The Mongol Invasion of Kyushu, Pt. 2
The conclusion to the first Mongol invasion of Japan, in which the defenders rally and nature intervenes.
From: 1274 C.E. To: 1275 C.E.
Location: Kyushu, Japan
Click Here to Read The Mongol Invasion of Kyushu, Pt. 1
From Ghenko, the Mongol Invasion of Japan by Nakaba Yamada, 1916.
Note: This article has been excerpted from a larger work in the public domain and shared here due to its historical value. It may contain outdated ideas and language that do not reflect TOTA’s opinions and beliefs.
With such a good omen at the eve of war, Shoni-Kakuye, his son Kagesuye and Suketoki, the youngest knight of all, left their castle in great haste, commanding their recruits, 3,000 strong. In a couple of days they marched fifty miles' distance to Chikuzen, and to the great joy of the garrison they appeared on the battlefield. Thousands of fresh war banners waved high on the forts. There was an indescribable revival of spirits on the Japanese side, and it caused a great loss on the opponents' side, which now gave way at the point which they had occupied with desperate fighting, most of the Mongol soldiers being drowned by the surf that cut off their way of retreat.
Kakuye's achievement in commanding the army was so excellent as to have annihilated the strongest flank of the invaders at a single blow; further, his troop pressed the main body of the Mongols that was situated on the left wing of the drowned rank. But there was a danger of being enveloped by the greatly superior force which a Mongol general commanded from an eminence, watching every movement of the Japanese force, and a heavy exchange of arrows took place between the hostile parties, until the evening dusk gradually obscured the surroundings.
Suddenly there appeared a very young knight on horseback, attired in armour of golden colour, with a white ribbon around his long black hair. He held gallantly the rein of his sturdy horse; a bow was in his left hand and a quiver upon his shoulder. As soon as he came to a certain distance from the enemy's flank, now obscurely seen in front, he found a Mongol general thickly whiskered, tall, stoutly built and guarded with scarlet mail and golden helmet. He seemed to be the highest commander of the Mongol forces on land.
Galloping a few feet, the young knight cried loudly to the enemy: "Listen. I am Shoni-Suketoki, the grandson of the governor of Dazai-fu, and this is my first campaign. Look how my arrow will hit the mark!" No sooner had he announced this in a clear voice, than he drew the bow to the full length of the shaft and aimed at the Mongol commander. Detaching his finger from the bow-string, the arrow flew off with an invisible speed. To everyone's surprise, it struck the breast of the Mongol giant, who fell down from his horse, head foremost, to the ground.
Taking advantage of the sudden dismay which prevailed in the Mongol ranks, Shoni-Kakuye and his troop cut their way into the swarming barbarians, slashing them in all directions, so that the enemy's ranks were cut into several detachments. Fierce hand-to-hand fighting took place, the clashing swords making sparks fly under the darkening sky of the evening, in which a combatant could hardly distinguish his opponent. The hot engagement, causing a heavy loss to the enemy, was silenced by the coming of the darkness, when General Kakuye assembled all his remaining troops (nearly one-third of them lay lifeless on the field), and led the survivors into the fortification.
Though the battles along the whole line in the field came to an end, there were still some skirmishes here and there, in the long extension of the field along the shores, where horrible sparks were visible through the darkness of night. Near one of the fort gates a knight was spurring his horse toward the gate, but he was perceived by a band of the Mongols led by a tall general. The pursued was Kagesuye, the son of Shoni-Kakuye, who had failed to join his father's troops in retreat.
Now the pursuers and the pursued were within bow-shot, when suddenly the knight quickly turned toward the enemy and sent a well-aimed shot at the leader of the pursuing force. Such an excellent archer was the knight that the Mongol general instantly fell a victim to Kagesuye's arrow, and the accident delayed all the horsemen who were following. Seizing the opportunity, the brave knight rode into the fort, and the iron gate screened him from sight.
The wounded general was afterwards known by the Japanese to be Yu-Pok-Hyong, one of the three chief commanders of the Mongol expeditionary force, who was too impetuous to miss even a single enemy who came into his sight. Severely wounded, he was immediately carried into the flag-ship, where a grave conference was to be held as to the strategy of the following day.
The serious loss which the Mongol army had suffered in this day's battle aroused the spirit of vengeance in the other generals, Hoi-Ton and Hung-Tsa-Kiu, who now held the conference with the wounded general, in which Hoi-Ton strongly argued that on that very night a furious attack should be made and Dazai-fu be taken in their power before greater Japanese reinforcements arrived at the coast; but Hung-Tsa-Kiu, who was closely acquainted with the geographical condition of Kiushu, held a quite different opinion and said: "Our troops are entirely fatigued with the battles fought during these four days, and it is of the first importance to give them a good rest to-night in the ships and to supply them with new weapons. Even if this were not necessary, a night raid in this part of Kiushu is very dangerous, because the Japanese have prepared all the ways with many pitfalls."
