HistoryExtra
type: channel
link: https://www.historyextra.com
description: Home of Britain’s bestselling history magazine and award-winning podcast
date: 2025-09-04T09:27:38.000Z
update period: hourly
update frequency: 1
update base: 2000-01-01T12:00+00:00
items: After Hiroshima: the atomic plague
items: Was the atomic bombing of Hiroshima and Nagasaki by the US in WW2 justified?
items: Why is a mythical catfish to blame for earthquakes in Japan?
items: History's greatest cities: Tokyo
items: Who is Yasuke? The true story of the African who became Japan's first black samurai
items: Tokyo’s devastating 1923 earthquake
items: The real John Blackthorne in Shōgun: the true story of samurai William Adams, the first Englishman in Japan
items: The Great Kantō earthquake: a 1923 disaster that left Tokyo in ruins
items: What happened to Hiroshima after it was bombed in 1945? How many people died?
items: WW2 timeline: 20 important dates and milestones you need to know

After Hiroshima: the atomic plague
type: item
date: 2025-09-08T08:00:06.000Z
subject: Membership
subject: Period
subject: Second World War
subject: A big day in history
subject: Death
subject: Hiroshima
description: In the wake of the nuclear attacks on Japan, the official Allied line was that radiation sickness was not a danger. Yet, as Steve O’Hagan reveals, the first western journalist to witness the effects on the people of Hiroshima told a very different story
encoded: At 6am on 2 September 1945, Australian journalist Wilfred Burchett boarded a crowded train heading south-west from the wreckage of war-ravaged Tokyo. He was disobeying strict orders that no westerners should venture outside the Japanese capital – and, though he did not yet realise it, he was undertaking the most momentous journey of his life. The Second World War had ended. However, Japan had not formally surrendered, and American occupation was still to come. Japan’s cities lay in ruins, and Burchett couldn’t even be sure that the train line to his destination, over 400 miles away, was intact. He was also alone and in great danger – hence the Colt .45 pistol in his suitcase. Resentment towards the Allies ran high. Crammed around Burchett in his carriage were Japanese Army officers bearing samurai swords. Although he spoke almost no Japanese, Burchett could feel the animosity in the soldiers’ venomous stares. Also among the passengers was an American priest, who nervously warned Burchett that one wrong move could cost them their lives. Should they smile or shake hands, it could be taken by the Japanese officers as a sign of gloating over the Japanese surrender to the Allies that was being formalised later that day. Burchett later recalled glancing nervously at the soldiers: their hands seemed to toy with the hilts of their swords. As the train plunged in and out of long, dark tunnels, he was convinced that he could hear the sound of steel being unsheathed from scabbards. Thankfully, the assault he feared never came. But even as the train reached its destination some 20 hours after setting out, his tension did not abate. He was arriving in Hiroshima – the city that, four weeks earlier, had been nigh obliterated by the world’s first ever nuclear bomb attack. In one of the 20th century’s most remarkable feats of investigative reporting, Burchett was about to become the first western journalist to bear witness to the aftermath of a nuclear explosion. A scramble to contr…

