Born in Edo as the second son of Okamura Yoshimichi, a shogunal retainer. Because his father lost his post after an incident and became a masterless samurai, Shihei and his siblings were taken in by their uncle Hayashi Jūgo, a doctor, and took the surname Hayashi. In these hard circumstances Shihei threw himself into study.
Around this time his elder sister became a consort of Date Munemura, lord of Sendai, and through this tie his elder brother Kazen was taken on as a Sendai retainer. Shihei moved to Sendai with his brother, but he had no stipend of his own and depended on his brother's household. In return he was free to travel and study.
From around this time he repeatedly submitted proposals to Sendai domain on how to restore its finances and how to develop schools to train capable people. But the views of the low-ranking Shihei were hardly ever adopted. Even so, he kept pursuing learning meant to improve the world.
He traveled to Nagasaki for the first time and learned about foreign lands from the Dutch interpreters. Through maps and books he learned that the world had many countries linked by ships crossing the sea. Shihei would visit Nagasaki three times in all, gathering knowledge of the outside world.
He visited Nagasaki again. Around this time he is said to have heard from the head of the Dutch trading post that Russia was extending its power eastward and approaching Japan's north. Shihei felt a strong sense of danger that Japan, surrounded by sea and reachable by foreign ships from any direction, was poorly defended.
Besides making his third visit to Nagasaki, in Edo he associated with scholars versed in Dutch learning and foreign affairs, such as Kudō Heisuke, Katsuragawa Hoshū and Ōtsuki Gentaku. Kudō Heisuke in particular was studying Russia's movements, and Shihei learned much from their discussions.
He wrote the Sangoku Tsūran Zusetsu, an illustrated account with maps of Korea, Ryūkyū, Ezo (Hokkaidō) and the islands around them. It aimed to inform people about the lands and seas surrounding Japan and stressed the importance of defending the north; it was later translated and became known abroad as well.
He completed the Kaikoku Heidan, which set out how to defend a Japan surrounded by sea. He wrote that from Nihonbashi in Edo to China and Holland ran one waterway without borders, and argued that Japan should build ships armed with cannon and strengthen the defense of its coasts nationwide.
No bookshop would publish the Kaikoku Heidan, so Shihei raised the money himself, having the woodblocks cut and so on, and over several years published all sixteen volumes at his own expense. He was driven by a strong wish that as many people as possible should understand the need to prepare for foreign ships.
The shogunate of senior councillor Matsudaira Sadanobu punished Shihei for discussing politics without permission and misleading the people, confiscating his books and woodblocks and confining him to his brother's house in Sendai. Ironically, that same year the Russian envoy Laxman arrived at Nemuro, and Shihei's fears became reality.
Confined, Shihei is said to have composed a verse: "No parents, no wife, no children, no woodblocks, no money, and yet no wish to die," and to have called himself "Rokumusai," the master of six nothings. The story conveys his character, which kept its humor even after losing everything.
He died at his brother's house in Sendai, still under confinement. He was later counted, with Takayama Hikokurō and Gamō Kunpei, among the "Three Eccentrics of the Kansei era." After his death foreign ships began appearing off Japan one after another, and his foresight in urging coastal defense came to be highly valued in the late Edo period.
Ōtsuki GentakuMatsudaira Sadanobu
Motoori NorinagaSugita GenpakuMaruyama ŌkyoUeda AkinariInō TadatakaHanawa HokiichiShiba KokanTsutaya Jūzaburō
People of the Edo period ・ People by period
Based on facts found in textbooks and biographies. Uncertain points are marked as such.