Matthew Calbraith Perry

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• Born: 10 April 1794
• Birthplace: Rocky Brook, Rhode Island
• Died: 3 April 1858
• Best Known As: Commodore Perry, who began Western trade with Japan, 1853

Matthew Calbraith Perry is remembered as the man who opened Japan to American trade and influence in the 19th century. The younger brother of Oliver Hazard Perry, Matthew Perry received his first naval command in 1821. From 1833-43 he commanded the Brooklyn Navy Yard, where he championed steam power for warships. After a few years on the seas, including action during the Mexican-American war, Perry was asked to undergo a voyage to isolationist Japan to initiate trade and diplomatic relations. Using diplomacy backed up by a persuasive show of force, Perry successfully negotiated treaties in 1853 and 1854 that gave the U.S. two coal ports in Japan and guaranteed the humane treatment of shipwrecked U.S. sailors. He returned to the U.S. and served as an administrator while supervising the writing of his Narrative, the story of his mission, published in 1856.

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Matthew Perry, detail of a Japanese watercolour, 1853; in the Chrysler Museum of Art, … (credit: Collection Chrysler Museum of Art, Norfolk, Virginia)

(born April 10, 1794, South Kingston, R.I., U.S. — died March 4, 1858, New York, N.Y.) U.S. naval officer. He followed his brother Oliver Perry into the navy and commanded the first U.S. navy steamship, the Fulton (1837 – 40). He led naval forces in the Mexican War and assisted Winfield Scott at Veracruz. In 1852 Pres. Millard Fillmore sent Perry to head a naval expedition to induce Japan to establish diplomatic relations with the U.S. Concluding that the country's centuries-old policy of isolation would be ended only by a show of force, Perry led four ships into the fortified harbour of Uraga (1853) and convinced the Japanese to accept his message. In 1854 he entered Edo (now Tokyo) Bay with nine ships and concluded the first treaty between Japan and the U.S., which granted the U.S. trading privileges and opened the Far East to U.S. influence.

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Perry entered the U.S. Navy in 1809 as midshipman under his brother, Oliver Hazard Perry, then served on the frigate USS President during the War of 1812, and was wounded when it exchanged fire with the Belvidera. In the 1830s, Perry became a leader in the movement to improve naval education and training and to have the navy adopt steamships. During the Mexican War he directed attacks on Frontera, Tabasco, and Carmen in 1846, and after assuming command of the Home Squadron in March 1847, Perry conducted the U.S. Army's amphibious landing at Vercruz; he also supervised the capture of Tuxpan and the blockade of Mexico's east coast.

After the war, in his famous expedition to open the closed society of Japan, Perry led four U.S. warships into Tokyo Bay on 8 July 1853 and delivered an invitation from President Millard Fillmore to the emperor to open relations with the United States. Returning in February 1854, he signed the Treaty of Kanagawa, providing for friendship and limited trade between the two nations. Ill health overtook the man known as “Old Bruin”; he returned to the United States and spent a year writing his account of the mission before retiring from the navy. Perry died in New York City on 4 March 1958.

Bibliography

• Samuel E. Morison, Old Bruin: Commodore Matthew C. Perry, 1794–1858, 1967.
• John Schroeder, Matthew Calbraith Perry: Percursor of the Steam Navy, in Captains of the Old Steam Navy, ed. James C. Bradford, 1986

Perry, Matthew Calbraith (1794-1858) naval officer and diplomat, born in Newport, Rhode Island. In 1833 he became second officer at the New York Navy Yard and an exponent of educational reform and technological innovation; in 1841 he became commandant of the Yard. The high point of his military career was the Mexican War (1846-48), when with Gen. Winfield Scott he succeeded in capturing the city of Veracruz (1847). In 1852 he began negotiations with Japan and opened that formerly closed nation to the West, making Japanese ports accessible to U.S. ships for provisioning, establishing a U.S. consulate, and eventually seeing the beginning of trade relations between the two countries.

See the Introduction, Abbreviations and Pronunciation for further details.

The American naval officer Matthew Calbraith Perry (1794-1858) is best known for the treaty he negotiated with Japan, which first opened that country to the Western world.