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Was the atomic bombing of Hiroshima and Nagasaki by the US in WW2 justified?
type: item
date: 2025-05-27T14:00:42.000Z
subject: 20th Century
subject: Period
subject: Second World War
subject: Debate
subject: Evergreen
subject: Hiroshima
description: For years debate has raged over whether the US was right to drop two atomic bombs on Japan during the final weeks of the Second World War. The first bomb, dropped on the city of Hiroshima on 6 August 1945, resulted in a total death toll of around 140,000. The second, which hit Nagasaki on 9 August, killed around 50,000 people. But was the US justified? We put the question to a panel of expert historians...
encoded: The atomic bombings of Hiroshima and Nagasaki by the United States in August 1945 brought the Second World War to a sudden and devastating close, and sparked a moral and historical debate that has continued since. Well over 100,000 people, most of them civilians, were killed instantly or in the immediate aftermath, with many more suffering from long-term effects of radiation exposure. The decision by US president Truman to authorise the use of nuclear weapons against Japan was unprecedented. It marked the first (and so far only) time that atomic bombs have been used in warfare. The justification offered at the time was that the bombings would force Japan’s surrender and avoid a prolonged and bloody invasion of the Japanese mainland. Yet the question remains: was the atomic bombing of Hiroshima and Nagasaki justified? Historians continue to debate the military necessity, political motivations and moral implications of the bombings. Was it a strategic decision to end the war quickly and save lives? Or a demonstration of power aimed as much at the Soviet Union as at Japan? Here, a panel of historians offers their perspectives on one of the most controversial chapters of the Second World War, and considers whether the US was right to bomb Japan in 1945. Was the bombing of Hiroshima and Nagasaki justified? “Yes. Truman had little choice” – Antony Beevor Few actions in war are morally justifiable. All a commander or political leader can hope to assess is whether a particular course of action is likely to reduce the loss of life. Faced with the Japanese refusal to surrender, President Truman had little choice. His decision was mainly based on the estimate of half a million Allied casualties likely to be caused by invading the home islands of Japan. There was also the likely death rate from starvation for Allied PoWs and civilians as the war dragged on well into 1946. Read more | The Manhattan Project: your guide to the building of the first atomic bomb What Truman did not …

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Why is a mythical catfish to blame for earthquakes in Japan?
type: item
date: 2025-02-07T09:36:31.000Z
creator: Jonny Wilkes
subject: General History
subject: Period
subject: Evergreen
description: According to Japanese mythology, the thrashing of a giant subterranean catfish causes the earthquakes that wreak havoc on the country. Far from being a feared or hated monster, however, this catfish can also be a force for good
encoded: Japan is no stranger to earthquakes. Located on the Ring of Fire, a seismically active area around the edge of the Pacific Basin, the country experiences around 2,000 quakes every year and around 20 per cent of all the world’s seismic events over a magnitude of six on the Richter Scale. Long before scientific explanations, Japanese folk myth came up with its own reasons to explain why the ground could suddenly and violently shake. At first, the blame was placed on dragons or serpents; then in the 17th century, it shifted to a creature called Namazu. Who is Namazu, the Earthshaker? Namazu is a giant catfish believed to live in underground rivers and seas beneath Japan and caused earthquakes by rubbing its body against the rocks or thrashing its mighty tail. In Japanese myth, the thunder god Takemikazuchi did manage to subdue and restrain the creature by pinning the head down with a stone (though in some versions, he thrust a sword through the catfish’s head.) The stone, kaname-ishi, is so large that its uppermost tip can supposedly be seen on the earth’s surface, sticking out of the ground at the Kashima Jingu shrine in Japan’s Kanto region. When Takemikazuchi becomes distracted, however, or is called away to an annual gathering of the gods, Namazu is able to wriggle around. That’s enough to bring about an earthquake. Read more | Dragons: from mythological beasts of history to the fire breathers of fantasy Images of symbolic catfish in Japan date back to the 15th century, and the animal may have been chosen as the mythical harbinger of destruction as the result of a widely held belief among Japanese fishermen. Apparently, they would observe catfish acting strangely right before a seismic event. Today, the catfish is used as the logo for early earthquake warnings sent out by the Japan Meteorological Agency, and also appears on the road signs to let drivers know which highways will be shut in the event of a quake. Which earthquakes have been blamed on Namazu? It was af…

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History's greatest cities: Tokyo
type: item
date: 2024-06-08T11:16:44.000Z
creator: Paul Bloomfield
subject: General History
subject: Membership
subject: Period
subject: History's greatest cities podcast series
description: Christopher Harding explores the unsettled story of the current capital of Japan, from devastating earthquakes to its prominence under the ruling shoguns
encoded: In episode two of our series exploring the great historical cities of Europe, Africa, Asia and the Americas, travel writer Paul Bloomfield is joined by Dr Christopher Harding as they delve into the fascinating, yet often turbulent, story of Tokyo. Together, they’ll visit key sites where major events unfolded – from exploring its medieval origins, and its growth as the base of the ruling shogun, to considering the major social and political upheavals of the 19th and 20th centuries. Along the way, they also meet some of the major figures who played pivotal roles in the development of what's now known as Tokyo.

