The opportunity came with strings attached. And whips and chains.
June 20, 1868: The Gannenmono, the “people of the first year,” arrived in Honolulu, Hawaiʻi, marking the beginning of Japanese immigration to the islands during the first year of Japan’s Meiji era.
They came looking for opportunity.
Japan was changing rapidly. The old feudal order was disappearing. For many ordinary people, the future was uncertain.
Recruiters promised work in Hawaiʻi’s growing sugar industry. The pay was said to be four dollars a month, a tempting offer for those hoping to improve their lives.
One hundred forty-eight men, women, and children agreed to make the journey across the Pacific.
They became known as the Gannenmono, the “people of the first year.”
It did not take long for many to regret the decision.
Courtesy of Metropolitan Museum of Art
Commodore Matthew C. Perry, whose 1853 arrival in Edo Bay marked the beginning of the end of Japan’s two-century closed-door policy under the Tokugawa shogunate.
Courtesy of the Cleveland Museum of Art
Emperor Meiji, whose reign marked the Meiji Restoration, a period of rapid modernization that transformed Japan from a feudal society into an industrial world power.
Eugene Van Reed, a Dutch American merchant who recruited the Gannenmono for work in Hawaiʻi. He proceeded with the migration without proper authorization.
Courtesy of Bishop Museum Archives
The Scioto, the British sailing ship that carried the Gannenmono from Yokohama to Honolulu in 1868. The month-long voyage marked the beginning of Japanese immigration to Hawaiʻi.
Not Easy Sailing
Recruiter Eugene Miller Van Reed arranged the migration without formal approval from Japan’s new Meiji government. On May 17, 1868, the group of immigrants departed Yokohama aboard the Scioto, bound for Hawaiʻi’s sugar plantations.
Even before reaching Hawaiʻi, trouble emerged aboard the British sailing ship Scioto.
Some of the recruits were not farmers but laborers, gamblers, and young men from the streets of Yokohama. Fights broke out during the month-long voyage. According to records, several passengers were eventually placed in chains by the ship’s captain to maintain order.
The journey was only the beginning.
Conditions Resembling Slavery
Upon arriving in Hawaiʻi, the immigrants entered a plantation labor system governed by the Masters and Servants Act.
Workers signed contracts that severely restricted their freedom. Leaving a job before a contract expired could result in arrest. Employers were legally permitted to hire bounty hunters to recover workers who fled. Attempts to organize, strike, or collectively protest conditions were treated as criminal offenses.
Plantation supervisors, known as lunas, wielded enormous authority. Workers reported being beaten with whips, punished for working too slowly, or disciplined for failing to understand instructions.
The promised opportunity came with strings attached.
And whips and chains.
From “The Riches and Marvels of Hawaii” by John L. Stevens
The Gannenmono were not the first contract laborers in Hawaiʻi. Chinese workers had arrived years earlier, beginning a pattern of importing labor from across Asia.
Courtesy of the University of Southern California Libraries
The promise was four dollars a month. The reality was long days in the sugar fields under a labor system that sharply restricted workers’ freedom.
Courtesy of the Library of Congress
Plantation housing for Japanese immigrant families in Hawaiʻi. What began as temporary labor contracts often became permanent lives in the islands.
Courtesy of Bishop Museum Archives
Japanese sugar plantation workers. Within a generation of the Gannenmono’s arrival, thousands of Japanese immigrants were working in Hawaiʻi’s sugar industry.
Plantation work was demanding, often requiring long hours under the Hawaiian sun. For many immigrants, life in Hawaiʻi proved far more difficult than recruiters had promised.
Consequences of Resistance
Not all of the Gannenmono accepted their treatment quietly.
In one incident, Japanese workers fought back against a luna who had been whipping laborers in the fields. The confrontation left the supervisor injured.
The consequences were severe.
Three Gannenmono were convicted and sentenced to nearly a year in jail. They were also fined $100, an enormous sum for workers earning just four dollars a month.
For many immigrants, the dream of Hawaiʻi had become something very different from what had been promised.
The First of the First Generation
Only about fifty of the original immigrants ultimately remained in Hawaiʻi. Yet despite the hardships, disappointments, and abuses they endured, the Gannenmono opened a path that millions would follow.
Despite the difficulties, Hawaiian leaders saw value in the immigrants. King Kamehameha V was sufficiently impressed that he encouraged additional Japanese immigration, helping establish a relationship that would continue for generations.
In the decades that followed, Japanese immigrants would help build Hawaiʻi’s plantations, businesses, communities, and political institutions. Their descendants would go on to become soldiers, governors, senators, educators, artists, and community leaders.
The first year was not an easy one. But it was the beginning.
Courtesy of Hawai'i State Archives
The Gannenmono were only the beginning. Thousands of Japanese immigrants followed, bringing not only labor, but families, traditions, and dreams of a better future.
Courtesy of Hawai'i State Archives
King Kalākaua and Japanese officials helped strengthen ties between Hawaiʻi and Japan. The relationship would eventually lead to the large-scale immigration.
Courtesy of Bishop Museum Archives
Matsugorō Kuwata arrived in Hawaiʻi as one of the Gannenmono in 1868. He stayed, married a Hawaiian woman named Meleana, and raised a family.
Courtesy of Bishop Museum Archives
Four of the original Gannenmono photographed in 1922. Few could have imagined in 1868 how profoundly their journey would shape the future of the islands.