Matthew C. Perry was born on April 10, 1794, in Newport, R.I. After being educated in local schools, he entered the navy as a midshipman in 1809. His first duty was aboard a vessel commanded by his elder brother, Oliver Hazard Perry. He next served aboard a powerful 44-gun frigate, taking part in encounters with two British ships and in a commerce-raiding expedition in northern European waters. In 1813 he was transferred to the frigate United States, which was marooned in New London, Conn., then under blockade by the British navy. He took advantage of the period of inactivity by journeying to New York, where he courted and married Jane Slidell in 1814.

Years of Varied Activity

For the next 17 years Perry was engaged in duties at sea of the widest variety: fighting Algerian pirates in the Mediterranean; carrying American Negroes to Liberia, where a colony of repatriated slaves was being established; transporting (in the schooner Shark, his first command) the American commissioner to the new colony; and hunting down slave traders and pirates. In 1830 he was given command of the sloop Concord and charged with carrying to Russia the new American minister, John Randolph. There Perry was received by the Czar, who offered him the rank of flag officer if he would join the Russian navy. That offer, in the words of Perry's biographer, he "politely but firmly declined."

In 1833 Perry began a decade of shore duty in the New York Navy Yard as second officer, later becoming commander. During those years he made significant contributions to the technological and educational development of the Navy. In 1833 he led in establishing the Naval Lyceum at the yard, which included a museum, reading room, and lectures "to promote the diffusion of useful knowledge" among the officers. He also helped found the Naval Magazine. Some years later he was a member of a board of examiners that prepared the first course for the soon to be established Naval Academy at Annapolis.

If he deserved the title "chief educator of the navy, " Perry also earned the appelation "father of the steam navy, " for it was he who pushed the replacement of sail by steam in the propulsion of war vessels, who helped design both hulls and engine of the new steamships, and who was given command of the first of the Navy's steam warships, Fulton II. It was in that ship that he set up the first naval school of gun practice.

In 1843 Perry took command of the Africa Squadron, newly organized to hunt for slave traders. Three years later, in the war with Mexico, Perry played an important role, leading an expedition in the capture of several coastal cities (using sailors as infantry) and, as commander of the Gulf Squadron, supporting Gen. Winfield Scott's storming of Veracruz. When the war ended in 1848, Perry was put on special duty in New York supervising the construction of ocean mail steamships. Then came the capstone of his career: the mission to Japan.

Opening Japan

Americans had been trading with China since 1844, so a way station in the Japanese islands for purchasing coal and supplies now became imperative. Protection for American seamen engaged in whaling in the northern Pacific Ocean was also needed. Perry carried a letter to the Japanese emperor from the American president requesting a treaty covering those matters as well as the right of Americans to trade in Japanese ports.

Perry set out from Norfolk, Va., on Nov. 24, 1852, with four ships and arrived at Edo (modern Tokyo) on July 2, 1853. He demanded of the Japanese officers who came out to meet his vessel the right to take the President's letter to the Emperor, but he was told he must go to Nagasaki, the only place open to foreigners. Perry refused, and when the Japanese saw his decks cleared for action, they relented. So Perry went onshore and, in an elaborate ceremony, delivered the letter to two princes representing the Emperor and promised to return in 12 months for the answer.

Rumors of French and Russian naval activity in Japanese waters brought Perry back in February 1854 (he had gone only to Hong Kong). This time, his reception was friendly (chiefly because he had seven well-armed ships in his squadron), and the Emperor appointed five commissioners to treat with him. At Yokohama the representatives of the two nations began negotiations and, on March 31, 1854, concluded a treaty which opened two ports, Hakodate and Shimoda, for trade and supplies and guaranteed fair treatment for shipwrecked American sailors.

His mission completed, Perry returned to New York in January 1855, a hero receiving "warm congratulations" from the secretary of the Navy, $20, 000 from Congress, gifts from several cities, and acclaim on all sides. The parties and receptions over, Perry turned his attention to preparing the report of his expedition, which he completed in late December 1857. He died on March 4, 1858.

Further Reading

Samuel Eliot Morison, "Old Bruin": Commodore Matthew C. Perry, 1794-1858 (1967), is the best biography. Arthur Walworth, Black Ships off Japan: The Story of Commodore Perry's Expedition (1946; rev. ed. 1966), is excellent on the Japanese phase.