The wounded general, whose spirit was then greatly affected by pain, concurred in the latter's opinion, and then General Hoi-Ton exclaimed in an indignant tone: "There is no better means to occupy any land than a night raid, particularly to crush down such a tenacious enemy as the Japanese. Alas! you are becoming old. The smart Japanese will surely come to-night to make a counter-attack." The opinion of the others was too strong to admit Hoi-Ton's view; but the conference ended with the conclusion that to avoid the night raid from the Japanese they should recall their main force to the fleet, and also give them a good rest and send out a fresh force on the next day, and make a vigorous charge so early in the morning that the fatigued enemy should be at once defeated. So, except some troops for watching the Japanese movements, the whole army returned into their ships in the dead of night.
When almost all the Mongol force had entered their ships lying on the Ghenkai Sea, the darkness of the night seemed to have become more intense, and even a little stronger wind began to blow as if it foretold coming danger. Within the secrecy of the invisible atmosphere, God seemed to have been working to overturn the plans of the devilish actors.
About three hundred battleships full of Kiushu knights, which had left Dazai-fu, were just approaching the Ghenkai Sea from the westward. The plan of the flotilla was to attempt a fierce night raid on the Mongol armada, and to burn down the great sea castles into a watery grave. It was indeed a splendid plan. They were simply open boats, each having about twelve men on board; but the crews were all men skilled with bows and swords. The whole fleet was divided into six, and one of these divisions — that is, a flotilla of nearly fifty boats — consisted merely of vessels loaded with an immense quantity of dry grass or straw fit for their terrible purpose.
Before the moon rose, the fleet of adventurers was not a great distance behind the great armada, now anchored with all its army on board like a big mountain amidst the sea. The Mongols had no idea of such an attack, though General Hoi-Ton was foresighted enough to think of a night raid from the land; nor did they know anything of a sea battle, as we hinted in a previous chapter, in the same way as the Japanese were totally unacquainted with flank movements.
The silence of night was suddenly broken by an amazing war-shout, raised by the Japanese adventurers who came within a bowshot of the armada, and began to shoot down the sentinels upon the huge Mongol vessels. The consternation of the Mongols is beyond the reach of description. The din of alarming drums and the impetuous cries of the Mongol commanders on the decks harrowed all the souls of those that had been resting in dreams of victory.
Thousands of arrows and guns were indiscriminately discharged upon the night raiders; but none of them was effective, while every shot of the Japanese told. Meanwhile, the fifty boats heaped up with hay were fired, and driven by the sea wind, the horrible boats of flame rushed among the crowded ships of the enemy. All at once the darkness cleared off over the Ghenkai Sea, as the fire-boats advanced here and there towards the Mongol fleet.
The numberless vessels were so brilliantly observable by the reflection of the blazing fires that they became easy targets to the Japanese archers, who could more easily escape the enemy as they floated up and down on the billows. So most of their missiles fell into the sea too far beyond or short of the advancing raiders, who, taking advantage of their enemies' panic, struck and struck their oars over the waves until their bows touched the lofty sides of the Mongol ships that so far had not caught fire.
They were large-decked vessels, with high prows, a clumsy capstan perched at the stern, and oars passing through holes in the sides; they were also provided with a kind of artillery, which could discharge iron balls with a detonation, striking down scores of the enemy. The rowers were protected by bulwarks of timber and matting, and at the prow there was an arrangement of shields from which arrows could be discharged. On the other hand, the Japanese had, as has been said, small open boats without any protection for the rowers, who worked in a group at the stern, and would have been cruelly exposed at the time of retreat.
But the little handful of intrepid men rushed again and again on the enemy's huge ships, which, when approached in the region of their bows, were capable of no offensive action, and could only lie huddled together for mutual assistance. Not only was any trick of manoeuvre impossible, but to their great alarm terrible fire was spreading from ship to ship. Without loss of time the Japanese raiders, one after another, laid their boats alongside any unburnt ship indiscriminately, and committed the crews to their swords and halberds.
Amidst such a melee of horror as the Mongols had never before met with, conditions became still worse for the attacked, for the weather changed. There came a storm, which stirred up the sea and air so terribly that destruction overwhelmed the great mass of the huge vessels that tossed now high towards the sky and then low in the trough of the sea.
Nature had become an ally of the Japanese, who had cleverly escaped the catastrophe, running into numerous inlets of the sea before the great wind came to complete their work; and there they waited the morning calm, taking undisturbed refuge in the coves and creeks.
As soon as the dawn had come the wind and waves lulled. The Mongol ships visible on the water were only 200, 700 ships having been burnt, wrecked and sunk.
The survivors were seen hoisting their sails in the morning breeze to run away northward, when the Japanese flotilla in ambush appeared on the scene out of their scattered recesses, and without loss of time they set off on the trail of the crippled fugitives, until the Mongol fleet ran into a port of Korea, in the mouth of which it is recorded that the Japanese gave the Mongols a heavy blow and then returned.
Yamada, Nakaba. Ghenko, the Mongol Invasion of Japan. Smith, Elder, & Co., 1916.
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