William Willis (physician)

This article is about the physician. For other uses of this name, see William Willis (disambiguation).

William Willis
Doctor William Willis
Born	1837 (1837) Ireland
Died	1894 (1895)
Nationality	British
Occupation(s)	doctor, foreign advisor to Japan
Known for	Foreign advisor to Meiji Japan;

William Willis (1837–1894) was a British physician (medical doctor) who joined the British mission in Japan in 1861.

Biography

Willis was born in Ireland in 1837, and studied medicine at Glasgow, Scotland. He volunteered for an assignment at the British legation in Edo, Japan in 1861, where he served as medical officer under Sir Harry Smith Parkes. During the unsettled years at the end of the Tokugawa bakufu and Meiji restoration, Willis treated the British nationals wounded in the Namamugi Incident and the Bombardment of Kagoshima.

Willis later participated to the Boshin war as the head of medical operations for Satsuma domain During the Battle of Toba-Fushimi, he set a military hospital in the temple of Shōkokuji (相国寺) in Kyoto, not far from the frontline. He continued to support the medical operations of the Satsuma side throughout the Boshin War.

Willis was later appointed professor and clinical chief of the Igakko (later the faculty of medicine of Tokyo Imperial University.

In 1870, Willis resigned to become head of the hospital and medical school in Kagoshima at the invitation of Saigo Takamori. The institution later became the medical department of Kagoshima University. With the outbreak of the Satsuma Rebellion in 1877, he returned to Tokyo.

Willis returned to England in 1881, and later spent time with his great friend Ernest Satow in Bangkok, Siam.

According to Satow, Willis was unusually tall at 6'8".

See also

• Anglo-Japanese relations
• Hugh Cortazzi 1985, Dr. Willis in Japan, 1862-1877: British medical pioneer (London: Athlone Press) ISBN 0-485-11264-7
• Denney, John. Respect and Consideration: Britain in Japan 1853 - 1868 and beyond. Radiance Press (2011). ISBN 978-0-9568798-0-6