William Adams

William Adams (24 September 1564 – 16 May 1620), better known in Japan as Miura Anjin (三浦按針; 'the pilot of Miura'), was an English navigator who, in 1600, became the first Englishman to reach Japan. He was later granted hatamoto status, and was recognised as one of the most influential foreigners in Japan during the early 17th century.

He arrived in Japan as one of the few survivors of the ship Liefde under the leadership of Jacob Quaeckernaeck. It was the only vessel to reach Japan from a five-ship expedition launched by a company of Rotterdam merchants (a voorcompagnie, or predecessor, of the Dutch East India Company). Soon after his arrival in Japan, Adams and his second mate Jan Joosten became advisors to shōgun Tokugawa Ieyasu.

Among Adams's legacies was his promotion of a policy of religious intolerance aimed particularly at Catholics, which later developed into a centuries-long policy of religious persecution directed primarily against Europeans and Christians of all denominations, eventually extending to Japanese converts as well. He also influenced the development of Japan's isolationist sakoku policy, under which interactions with other countries were severely restricted, almost all foreign nationals were barred from entering Japan, and Japanese commoners were prohibited from leaving the country.

For more than a decade, the Tokugawa authorities did not allow Adams and Joosten to leave Japan. Although he was eventually granted permission to return to England, Adams chose to remain in Japan, where he died at the age of 55. His Japan-born children, Joseph and Susanna, were likely expelled to Batavia in 1635, when Tokugawa Iemitsu closed Japan to foreign trade; after that, they disappear from the historical record.