Warming Up
Tanya Sehgal, Brown '06
This lithograph depicts the military exercises typical of the American squadron while it was in Japan. The colorful scene shows artillery fire and infantry exercises being performed for Japanese onlookers at Simoda. The great ostentation with which the exercises were being done may simply result from a desire on the part of the Americans to show off and demonstrate their military skills, but perhaps there were also greater diplomatic goals in the minds of the officers. Perry wrote in a narrative of the expedition, "This experience has admonished me that, with people of forms, it is necessary either to set all ceremony aside, or to out-Herod Herod in assumed personal consequences and ostentation. I have adopted two extremes - by an exhibition of great pomp, when it could properly be displayed, and by avoiding it, when such pomp would be inconsistent with the spirit of our institutions" (Matthew Calbraith Perry, Narrative of the expedition of an American squadron to the China Seas and Japan, p. 393).
Perry deemed military exercises to warrant great pomp and splendor and he left no stone unturned. The band played in the right corner of the picture to further the point that the exercises were more of a performance for the onlookers than anything else. Additionally, placing the onlookers in the foreground and the Americans in the background demonstrates that the Americans perceived the event as something performed for the Japanese. With this in mind, the Americans went through their routine in a physical space that was open to viewing from all four sides, so there were Japanese men and women everywhere. Heine went into great detail showing a few of the Japanese men clapping, and another pointing out the magnificence of the spectacle to a nearby child, presumably his son.
The response of the Japanese onlookers was clearly the most important part of this activity, about which Heine wrote, "The speed and precision of our artillery fire, and of our infantry exercises evoked from the Japanese the maximum of admiration and applause" (Wilhelm Heine, With Perry to Japan: A Memoir, p. 159). While the Japanese admired and applauded the Americans, Perry recognized that it was even more important for the Japanese to be slightly intimidated by the strength of his squadron because then they were more likely to accede to his demands. Thus, this picture reveals the strategy of the Americans to impress and awe the Japanese with their military power.