Home > Japanese warship Shohei Maru

Shohei Maru (Japanese: 昇平丸) was Japan's first Western-style warship following the country's period of Seclusion. She was ordered in 1852 by the government of the Shogun to the southern fief of Satsuma in the island of Kyushu, in anticipation of the announced mission of Commodore Perry in 1853.

The ship was commissioned in 1854 and sent to Edo in February 1855, before being transfered to the Bakufu government in August 1855.

Shohei Maru was apparently built using sailship construction manuals from Holland, and some level of hands-on knowledge may have been obtained by occasional observations of foreign vessels roaming the waters of Japan.

The ship was used mainly for training by the Bakufu, and was seized by the new Imperial government following the Meiji Restoration in 1868.

Shohei Maru was then used as a merchandise transport for the development of the northern island of Hokkaido, were she was wrecked after a storm on March 2nd, 1870.

Although Shohei Maru represented a return to the building of ocean-going warships on the part of the Bakufu after two centuries of prohibition, Japan had built several western-style sailships in the beginning of the 17th century, such as the galleonFor the fictional unit of money called a "galleon", see Money in Harry Potter. A galleon was a large, multi-decked sailing ship used primarily by the nations of Europe from the 16th to 18th centuries. Whether used for war or commerce, they were generally San Juan BautistaSan Juan Bautista (“St John Baptist”) (originally called Date Maru, in Japanese) was one of Japan's first Japanese-built Western-style sail warships, and the first one to cross the Pacific in 1614. She was of the Spanish Galleon type, known in Japan as Ku.