Foreign Office Files for Japan, 1919-1952

Date reviewed: 2017. 

In 1919, following the Treaty of Versailles that concluded World War I, Great Britain and Japan were close allies, though their relationship was fraying. By 1952, the two countries had fought each other during World War II, and then reunited as allies. This collection of original documents from the United Kingdom’s National Archives, will, when complete, provide a British-based overview of that period, through correspondence, diplomatic dispatches, maps, contracts, summaries of events, and more. At present, documents from the period of 1931 to 1945 are available, and the subsequent and prior periods will be added in 2018 and 2019, respectively.

Searching through the collection uses the familiar AM interface, and the digitization quality is quite remarkable. Tools for viewing, saving, and storing documents are excellent. Handwriting has not yet been converted to searchable text, though extensive subject tags—for countries, places, people, topics, etc.—have been assigned throughout the collection. The set reflects the British Foreign Office’s primary documents associated with Japan in these time periods, and the content includes many typed dispatches sent to London, as well as newspaper clippings, hand-drawn maps, reports, correspondence, and more. Documents are organized by the series and folder structure of the Foreign Office’s originals. The “Chronology” tab, which combines relevant events from across collections, is a particularly nice feature for understanding how a collection’s subject interacts with the rest of the world.

Summing up: Overall, when complete, this collection should be a valuable tool for exploring the British Government’s fraught relationship with its Japanese counterpart

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