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Hugh Fraser (February 22, 1837 – June 4, 1894) headed the British Legation in Tokyo as Minister Plenipotentiary and Envoy Extraordinary in the final stages of the negotiations which led to the signing on July 16 1894 of the revised treaty (called the Anglo-Japanese Treaty of Commerce and Navigation) between the United Kingdom and the Empire of Japan. This replaced the 'unequal treaty' signed by James Bruce, 8th Earl of Elgin in 1858 and led to the abolition of extraterritoriality in Japan in 1899. Thus was Japan freed from the semi-colonial status imposed by the unequal treaties signed with foreign countries.
Life of Hugh Fraser
Hugh Fraser came from the Balnain (Inverness) branch of Clan Fraser, Scotland.
He was born on 22 February, 1837, and sent to Eton College from 1849 to 1854. He was appointed to the British legation in Central America in September 1862.
Hugh Fraser later served in Stockholm, Beijing and Rome. In 1874, he met and married Mary Crawford in Italy.
She is better known than her husband for her book A Diplomatist's Wife in Japan: Letters from Home to Home.
Funeral
Mr. Fraser died aged 57 in his post at Tokyo and was buried on June 6, 1894 in the foreigners' section of the municipal cemetery at Aoyama in central Tokyo. The coffin was carried out of the British Legation at 3.00 pm, and reached St. Andrew's Church at 4.00 pm. Many mourners passed the coffin, including Japanese government ministers and all the Foreign Representatives.
The ceremony was arranged by Josiah Conder, the British architect. Obituaries were published in The Japan Weekly Mail and the Nichi Nichi Shinbun, a semi-official Japanese newspaper. The latter stated: "The singularly just and impartial views taken by him on all occasions were erroneously supposed...to be unwarrantably friendly to Japan....In private life, he was kind, modest, and reserved, winning the respect and love of everybody, both Japanese and foreign, that came into close contact with him. A man of firm resolution, he was never moved from the path of duty by the clamours of his nationals in the settlements."
Current issue
Many of the graves at the Aoyama cemetery, including Hugh Fraser's, are currently (2005) under threat of removal and reburial elsewhere for non-payment of maintenance fees. The deadline is the end of September 2005. Other famous persons buried in the foreign section include Captain Francis Brinkley, Guido Verbeck, Henry Spencer Palmer, Edoardo Chiossone, Joseph Heco and Edwin Dun.
The Foreign Section Trust [1] has recently been formed to campaign to preserve the foreign part of the cemetery. Another photograph of Hugh Fraser's grave with the Japanese notice of impending removal and reburial is here.
Update: it seems that the graves are no longer under threat. See this report from the Asahi Shimbun, October 20, 2005.
See also
- Heads of the United Kingdom Mission in Japan
- Anglo-Japanese relations
- Foreign cemeteries in Japan
References
- 'Hugh Fraser, Minister to Japan, 1889–94' by Sir Hugh Cortazzi, Chapter 6, British Envoys in Japan 1859–1972, edited by Hugh Cortazzi, (Global Oriental, 2004) ISBN 1-901903-51-6 . See here.
External links
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