He did not choose to do so and take passage in the Clove, then on the point of sailing, according to his own account, because of ‘some discourtesies’ received from Saris. The latter, indeed, was unduly suspicious of Adams, and tried to drive a hard bargain with him on the terms of his proposed service. But there were pressing reasons why he should remain, at least for a time, in Japan. He had a Japanese wife and two children, and he was ill provided with money. He was ambitious, too, to discover the north-west or north-east passage to England, and this may have influenced him. In the end he agreed to enter the company's service for 100l. a year, payable at the end of two years. His actual term of service extended from 24 Nov. 1613 to 24 Dec. 1616, and during that time he was chiefly employed in trading voyages and in accompanying the English to the court of the Shogun when they carried up the customary presents or on other occasions. In 1615, in a voyage which was intended for Siam, but which failed in its object, he put into the Loochoo Islands, which had been lately added to the Japanese dominion. The next year he made a successful voyage to Siam, and in 1617 and 1618 he twice visited Cochin China.
In 1616 Adams's patron Iyéyasu died and was succeeded by his son Hidétada, who soon gave proof of hostility to foreigners; and although Cocks states that Adams was in favour with this Shogun also, his influence was evidently of no great weight. The privileges of both English and Dutch were curtailed, and the persecution of Christians, which for some time had practically ceased, now broke out with renewed violence. The English venture in Japan had also by this time proved a failure, and to make matters worse the Dutch declared war and took English shipping and attacked our factory at Firando. Peace was scarcely restored when, on 16 May 1620, Adams died. A little more than three years after, in December 1623, the English factory was dissolved and our countrymen withdrew from Japan. There is no record of Adams's age at the time of his death, but it was probably more than sixty years, as he could hardly have been under forty when he landed in Japan. He left about 500l., which he bequeathed in equal portions to his wife and daughter who survived him in England, and to his son and daughter in Japan. His will was preserved at one time in the archives of the East India Company; but it has now disappeared. He lies buried on the summit of the hill above the village of Hémi-mura (the site of his estate) and overlooking the harbour of Yokosuka. In 1872 Mr. James Walter discovered his tomb with that of his Japanese wife, who survived him thirteen years. Adams's memory lived in Japan. A street in Yedo, Anjin Cho (Pilot Street), was named after him, Anjin Sama having been his Japanese title; and an annual celebration is still held in honour of the Englishman who was ‘in such favour with two emperors of Japan as never was any christian in these parts of the world.’
[Adams's Letters printed in Purchas his Pilgrimes, part i.; Rundall's Memorials of the Empire of Japon (Hakluyt Society), 1850; Hildreth's Japan, 1855; Griffis, The Mikado's Empire, 1876, p. 262; Diary of Richard Cocks (Hakluyt Society), 1883; The Far East Newspaper (Yokohama), vol. iii. No. 1.]
ADAMS, WILLIAM (1706–1789), divine, was born at Shrewsbury 17 Aug. 1706, and at thirteen entered Pembroke College, Oxford. He took his M.A. degree in 1727, became fellow of his college, and, in 1734, tutor in place of Mr. Jorden. Samuel Johnson, born in 1709, had been one of Jorden's pupils; and during his short university career, 1728–9, formed a friendship with Adams which lasted till Johnson's death. In 1730 Adams was presented to the curacy of St. Chad's in Shrewsbury, and ceased to reside. In 1755 he became rector of Counde in Shropshire; and, in 1756, took his B.D. and D.D. degrees in Oxford. He was elected to the mastership of Pembroke, to which was attached a prebend of Gloucester, in 1775, and resigned St. Chad's. He was afterwards made archdeacon of Llandaff. He retained these offices and the rectory of Counde till his death in the prebendal house at Gloucester, 13 Jan. 1789. He married Sarah Hunt, and left a daughter, married, in 1788, to B. Hyatt of Painswick in Gloucestershire. Adams's friendship with Johnson is commemorated by Boswell, to whom he gave some information about their common friend. Adams attended the first representation of ‘Irene’ in 1749. He tried to reconcile Johnson to Chesterfield's incivility in 1754, though at the same time taking a message from Warburton to Johnson approving of his ‘manly behaviour.’ In June 1784 Johnson, accompanied by Boswell, paid a visit to Adams at Oxford. Johnson stayed at Pembroke lodge for a fortnight, and was greatly pleased by the attentions of Adams and his daughter. Adams published some occasional sermons, one of which ‘On True and False Doctrine,’ preached at St. Chad's, 4 Sept. 1769, and directed against the methodist doctrines of W. Romayne, led to some controversy, in which
