Kuchinotsu Port; Its Rise and Fall

Abstract

Kuchinotsu Port lies south of the Shimabara Peninsula and Kuchinotsu is the port town located at the mouth of the Ariake Sea. We can find out the special role the town once played and its rise and fall and how Kuchinotsu ranks among some of the port towns in Nagasaki Prefecture. Kuchinotsu used to be an excellent port naturally favored, but today it is known only as a minor port town. Kuchinotsu Port is an inlet cut deeply between the Hayasaki Peninsula and Uaharu-Atagoyama Basalt Area facing the Hayasaki Strait which has rapids. With its anchorage, 1, 878 square yards (1.57km2), surrounded with such breakwaters as Miyazakiabna and Tobirazaki, Kuchinotsu was a flourishing town as the biggest port town in the Ariake Sea until we had larger ocean-going vessels. Kuchinotsu had been a trading port for the ships authorized by the Tokugawa Shogunate and in 1567, the tenth year of Eiroku, when Portuguese ships came, early European ships from the South poured into port. Chinese traders also visited the town. That is why we have the section in town that gained a name after them. The place where early European ships came to anchor has been designated as a historical site. In 1862, the second year of Bunkyu, the onetime anchorage recovered land from the sea. It was after the Meiji Restoration that the town grew and prospered, as Mitsui Bussan Trading Company in Miike began to ship coal in 1876, the ninth year of Meiji. Miike Coal Mine produced more coal than before with its mines newly developed such as Oura Mine, and so on. (Oura Mine in 1879, Katsutachi in 1885, Kiyaura in 1887) After the trading company took up work in Miike coal in January 1889, the 22nd year of Meiji, new mines such as Miyahara Mine (1895), Manda Mine (1902), Yotsuyama Mine (1918) were developed. All this coal was carried in small boats from a coal yard at Mikawa, Omuta, to Kuchinotsu, where it was transshipped into larger boats. At that time the Ariake Sea had a shoaling beach in the vicinity of Omuta and had a maximum tide range of 6.01 yards (5.5m) insufficient for larger boats to come into port. It was in Kuchinotsu that coal was shipped abroad, -especially to Shanghai, Tientsin and Hongkong-often along with girls who were called “Karayukisan” recruited from poor families by the dealers. Coal handling required much labor. From the neighboring districts some 250 laborers from Minamarima, 100 from Kazusa, and from the town Kuchinotsu 650 worked for shipping coal. It is said that there were over one thousand coal heavers around 1891, the 24th year of Meiji, when the first twenty Korean settlers came. In 1895 approximately 700 people moved to Kuchinotsu from isolated islands in Kagoshima Prefecture; such as Yoronjima Island, Tokunoshima Island, Okinoerabushima Island, Tanegashima Island, Koshikijima Island and so on. They were named Yoron, for the majority of them are from Yoronjima Island. (100 in 1899, 100 in 1900, 400 in 1901). In 1908, the 41st year of Meiji, Yoron School was proviced since there were 738 Yorons. The number of recruited coal heavers reached 1, 124 including their family members. Thirty-four percent of them were settlers from other parts of Kyushu and 88.9 percent of them (i.e. 657 workers) were stevedores. The construction of a harbor in Miike was gradually started while Kuchinotsu was busy shipping coal with coal heavers recruited. The construction of a Miike harbor was started in 1902, the 35th year of Meiji, and completed in 1909, the 42nd year of Meiji. And then Kuchinotsu declined. A modern artificial large harbor could play a better part as a port of coaling, introducing machinery instead of labor. Ships came to anchor in a private harbor those coal mines could directly connect. Only thirty percent of coal heavers in Kuchinotsu moved to Miike.