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Who is Yasuke? The true story of the African who became Japan's first black samurai
type: item
date: 2024-05-17T12:50:49.000Z
creator: Thomas Lockley
subject: Period
subject: Tudor
subject: Historical people
subject: TV interest
description: In a land wracked with conflict, the arrival of an imposing black man caused uproar. Thomas Lockley explores the Japanese sojourn of the first African samurai...
encoded: Yasuke was a man of African origin who arrived in Japan in the late 16th century, and is widely held to have been the first and only black samurai (though not the only foreign samurai, lest we forget William Adams, the inspiration for Shōgun's John Blackthorne). Now Yasuke is set to be one of the playable characters of Assassin's Creed: Shadows, with the upcoming installment of the time-hopping series taking us to feudal Japan. Unlike most Assassin's Creed protagonists, Yasuke is a real historical figure. Here, historian Thomas Lockley explores the African samurai's life. View oEmbed on the source website Who was Yasuke? This man known to history as Yasuke (possibly a Japanese corruption of Isaac) was most likely a member of the Jaang (Dinka) people, of what’s now South Sudan, who had been trafficked to India as a boy. There he entered the service of the chief Jesuit in Asia, Alessandro Valignano, who was on an inspection tour of the Indies. Valignano’s ultimate destination was Japan, home of the most successful mission in Asia, where he arrived in 1579 with his bodyguard and valet, Yasuke. The first record of Yasuke in Japan describes a 1581 visit to Kyoto, then the country’s capital. En route the Jesuit’s party passed the port city of Sakai, where huge crowds clamoured for a glimpse of the African; buildings collapsed under the weight of spectators, and the Jesuit procession was severely disrupted. In order to escape, Yasuke had to ride a horse through the throng of enthralled locals. He was not only the first African they had seen but was, by Japanese measures, a ‘giant’ – 188cm tall – good looking, intelligent and entertaining, with the strength of 10 men. And, because the Buddha was often portrayed with black skin, many saw him as a divine visitor. That raucous reception was repeated in Kyoto, where thousands turned out to witness his arrival. He took refuge in the Jesuit church but the mob broke down the doors, demanding to see him; some spectators were even c…

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Tokyo’s devastating 1923 earthquake
type: item
date: 2024-04-04T09:47:51.000Z
subject: 20th Century
subject: General History
subject: Membership
subject: Period
description: Christopher Harding revisits the catastrophic earthquake that levelled much of Tokyo more than 100 years ago
encoded: On 1 September 1923, the streets of Tokyo began to shudder. It was the first warning sign that something terrible was coming – a devastating earthquake that would level much of the city. But, as historian Dr Christopher Harding tells Ellie Cawthorne, the Great Kantō earthquake wasn’t just a natural disaster – it also exposed deep lying social and political divides. Read more from Chris Harding: The Great Kantō earthquake: a 1923 disaster that left Tokyo in ruins View Green Video on the source website

