I'm reading James Clavell’s “Shogun” and in it the Portuguese (then part of the broader Spanish empire) are depicted as using Christian Japanese mercenaries (ronin) to man their forts in the Philippines and as far west as Goa in India. Is this something that happened in real life and if so do we have any records of what life was like for Japanese in India or the broader pacific during the late 16th, early 17th centuries?
They certainly did. For the Spanish, their main recruitment ground was the Japanese enclave (nihonmachi) of Dilao in the suburbs of Manila. Dilao was established as early as 1585 in order to monitor and regulate the activity of the growing number of Japanese émigrés. (A similar district was set up for Chinese in Binondo.) It was under the spiritual care of the Franciscan order whose members were also running missions in Japan.
This diaspora community consisted of merchants and various middlemen (both legal and illicit); Christian refugees; and low-ranking samurai and mercenaries (some daimyos eventually made their way too). Colonial authorities were always nervous of them as they were deemed bellicose, arrogant, and all-around troublemakers. Its representatives repeatedly demanded extraterritoriality rights, and felt more confident of receiving political support from the homeland. It didn’t help that years prior, the Spanish had already clashed with Japanese wako pirates who raided Manila in 1574 and were driven out of northern Luzon in 1582.
Still, the Spanish eventually put them to use in various military adventures across Asia. In 1598, the Governor-General of the Philippines decided to intervene in a conflict between Cambodia and Siam in hopes of gaining concessions from the former. An unnamed number of Japanese joined the mission. In 1602, they once again embarked with a Spanish armada intent on fending off Dutch incursions into the Moluccas which was a Portugese zone. This time they were 500. In 1603, the Chinese of Manila rose up in rebellion forcing the state to call Japanese militia to help quell it. As one Jesuit put it, they were the “Spaniards” of Asia”.
Eventually, the Japanese themselves rioted and Dilao was destroyed only to be rebuilt since the Franciscans felt a personal responsibility in sheltering Christian exiles. One later arrival was the daimyo Takayama Ukon who came with 300 Japanese Christians. By 1615, a second nihonmachi was founded in San Miguel but this time under Jesuit care. A third cropped up in Cavite presumably to service the colonial shipyard where galleons were made.
Sources:
Antonio de Morga; Sucesos de las Islas Filipinas
Birgit Tremml-Werner; Spain, China, and Japan in Manila, 1571-1644: Local Comparisons and Global Connections