⑩ Getting to Know Admiral Yi's Five Great Naval Battles

It's widely known by now that Admiral Yi Sun-sin fought 23 battles and won all 23 -- a commander who never lost.

But when it comes to “Admiral Yi's Five Great Naval Battles,” people disagree on what belongs on the list, and plenty of readers may never have given it a thought at all.

Having studied Admiral Yi for a long time, I can't pass up the chance to talk about his Five Great Naval Battles. Laid out in chronological order, these five battles make it easy to follow the whole story of the seven-year Imjin and Jeongyu Wars alongside Admiral Yi's own story.

One thing I should clarify up front.

Some people name the Battle of Okpo, the Battle of Hansan Island, the Battle of Busanpo, the Battle of Myeongnyang, and the Battle of Noryang as Admiral Yi's “Five Great Naval Battles.” But there is no settled academic consensus on what the five should be.

I left out the Battle of Okpo. It carries great symbolic weight as the Joseon navy's first victory, but in terms of scale -- some 20 panokseon warships against roughly 30 Japanese ships -- or its overall impact on the war, it's hard to place it alongside the other four. In its place, I put the Battle of Jeoldo. After Myeongnyang, the Battle of Jeoldo was the battle that effectively won back Joseon's command of the southern seas.

Weighing the scale of each battle and the impact of its outcome, I'll walk you through Admiral Yi's Five Great Naval Battles as the Battle of Hansan Island, the Battle of Busanpo, the Battle of Myeongnyang, the Battle of Jeoldo, and the Battle of Noryang. Now let's go through these five battles in chronological order.

1. The Battle of Hansan Island (July 8, 1592, by the lunar calendar) -- An Enemy's Ambitions, Caught in the Crane's Wings

After the Japanese navy suffered defeat after defeat following the Battle of Okpo, Toyotomi Hideyoshi ordered his elite naval commander, Wakizaka Yasuharu, to crush Yi. The Japanese fleet had been holding in the narrow channel of Gyeonnaeryang; Admiral Yi drew them out into the open waters off Hansan Island.

Forces: some 55 Joseon panokseon and turtle-ship warships against 73 Japanese ships.

Result: 59 Japanese ships were sunk or captured; Japanese casualties, though the sources vary, are said to have reached roughly 9,000.

This is where the crane-wing formation -- encircling the enemy the way a crane spreads its wings -- was perfected. The defeat wrecked the Japanese plan for a joint land-and-sea advance and protected Jeolla Province, Joseon's breadbasket. Toyotomi Hideyoshi responded by issuing an order banning further naval engagements.

The story of Wakizaka, who fled defeated to hide on a deserted island and survive ten days on seaweed, is told in more detail in an earlier post on this blog, “The Story of Wakizaka Yasuharu.”

2. The Battle of Busanpo (September 1, 1592, by the lunar calendar) -- Striking the Enemy's Heart

After their crushing defeat at Hansan Island, the Japanese navy grew cautious and stopped venturing out to sea. Admiral Yi didn't stop there -- he decided to strike Busanpo itself, the main base of the Japanese navy. The combined navies of the three provinces pushed toward Busanpo, destroying every Japanese ship they met along the way past Mounundae, Hwajungumi, Dadaepo, Seopyeongpo, and Jeolyeongdo.

Forces: the combined fleet of Admiral Yi, Won Gyun, and Yi Eok-gi against roughly 470 Japanese ships anchored at Busanpo.

Result: about 100 Japanese ships destroyed; the Joseon navy lost a beloved commander, the Nokdo manho Jeong Un.

Arriving at Busanpo, they found close to 470 Japanese ships packed along the foot of the hills. Admiral Yi and his fellow commanders formed a long battle line and charged straight in; the Japanese abandoned their ships and climbed the hills, firing muskets and arrows in defense. After a full day of fighting, the Joseon navy smashed roughly 100 Japanese ships. But the cost was not small -- Jeong Un, the Nokdo manho who always fought at the front, was struck by a bullet and killed that day. In a report he later submitted, Admiral Yi mourned his death, and the Nanjung Ilgi records him writing, “The only men I could truly rely on were Jeong Un and two or three others.”

After the Battle of Busanpo -- a direct strike on the enemy's home base -- the Japanese no longer dared to come out and face the Joseon navy at sea.

