Nunobiki Maru
{{Short description|Japanese steamship}}
{{Use dmy dates|date=March 2025}}
| {{Infobox ship begin|display title=Nunobiki Maru}}
{{Infobox ship image |Ship caption= |Ship image= }} {{Infobox ship career |Hide header= |Ship country=Japan |Ship flag=File:Naval Ensign of Japan.svg |Ship name=Nunobiki Maru |Ship namesake= |Ship ordered= |Ship builder=Caird & Company, Greenock, Scotland |Ship laid down= |Ship launched= 30 November 1874 |Ship completed=1874 |Ship acquired= |Ship commissioned= |Ship decommissioned= |Ship in service= |Ship out of service= |Ship struck= |Ship homeport= |Ship honours= |Ship fate= Foundered 21 July 1899 |Ship notes= }} {{Infobox ship characteristics |Hide header= |Header caption= |Ship type= Steamship |Ship tonnage=1,336 grt |Ship length= {{convert|79.3|m|ftin|abbr=on}} overall |Ship beam= {{convert|9.2|m|ftin|abbr=on}} |Ship height= |Ship draught= |Ship decks= |Ship propulsion=compound steam engine |Ship speed= |Ship range= |Ship capacity= |Ship crew= |Ship armament= |Ship aircraft= |Ship notes= }} |
{{nihongo|Nunobiki Maru|布引丸|literally, Drawn Fabric}} was a Japanese steamship known mainly for her attempted delivery of arms, most notably powerful Murata rifles, from Japan to the Philippines, a key event in Japanese–Filipino relations during the Philippine–American War.
History
In 1874, the steamship Nunobiki Maru was built by Caird & Company in Greenock, Scotland.{{cite web|title=Nunobiki Maru (+1899)|url=http://wrecksite.eu/wreck.aspx?208824|website=The Wrecksite|accessdate=25 October 2016}} The ship was first operated by the Stoomvaart Maatschappij Nederland as SS Sindoro. In 1896, it was acquired by Mitsui Bussan.{{cite web|title=Sindoro SS (1874~1896)|url=http://wrecksite.eu/wreck.aspx?208825|website=The Wrecksite|accessdate=25 October 2016}} The ship was best known for her delivery of arms. In 1899, Filipino diplomat Mariano Ponce gained the aid of Chinese revolutionary Sun Yat-sen in finding a way to procure arms. Sun sympathized with the Filipino cause during the Philippine–American War and may have seen the Philippines as a staging point for his revolution in China.{{cite book|last1=Ocampo|first1=Ambeth|title=Looking Back 2|date=2010|publisher=Anvil Publishing|location=Pasig|pages=8–11}} With Sun's help, Ponce was able to meet pan-Asian Japanese philosopher Tōten Miyazaki and Japanese silviculturist Yaroku Nakamura.{{cite book|last1=Matthiessen|first1=Sven|title=Japanese Pan-Asianism and the Philippines from the Late Nineteenth Century to the End of World War II: Going to the Philippines Is Like Coming Home?|date=2015|publisher=BRILL|url=https://books.google.com/books?id=llPeCgAAQBAJ&pg=PA28|accessdate=25 October 2016|isbn=9789004305724}} Sympathizing with the Filipino cause as well, Miyazaki and Nakamura managed to make an arms purchase amounting to 155,000 yen with Japanese trader Kihatiro Okura. This amount included the 18,000 yen used to purchase Nunobiki Maru, the ship used to deliver the arms. With the grant given by Nakamura's brother, Vice Minister of War Yujiro Nakamura, the deal was made.{{cite web|last1=Ocampo|first1=Ambeth|title=Japanese with a different face|url=http://opinion.inquirer.net/86364/japanese-with-a-different-face|website=Inquirer.net|accessdate=25 October 2016}}
On 20 June 1899, the ship sailed off from Nagasaki. The delivery was composed of 10,000 rifles, six million Murata rounds, a single fixed cannon, ten field guns, seven field glasses, equipment for handloading Murata cartridges including presses and dies, and other military supplies.{{cite web|title=Today in Philippine History, June 20, 1899, Nonubiki Maru leaves Nagasaki for the Philippines loaded with rifles and ammunition|url=https://kahimyang.com/kauswagan/articles/1192/today-in-philippine-history-june-20-1899-nonubiki-maru-leaves-nagasaki-for-the-philippines-loaded-with-rifles-and-ammunition|website=Kahimyang Project|accessdate=25 October 2016}}{{cite book|last1=Anderson|first1=Benedict|title=Under Three Flags: Anarchism and the Anti-Colonial Imagination|date=2005|publisher=Anvil Publishing|location=Pasig}} In order to avoid the American blockade, the ship was supposed to anchor off Taiwan first before arriving in the Philippines. However, she foundered in a typhoon between Taihoku and Shanghai,{{cite book|last1=Miyasaki|first1=Toten|title=My Thirty-Three Year's Dream: The Autobiography of Miyazaki Toten|date=2014|publisher=Princeton University Press|url=https://books.google.com/books?id=OeL_AwAAQBAJ&pg=PA195|accessdate=25 October 2016|isbn=9781400857258}} and the ship was lost on 21 July 1899. Nunobiki Maru was foundered when she was {{convert|60|nmi|km|abbr=in|lk=out|order=flip}} from the Saddle Islands at the mouth of Yangtze River. Despite the sinking of the Nunobiki Maru, Nakamura pressed on for a second delivery which included 2.5 million rounds of ammunition. However, the remaining crew of the Nunobiki Maru revealed the purpose of the cargo. This resulted in a diplomatic dispute between Japan and the United States. The second delivery never went through. Meanwhile, after the disaster that struck Nunobiki Maru, Miyazaki expressed his suspicion that Nakamura's intentions were driven more by profit than altruism, and came to state to Sun that the arms were defective and that ship herself might have been in bad condition when she set sail. In addition, after the incident, it became more difficult to deliver arms out of Japan.
Technical details
Nunobiki Maru had a compound engine, a drive shaft, and a propeller. It was a ship transport protected by iron. She was 79.3 meters long, and her beam was 9.2 meters. Her hull number was 183.
See also
References
{{Reflist}}
Further reading
- {{cite book|title=The Nunobiki-Maru affair|date=1998|publisher=National Historical Institute|location=National Library of the Philippines Government Publication}}
{{1899 shipwrecks}}
Category:Ships built on the River Clyde