The Ōmura Martyrs: The Persecution in Ōmura, 1617 to 1630

In the spring of 1617 the young lord of Ōmura (大村) came home from Edo (江戸) under strict orders from the shogun to hunt down priests and their hosts, on pain of losing his domain.¹He had been baptized as a baby, and until then he had quietly let priests escape or return.¹⁹The lord, Ōmura Sumiyori (大村純頼), sent a renegade uncle to Nagasaki (長崎), who hired about forty men to spy out the religious.²⁰¹

In 1617 Ōmura put to death four missionaries, one from each of the four religious orders in Japan, with a Japanese catechist and several lay Christians.²³The Spanish Franciscan Fr Pedro de la Asunción was lured to the village of Kikitsu on April 8 by a man who said a repentant apostate wanted a priest, and was taken to the prison at Kōri (郡).²¹The Portuguese Jesuit Fr João Baptista Machado was betrayed in the Gotō (五島) islands while hearing confessions, and he finished the words of absolution before going out to the soldiers.²²²³He reached Kōri on April 29 with his catechist Leo Tanaka (田中).²⁴²⁵

The jailer's wife, a Christian, secretly carried the priests' letters and what they needed for Mass.²⁶In one letter the friar begged the orders to end their quarrels, "that all may join in lending their shoulders to hold up the building of the new Church" (translated).²⁷The two priests were beheaded on a hillock at Kōri on May 22, 1617.²⁸²⁹As custom required for persons of rank, the headsman was one of the lord's chief officers; the friar died at one stroke, the Jesuit at the third.³⁰³¹

Five days later the Dominican Fr Alonso Navarrete and the Augustinian Fr Hernando de San José set out from Nagasaki to preach openly in Ōmura.³²At Ikiriki (伊木力), 300 apostates were reconciled, among them Rin Tomonaga, the governor who had arrested Fr Pedro.³³The two friars were arrested at Nagayo (長与) and beheaded with Leo Tanaka on the island of Takashima in Ōmura Bay on June 1, 1617.³⁴³⁵To stop pilgrimages, the lord had all four priests sunk at sea in weighted coffins.³⁵²Months later one coffin floated up, holding Fr Pedro and Fr Hernando.³⁶

Rin Tomonaga returned to the faith, confessed it before the lord and was cut down on November 4, 1617.³⁷³⁸On Christmas Day John Miyemon, president of the Rosary confraternity, was executed.³⁹

In 1618 Louis Kitano, a Christian of Ōmura, was martyred there on July 26.⁴⁵

In 1619 the Ōmura prison held missionaries taken the year before, among them the Jesuit Fr Carlo Spinola, together with eight catechists.⁶This was the Suzuta (鈴田) prison, which has its own page.⁴⁰When the guards were ordered to swear by the gods that no food would reach the prisoners, the guard Linus Toyemon refused, saying he could swear only by the true God.⁴¹He was killed on his bed on the night of April 30, 1619, and his wife, who demanded the same death, was jailed with her children.⁴¹⁴⁰

A gentleman, Peter Arizo, sent each prisoner a melon with his name carved on the rind.⁴⁰⁴²The man carrying them was caught, and both men, refusing to give up the faith, were beheaded on June 19, 1619.⁴⁰⁴²That year the Jesuit brother Ambrósio Fernandes died in the prison of cold and hunger.⁴³

On May 22, 1620 Matthias, a catechist of Couros, was tortured and killed at Ōmura.⁷

In 1621 the governor Ficoyemon, who ruled Ōmura for the young lord and had abandoned the faith, began a new persecution.⁸The nobleman Francis Hampei offered to swear loyalty by the true God but not by the kami and buddhas, and he was cut down in the castle of Kubara on June 20.⁸⁴⁴⁴⁵Louis Hansuke, who had hidden a Jesuit brother, was beheaded the same day.⁴⁶⁴⁵

On October 7 Michael Kiroku, a pilot for the Jesuits, and Michael Fukuda, head of a confraternity, were killed.⁴⁷⁴⁸Peter Arasuki, aged 26, was beheaded that day for having received religious.⁴⁹Two days later his mother Justa, his pregnant widow Agatha, aged 17, and his sister Mary, aged 14, were beheaded at the same spot.⁴⁹⁵⁰They went at night dressed as for a wedding, escorted by 300 Christians with whom they shared their rosary beads.⁵¹Cosmas Takashima, aged 68, was beheaded in his own house before his wife and son.⁵²⁵³

