Japanese warship Chōyō

Chōyō Maru in 1868 painting
History
Empire of Japan
Name:	Chōyō Maru
Builder:	C.Gips & Sons, Dordrecht, Netherlands
Laid down:	1854
Launched:	1856
Acquired:	1858
Struck:	May 11, 1869
Fate:	sunk in combat
General characteristics
Type:	Steam corvette
Displacement:	600 t (591 long tons)
Length:	49 m (160 ft 9 in) o/a
Beam:	7.27 m (23 ft 10 in)
Propulsion:	Coal-fired steam engine, 100 hp (75 kW)
Sail plan:	3-masted schooner rig
Speed:	6 knots (6.9 mph; 11 km/h)
Armament:	12 cannon

Chōyō Maru (朝陽^?) was an early sail and screw-driven steam corvette. She was ordered by the Tokugawa shogunate ruling Japan during the Bakumatsu period from the Netherlands and served as a training vessel, and subsequently served with the nascent Imperial Japanese Navy during the Boshin War. She was lost in combat during the Naval Battle of Hakodate Bay.

Since the beginning of the seventeenth century, the Tokugawa shogunate ruling Japan pursued a policy of isolating the country from outside influences. Foreign trade was maintained only with the Dutch and the Chinese and was conducted exclusively at Nagasaki under a strict government monopoly. No foreigners were allowed to set foot in Japan, and no Japanese was permitted to travel aboard. In June 1635 a law was proclaimed prohibiting the construction of large, ocean-capable vessels. However, by the early nineteenth century, this policy of isolation was increasingly under challenge. In 1844, King William II of the Netherlands sent a letter urging Japan to end the isolation policy on its own before change would be forced from the outside.

Following the July 1853 visit of Commodore Perry, and intense debate erupted within the Japanese government on how to handle the unprecedented threat to the national’s capital, and the only universal consensus was that steps be taken immediately to bolster Japan’s coastal defenses. The law forbidding construction of large vessels was repealed, and many of the feudal domains took immediate steps to construct or purchase warships. However, the ships produced within Japan were based on reverse-engineering of designs some decades old, and the ships were already obsolete by the time of their completion. The need for steam-powered warships to match the foreign Black ships was a pressing issue, and the Tokugawa shogunate issued an order to the Dutch for two new warships for the price of 100,000 Mexican dollars each.