddaughters.

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