On September 12, 1622 eight Dominican and Franciscan prisoners from Suzuta were burned alive in a secluded place about three miles from Ōmura.⁹Earlier that month twenty Ōmura prisoners had been taken to Nagasaki for the Great Genna Martyrdom.⁹⁵⁴The eight were Fr Tomás de Zumárraga, Mancio de Santo Tomás, Domingo Magoshichi, Fr Apolinar Franco, Francisco de San Buenaventura, Pedro de Santa Clara, Juan of Ikeda and Matías Hayashi.⁹Gonroku (権六), who held the shogun's authority over religious executions, sent a deputy, and a Buddhist monk kept urging the dying to invoke Amida.⁵⁵⁹The fires were large, so their torment was short.⁵⁶Fr Franco died last, and when his habit burned away the iron hair shirt he always wore could be seen.⁵⁷

Leo Sukezaemon of Nagayo, who had taken a relic at the Nagasaki martyrdom, was then burned alive with the wood left from the friars' pyres.⁵⁸⁵⁹His wife Mary and his godfather Thomas Genzaemon were beheaded first.⁵⁹⁶⁰The godfather had told the guards, "Leo is my godson, and this is no time to abandon him" (translated).⁶⁰

In 1624 Ōmura beheaded two leading Christians of Nagayo in July and burned five religious prisoners in August.¹⁰¹¹Thomas Nakagawa Magosuke, a farmer who had made his house a church, and Joseph Gonzalez, a boatman who carried Jesuits, were beheaded at Mossuyama on July 10.¹⁰⁶¹The prisoners were the Franciscans Luis Sotelo and Luis Sasada, the Jesuit Miguel Carvalho, the Dominican Pedro Vásquez and the Japanese tertiary Louis Baba.⁶²¹¹On August 25, 1624 they were led with ropes round their necks to a field called Hoko and burned at a slow fire for nearly three hours.⁶³⁶⁴Louis Baba, his bonds burnt through, knelt and kissed the priests' hands.⁶⁴

In 1627 persecution flared again because a list of everyone in Ōmura who had sheltered two Franciscans was found among their goods at Nagasaki.¹²To clear themselves before the shogun, the governors killed about twenty-five people along the coast.⁶⁵On July 29 the Dominican Fr Luis Bertrán and the Japanese brothers Mancio of the Cross and Pedro de Santa María were burned alive, and three Dominican tertiaries were beheaded.⁶⁶⁶⁷A very poor woman named Catherine was taken from her field, stripped in every village for mockery and burned alive with her unborn child on September 19.⁶⁸⁶⁹The three sons of Sixtus Kiyemon were burned at a slow fire on September 4, and their father was beheaded six days later.⁷⁰⁷¹

In 1628 Ōmura gave a large share of the nearly eighty martyrs counted in Japan that year.¹³In May John, a kanbō (helper) of the Jesuit Fathers, and his wife Isabel were beheaded.⁷²⁷³In September many hosts and tertiaries were beheaded or burned, among them Dominic Kurobyoe, majordomo of the Rosary, burned on September 10.⁷⁴⁷⁵

In 1629 two friars, Francisco and Vicente, were arrested, and all their hosts were seized after them.¹⁴In prison the vicar provincial gave the habit of donado (lay helper) or tertiary to many of them, and all refused rewards to give up the faith.¹⁴In December the host Hieronymus Yagoemon was beheaded at Ōmura.⁷⁶

On September 28, 1630 about seventy Christians from the Ōmura prison, most of them boatmen and hosts who had carried or sheltered missionaries, were burned or beheaded.¹⁵¹⁶They were led to a field called Hokonohara (放虎原), a quarter league from Ōmura, where forty were burned two to a stake.⁷⁷¹⁶One woman dressed as if for her wedding, saying she was going to meet her heavenly spouse.⁷⁷The rest were speared or beheaded, among them children of seven and five.⁷⁸⁷⁹Three days later a family of five, hosts of the friars, was beheaded at the same place.⁷⁹

From the first executions, Christians soaked cloths in the martyrs' blood and kept hair, clothing and earth as relics.¹⁷¹⁸A martyr in a family was a title that made it illustrious.⁸⁰The Dominican Jacinto Orfanel wrote that God had chosen one religious from each of the four orders to encourage all the missionaries.⁸¹