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The real John Blackthorne in Shōgun: the true story of samurai William Adams, the first Englishman in Japan
type: item
date: 2024-02-27T15:45:50.000Z
creator: Kev Lochun
subject: Elizabethan
subject: Period
subject: Trends-Entertainment
subject: TV interest
description: If you look at the life of Western samurai William Adams, you’ll realise that the character of John Blackthorne in feudal Japanese drama Shōgun is not entirely a work of fiction
encoded: Samurai and skulduggery abound in FX’s showpiece period drama Shōgun, which transports viewers to the treacherous world of feudal Japan at the dawn of the 17th century. The series, streaming on Hulu in the US and Disney+ in the UK, is based on James Clavell’s 1975 historical-fiction novel of the same name. Much of the story is told from the view of John Blackthorne (played by Cosmo Jarvis), an English navigator who washes up on the shores of Japan in 1600 and finds himself in a land on the brink of civil war. But though the plot particulars of Shōgun are a work of imagination, did you know that John Blackthorne is based on a real person? Who is the real John Blackthorne? The character of John Blackthorne in Shōgun is loosely inspired by William Adams. He is the first Englishman believed to have set foot in Japan, and considered one of the few Western samurai. Just as Blackthorne makes an ally of the warlord Yoshii Toranaga (Hiroyuki Sanada) in the drama, Adams became a trusted advisor to the real figure who inspired the character of Toranaga, a warlord named Tokugawa Ieyasu. Iesyau would come to rely on Adams as a trade and diplomatic advisor after becoming shōgun, granting him land, the revered title of hatamoto, and a pair of swords to indicate his status as a samurai – though he was not a warrior. Who was William Adams? William Adams was born in September 1564 in Gillingham, Kent. Little is known of his youth, but much of what we do know comes from Adams’ own hand, in the form of a letter addressed to ‘Unknown friends and countrymen’ that he wrote in the Japanese port of Hirado in 1611. We know that, aged 12, he was apprenticed to a Nicholas Diggins in Limehouse, London, where he learned nautical navigation, astronomy and shipbuilding. He remained there until he was 24 – the year of the Spanish Armada. That was 1588. Adams signed up to Francis Drake’s navy, with Adams listed aboard the supply ship Richard Duffylde; whether he actually fought in the battle is uncl…

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The Great Kantō earthquake: a 1923 disaster that left Tokyo in ruins
type: item
date: 2023-08-31T06:56:52.000Z
creator: Dr Christopher Harding
subject: 20th Century
subject: Period
description: In 1923, at a time when a reinvented Japan had bloomed as a global power, a violent earthquake razed the country's bustling imperial capital and killed more than 100,000 people. Christopher Harding explores the events and aftermath of the disaster – and its pivotal cultural and physical legacy
encoded: Shortly before noon on 1 September 1923, people in Tokyo and the nearby port city of Yokohama felt the ground beneath them shake. It was not especially unnerving: this region of Japan, the Kantō Plain, stood at the meeting point of four tectonic plates. Tremors were common, and usually passed after a few seconds. On this occasion, though, they continued – for five seconds, then 10 – and were so powerful that people were forced to reach out to steady themselves and catch possessions as they fell. After around 15 seconds, side to-side movement suddenly gave way to something much worse: violent vertical convulsions of such devastating power that they could be felt as far away as Spain in one direction and California in the other. In past centuries, some in Japan had associated earthquakes with the restive movements of a giant catfish living deep within the Earth. People in Tokyo and Yokohama now gained a visceral, terrifying sense of why that belief might have taken root. The shockwaves caused the ground beneath their feet to undulate. Objects did not just fall – they jumped off the floor, accompanied by an angry, ominous rumble that was soon drowned out by the noise of brick and concrete buildings collapsing, tiles crashing from roofs and people shouting and screaming. The cacophony briefly gave way to an eerie quiet as people took in what had happened. Stepping out of homes or shops to survey the landscape around them, they began to think of relatives and friends – and the need to escape. As the first of many hundreds of aftershocks arrived, the streets of Tokyo filled with people trying to flee to the countryside. The prospect of further tremors to come was worrying enough; far worse was the peril that some could already smell on the air: fire. Tokyo: centre of a revitalised nation In 1923, Tokyo was a city in transition. Barely half a century before, in 1868, a cadre of ambitious young samurai had led an armed revolt, overthrowing the Tokugawa shogunate. Their visi…

