⑳ Why Did the Turtle Ship Fight for Only Three Months? (Part 6, Conclusion)

In Part 5, the turtle ship left its last recorded trace under the name “left assault turtle-ship commander Yi Eon-ryang,” at Ungpo in February 1593. After that, three things happened at once: the naval ban, the building of Japanese fortresses, and the ceasefire talks. From 1593 to 1596, there was no place left for the turtle ship.

And then, in 1597, the turtle ship disappeared in an entirely different way.

July 16, 1597 -- Chilcheollyang

While Admiral Yi, freed from the state tribunal, was serving as a private soldier under General Gwon Yul, the Joseon navy -- now led by the newly appointed Naval Commander of the Three Provinces, Won Gyun -- suffered a near-total, humiliating defeat in a surprise Japanese attack. Five turtle ships went down with the rest of the fleet that day.

Then came September 16 and the Battle of Myeongnyang. Reappointed as Naval Commander of the Three Provinces, Admiral Yi had just thirteen panokseon warships left in his hands. There was no time to build a single turtle ship, and Admiral Yi defeated 133 Japanese ships with only those thirteen panokseon -- no turtle ships at all.

After Myeongnyang, the Joseon navy went on to win a string of major victories in succession -- Jeoldo in July 1598, Noryang in November 1598. All of them fought without a single turtle ship.

What caught my attention was the period after Myeongnyang. If the turtle ship was really such a powerful weapon in battle, why weren't any built between Myeongnyang and Noryang -- the battle where Admiral Yi died?

To find an answer, I set out a few hypotheses and tested them one by one.

First Hypothesis -- There Wasn't Enough Time

Between Myeongnyang and the Battle of Jeoldo, there were eight months. Eight months is no short span -- plenty of time to build a turtle ship if one had truly been needed. And yet none was built during that period.

Between Jeoldo and Noryang, there were another four months. Still, no turtle ship was built.

The “not enough time” hypothesis wasn't a sufficient answer.

Second Hypothesis -- The Japanese Had Acquired Naval Cannon

The turtle ship's great strength was that muskets and arrows couldn't touch it. If the Japanese had equipped their ships with cannon, that strength would have meant far less.

I checked. It wasn't true.

Right up through the Battle of Noryang, the Japanese never managed to mount cannon on their ships. Their only firearm remained the musket, while the Joseon navy operated naval cannon throughout the entire war.

Third Hypothesis -- There Was No One Left Who Could Build One

The name Na Dae-yong, who first built the turtle ship, came to mind.

If he had died after Chilcheollyang, there might have been no one left with the skill to build another turtle ship.

I checked. Na Dae-yong was alive.

He fought in every battle from Okpo through Myeongnyang and Noryang. Even after the war ended, he went on to design new ships. I set this hypothesis aside too.

The Turtle Ship's Core Role

To find the answer, I went back and thought again about what the turtle ship actually did in battle.

Its first job was to meet a large mass of enemy ships head-on and block the charge of those in the lead.

When enemy ships surge forward, if the leading edge is stopped, the ships following behind lose their bearings and bunch up in one place. Ships clustered together become an easy target for the cannon fire pouring out of the Joseon panokseon. And while the turtle ship held off the charging enemy, the panokseon warships would spread out into the crane-wing formation and encircle them. This combination of turtle ship and panokseon was one of Admiral Yi's basic tactics.

The turtle ship's second job was to strike at the enemy commander and break apart the enemy formation. Enemy commanders typically led a large number of ships and issued orders from a tower built on a large ship of their own. This second role, too, required a certain scale of enemy force to be present. In other words, the turtle ship wasn't meant for small skirmishes -- it was a force needed in battles of a certain size, and above all in large-scale engagements.

The turtle ship was an assault vessel. It's easy to assume, then, that it would have been used to chase down and sink fleeing enemies. But that was only possible against an enemy already cornered. Against an enemy fleeing into open water, it wasn't possible at all -- because the turtle ship was a flat-bottomed vessel converted from the panokseon design, while Japanese ships were fast, sharp-hulled vessels built for speed.

At the End of a Long Question

At the start of this series, I laid out my long-standing question: “Why did the turtle ship fight for only three months?” This question began purely out of my own personal curiosity.

But in the course of digging through the sources, I discovered something new -- that the turtle ship left a record at Ungpo in February 1593 as well. Strictly speaking, then, the turtle ship's recorded service runs longer than three months.

Still, that record from Ungpo doesn't compare to what came in 1592. From Sacheon to Busanpo, the three months in which the turtle ship truly distinguished itself with clear, substantial results remain the heart of the story -- so I decided to leave the original title of this series as it was.

The turtle ship was never a ship that fought alone. The mainstay of the Joseon navy was not the turtle ship -- it was the panokseon.

The turtle ship could only do its job with the panokseon backing it up. That's exactly why, after Myeongnyang, Admiral Yi focused on building more panokseon warships all the way until his death at Noryang.

Everyone knows that Admiral Yi operated thirteen panokseon warships at the Battle of Myeongnyang.

But at his final battle, Noryang, the number of panokseon he commanded is estimated at around sixty. And when Admiral Yi was arrested and handed the Joseon navy over to the newly appointed commander Won Gyun, the fleet he passed on is said to have numbered 134 panokseon. Had Admiral Yi been given more time and more resources, he would surely have kept expanding that fleet of panokseon, and built turtle ships again as he had in 1595. But that time and those resources were never given to him.

I think it's time now to set this long-standing question of mine to rest.

“Why did the turtle ship fight for only three months?” I trust you've each found your own answer by now, too.

👉 Next post: ㉑ The Most Feared Enemy: Famine and Plague

— Momcheolhak.