Godai Tomoatsu
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Godai Tomoatsu (五代友厚?) (1836-1885) was one of the Satsuma students of 1865, smuggled out of Japan to study in Great Britain. He returned to become Japan's leading entrepreneur of the early Meiji period.
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[edit] Early life
Godai was born in Satsuma domain (present day Kagoshima Prefecture), and was sent by the domain to study naval science and technology at the Kaigun Denshujo in Nagasaki. After participating in the Anglo-Satsuma War of 1864, he was chosen as one of the 15 students to be sent to Great Britain to study at the University College of London.
[edit] Bakumatsu period
Godai later returned to Europe to negotiate with the Comte des Cantons de Charles Montblanc (1832-1893) to establish a joint venture for the develop of Satsuma's natural resources in exchange for European weapons and manufactured goods. This French-Satsuma trading company attacted French investment into Satsuma domain to establish a steamship shipyard, textile (silk) spinning factories, and to send promising students from Satsuma overseas for studies, and enabled Satsuma to participate as if an independent country in the Paris Exihibition of 1867. At the same time, Godai used his contacts to purchase the latest warships to equip the Satsuma in preparation with the growing conflict to overthrow the Tokugawa bakufu.
[edit] Meiji statesman
After the Meiji Restoration, Godai became a san'yo (junior councilor), and used his foreign experience to defuse a number of incidents created against foreigners by xenophobic ex-samurai. He resigned from government service in 1869, and turned his full attention to business. Basing himself in Osaka, he created several major joint stock companies involved in international trade, commerce and shipping, which he operated simultaneously. Godai went on to found the Osaka Chamber of Commerce and the Osaka Stock Exchange.
Godai was implicated in the Hokkaido Colonization Office Scandal on 1881, which brought down the administration of Prime Minister Kuroda Kiyotaka.
[edit] Reference and further reading
- Cobbing, Andrew. The Japanese Discovery of Victorian Britain. RoutledgeCurzon, London, 1998. ISBN 1-873410-81-6
- Sagers, John. Origins of Japanese Wealth and Power Reconciling Confucianism and Capitalism, 1830-1885. MacMillion, New York 1995. ISBN 1-4039-7111-0
