Pirates! Tour of the Murakami Clan hangouts

[Hazbones]

I just got back from my 2-day trip hunting down the Murakami Pirates of Shikoku and learned a lot about the clan as well as the places where they fortified and called "home".

The Murakami Clan started out just like any other but it split, one half deciding to go Pirate and the other decided to stay on dry land and take their chances. My goal was to hunt down the truth about the faction that turned to piracy.
After the first split, the family located themselves on an island in the Seto Inland Sea called Innoshima. In the game, this would be a clump of island that stretch from Northwest Shikoku Island up and almost touches Aki and Bingo Provinces. The game shows only a single island but in fact, there are MANY there.

The clan established a castle there as a base of operations. From Innoshima, they began to collect "tolls" from any passing trade ship they could run down. Even though pirates were despised by civilized men, daimyo were quick to hire them as privateers to collect trade taxes and tolls from which the Murakami's shares made them rich.

Attached Pics:
Innoshima Murakami Suigun Castle (Aug 2014)
Murakami Suigun Castle Main Keep
Murakami Mon on building
Murakami family cemetery (actual pirates buried there)
Murakami Suigun Castle as seen from the family cemetery

To be continued...

[Hazbones]

The Murakami Clan had 3 branches and each was named after the island they inhabited. The Innoshima Murakami, Kurushima Murakami, and the Noshima Murakami.
The main Innoshima branch wanted to distance itself from the other 2 and were the only ones to remain somewhat autonomous. The later 2 branches both joined the Mori Clan and made up the majority of the Mori navy making that clan the dominant force in the Seto Inland Sea.

The Kurushima branch was the lesser of the 3 branches but had a sizable navy capable of patrolling the waters around Shikoku. Due to the timing of the tour boat to Noshima, I was not able to visit Kurushima. Nothing remains of that bastion as it was all palisade and wood thus time has long since destroyed the fort.

Attached pics:

Noshima historical map. Note the wood docks which surround the whole island. This pic shows Noshima and Taisaki jima, the watchtower hill.
Murakami Suigun Museum, the very first pirate museum in Japan
A Murakami pirate skiff
1 From left to right; Taisaki jima watchtower (center pic), Noshima castle, Ushima (warehouse base)
2 Taisaki jima watchtower
3 Approach to the loading dock area. This is the main port of the island where pirates unloaded their cargo.

[Hazbones]

Not to worry, we boarded a boat from Ohshima Island and traveled about 5~10 minutes out into the straits to Noshima Island. This was the home of the 3rd and final branch of the Murakami Pirate family. Looking at it today one cannot imagine hundreds or thousands of people living on such a small island group so it is believed that many of the men lived on their boats moored to the docks which surrounded the islands instead. The Noshima fortress is actually made up of 2 small islands (Noshima plus Taisaki islands) and 1 larger one (named Ushima). The whole island group was a floating castle. In fact, the museum has many stories about the archeology on the island and that "Sea Castle" or "Umi-Jiro" was a new type of castle construction that was just now being discovered and classified by professors.

Attached pics:

4 View of Ohshima Island from loading dock area
5 3rd circle (san-no-maru) was the first level of defense. It was only guarded by wood palisades.
6 3rd circle looking up toward the 2nd and 1st circles. You can clearly see the levels of each.
7 2nd circle (ni-no-maru) looking out toward Taisaki jima (watchtower)
8 2nd circle stairs leading up to the Main circle (hon-maru)
9 2nd circle looking down onto the 3rd circle.

[Hazbones]

Noshima was the primary castle island with 3 rings; Primary (hon-maru) where the main structure stood, 2nd ring (ni-no-maru), and 3rd ring (san-no-maru). Below these defensive rings was a large gate on one side of the island and a large flat landing beach used as the primary loading docks. There was a detached outer circle (de-maru) which overlooked the loading docks and the bridge going to Taisaki jima (watchtower). The entire island was encircled by wood docks for mooring boats and large ships. This fortress was built before 1600 so the familiar center keep you'd expect to see at a castle did not exist. Most structures were simple palisade walls and small wood buildings and huts.

10 Main circle looking out toward Ohshima Island
11 Main circle view toward Taisaki jima (watchtower)
12 Main circle view down to docks
13 View from 2nd circle looking toward Ushima Island. 500 yrs before there was a large bridge here spanning the two islands.
14 Stairs down from Main circle to 2nd circle.
15 Looking closely at Ushima Island, you can see the stairs leading up to the different levels.

[Hazbones]

The Murakami's range covered most of southern Honshu and all of Shikoku and Kyushu. The Noshima and Kurushima Murakami branches sided with the Mori and had many victories as part of the Mori army. They fought on land as well as at sea. When Mori was defeated, so too were the Murakami. The two Noshima and Kurushima branches were heavily connected through marriages to the Mori but the Innoshima branch remained at-large. It was not until Toyotomi's invasion of Shikoku that the Murakami Pirates were subjugated and piracy outlawed forever.

Attached pics:

16 View from the 2nd ring (ni-no-maru) toward the outer circle (de-maru).
17 View from the outer circle up toward the main circle (hin-maru).
18 View looking down from the outer circle to the loading dock area.
19 Approach looking toward the main dock and gate of the island. See stairs leading up to the 3rd ring.