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What happened to Hiroshima after it was bombed in 1945? How many people died?
type: item
date: 2023-07-22T06:05:00.000Z
subject: 20th Century
subject: General Modern
subject: Period
subject: Second World War
subject: Hiroshima
description: Some 78,000 people were killed instantly when the US dropped an atomic bomb on the city of Hiroshima in Japan on 6 August 1945. Those who survived suffered radiation sickness and severe burns – and the city was utterly destroyed. Jason Goodyer of BBC Science Focus reveals the devastating aftermath of bombing and explains the science behind it...
encoded: The US produced the first nuclear weapons during the Second World War following extensive scientific research dubbed the Manhattan Project, led by J Robert Oppenheimer. When they dropped two bombs on the Japanese cities of Hiroshima and Nagasaki in 1945, the world had never experienced anything like it before. The dropping of the device – codenamed 'Little Boy' – on Hiroshima on 6 August 1945, claimed the lives of an estimated 140,000 people. What happened when the bomb struck Hiroshima? One second after the bomb struck on the city of Hiroshima, a huge fireball 280m in diameter erupted with a core temperature of more than 1,000,000 degrees Celsius. Heat rays from the explosion raised surface temperatures of everything in their path to more than 3,000 degrees Celsius – more than twice the melting point of iron. Read more | Before the atomic bombs, the USA hit Japan with one of the most overlooked (but deadly) campaigns in WW2 This sudden and extreme rise in temperature rapidly expanded the air around it, generating a blast that travelled faster than the speed of sound. Then, a drop in air pressure in the space behind the blast caused a backdraft powerful enough to burst the eyeballs and internal organs of anyone in its path. Almost everyone within one kilometre of the hypocenter was killed instantly. Those further out were pelted with bits of the city’s buildings, and badly burnt by the extreme heat, giving rise to the characteristic keloid scars – large overgrown tissue produced when the body creates too much collagen. The scar becomes larger than the initial wound. Read more | The countdown to Hiroshima: the 24 hours before the world changed Most of the radiation generated by the blast took the form of gamma rays, but 10 per cent was made up of neutron waves. Both are types of ionizing radiation that are capable of causing alterations to DNA, though neutrons are much more dangerous. Around 10 per cent of Little Boy’s 64kg of uranium was eaten up by the initial fiss…

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WW2 timeline: 20 important dates and milestones you need to know
type: item
date: 2022-05-17T09:02:00.000Z
subject: 20th Century
subject: Period
subject: Second World War
subject: Evergreen
subject: Second World War battles
description: Lasting six years and one day, the Second World War started on 1 September 1939 with Hitler's invasion of Poland and ended with the Japanese surrender on 2 September 1945. Here, we trace the timeline of a conflict that engulfed the world, with expert insight from Professor Jeremy Black and the late Terry Charman on 20 key milestones…
encoded: The Second World War was the deadliest and most destructive global conflict in history, claiming the lives of more than 50 million people. Adolf Hitler started the war in 1939 when his German forces invaded Poland. When did WW2 start? 1 September 1939 When did WW2 end? 2 September 1945 | Read more about the end of WW2 Which countries were involved? WW2 involved almost every part of the world. But the key players were the Axis powers on one side (Germany, Italy, and Japan) and on the other side the Allies (France, Great Britain, the United States, the Soviet Union, and, to a lesser extent, China) How many people died? It has been estimated that 50 million soldiers and civilians died in WW2 Why did WW2 happen? We can now say without equivocation that this was Hitler’s war, say expert historians including Professor Richard Evans, Sir Ian Kershaw and Laurence Rees | Read more about why WW2 happened Read on for a timeline for a list of the most important dates and milestones of WW2… Clash near the Marco Polo Bridge, close to Beijing, 7 July 1937 The triggering of the full-scale war with China that lasted until 1945 began with an obscure clash involving a Japanese unit on night manoeuvres near the Marco Polo Bridge southwest of Beijing on the night of 7–8 July 1937. The Japanese felt the nation’s honour had been challenged and sent fresh forces to the region. Hardliners in the Japanese army used the incident to press for a settlement of China on their terms, while the Chinese nationalist leader, Jiang Jieshi, was unwilling to propriate Japan. As a result, an intractable struggle began that greatly weakened both sides. Large-scale conflict broke out toward the end of July, and Beijing was occupied on 29 July. By Professor Jeremy Black WW2 | The Big Questions Member exclusive | Historian and broadcaster Laurence Rees explains major moments of the global conflict in this five-part series. Listen to all episodes now The German invasion of Poland, 1 September 1939 The Second W…

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