3. The Battle of Myeongnyang (September 16, 1597, by the lunar calendar) -- A Miracle with Thirteen Ships

When the Jeongyu War broke out, the Joseon navy under Won Gyun's command was annihilated at Chilcheollyang. After enduring service as a private soldier stripped of rank, Admiral Yi returned as Naval Commander of the Three Provinces to find just twelve ships left in his hands. One more was collected at Hoeryeongpo, bringing the total to thirteen. I wrote about this in more detail in an earlier post, “The Disgrace of Chilcheollyang and the Reappointment as Naval Commander of the Three Provinces.”

Forces: 13 Joseon ships against 133 Japanese ships (reportedly some 300 if the ships held in reserve behind them are counted).

Result: 31 Japanese ships completely destroyed and the enemy general Kurushima Michifusa killed; Joseon casualties are said to have been extremely few.

As for exactly where the Battle of Myeongnyang was fought, I believe -- as I already covered in an earlier post, “How Was the Battle of Myeongnyang Won?” -- that the fighting took place not in the Uldolmok strait beneath the Jindo Bridge, where the current is far too strong and the channel too wide, but in the waters off nearby Imhado Island, where the panokseon warships blocked the channel and fought.

For a long time, I honestly couldn't make rational sense of how Admiral Yi, with just 13 panokseon and soldiers whose morale had collapsed, managed to defeat 133 Japanese ships. But standing in the waters off Imhado Island, I was able to understand it rationally, and I've already explained that understanding on this blog -- anyone curious can revisit that earlier post, “How Was the Battle of Myeongnyang Won?”

Admiral Yi fought the first two or three hours of the Battle of Myeongnyang almost entirely alone, aboard his own flagship.

The tactics that day were brilliant, and Admiral Yi's fearless, never-retreat spirit was certainly a key reason for the victory. But as Admiral Yi himself wrote in the Nanjung Ilgi, the truest description of that day's win is probably this:

This was truly a blessing from Heaven.

4. The Battle of Jeoldo (July 19, 1598, by the lunar calendar) -- Winning Back Command of the Sea

Even after Myeongnyang, the Joseon navy's strength remained modest. But Admiral Yi rebuilt panokseon warships at Gogeumdo and trained his men there. The fleet of the Ming admiral Chen Lin joined them later as well, but -- as I explained in an earlier post, “Admiral Yi and Chen Lin, Part 2” -- it was the Joseon navy that actually did the fighting. The Ming navy is said to have held back and watched rather than joining the battle.

Battle situation: when about 100 Japanese ships invaded, the ambush fleet under the Nokdo manho Song Yeo-jong and the main Joseon force struck together.

Result: 50 Japanese ships burned.

After this battle, Admiral Yi -- who had no need to boast of his own achievements -- handed over some 40 Japanese heads to Chen Lin outright. That scene is recounted in “Admiral Yi and Chen Lin, Part 2.” If Myeongnyang was a miracle, the Battle of Jeoldo was a declaration: the undefeated Joseon navy had returned.

5. The Battle of Noryang (November 19, 1598, by the lunar calendar) -- The Final Battle

On the 18th day of the eighth month, 1598, by the lunar calendar, Toyotomi Hideyoshi died.

The Japanese hurried to withdraw, and Ming China wanted to open an escape route and bring the war to a quick close. But Admiral Yi could not simply let the Japanese sail home after seven years of Joseon's people dying. As I quoted in an earlier post, “The Story of Wakizaka Yasuharu,” Admiral Yi is said to have spoken these words:

If only I can defeat this enemy, I would have no regret even if I died this very moment.

Forces: the Joseon-Ming allied navy against somewhere between 300 and 500 Japanese ships coming to rescue Konishi Yukinaga (the sources vary).

Result: a large portion of the Japanese fleet sunk or captured; very few ships are said to have escaped.

In this final battle, Admiral Yi was struck by an enemy bullet and killed.

The story is often told dramatically -- that he took off his armor and was beating the war drum when he was killed -- but as I already explained in an earlier post, “Not the Song of the Sword, but the Song of the Bow,” I don't agree with that account. A man who never set down his bow his entire life would, I believe, have kept shooting arrows until they ran out, and only then picked up the drumsticks at the very end. And Admiral Yi died in battle, leaving behind the words: “The fighting is urgent -- do not announce my death.”

Picture in your mind the moments of these battles -- Hansan Island, Busanpo, Myeongnyang, Jeoldo, and finally Noryang, where he died -- and I doubt there's a more dramatic story anywhere. If you trace Admiral Yi's Five Great Naval Battles through your own mind in order, I think you'll come away with a new appreciation for it as well.

👉 Next post: ⑪ The Nanjung Ilgi: Reading the Extraordinary Hidden in the Ordinary

— Momcheolhak