--- title: '1904 Meiji Japan Navy: Seventy-Seven Brave Soldiers Decide to Die' url: https://propagandaarchive.org/collection/port-arthur-blockships-1904/ description: 'A commemorative print titled ''1904 Meiji Japan Navy: Seventy-Seven Brave Soldiers Decide to Die'' depicts the volunteer crews of Japan''s Port Arthur…' section: Collection --- [Collection](https://propagandaarchive.org/collection/) [![1904 Meiji Japan Navy: Seventy-Seven Brave Soldiers Decide to Die](https://propagandaarchive.org/collection/images/port-arthur-blockships-1904.jpg)](https://propagandaarchive.org/collection/images/port-arthur-blockships-1904.jpg) # 1904 Meiji Japan Navy: Seventy-Seven Brave Soldiers Decide to Die A commemorative print titled '1904 Meiji Japan Navy: Seventy-Seven Brave Soldiers Decide to Die' depicts the volunteer crews of Japan's Port Arthur blockship operation caught in searchlights, rowing toward the harbor mouth they scuttled ships to close. The title frames a costly, largely unsuccessful naval operation as unambiguous heroism, folding the operation's actual results into a single virtue word. - **Date:** 1904 - **Period:** [Pre-1914](https://propagandaarchive.org/collection/#era=pre-1914) - **Made by:** Empire of Japan (Russo-Japanese War home-front print); artist Kuroki Hannosuke - **Region:** [East Asia](https://propagandaarchive.org/collection/#region=east-asia) - **Country:** [Empire of Japan](https://propagandaarchive.org/collection/#country=empire-of-japan) - **Medium:** [Print](https://propagandaarchive.org/collection/#medium=print) - **Issuer type:** [State](https://propagandaarchive.org/collection/#actor=state) - **Regime:** [Meiji Japan](https://propagandaarchive.org/collection/#regime=meiji-japan) - **Leader:** [Katsura Taro](https://propagandaarchive.org/collection/#leader=katsura-taro) - **Audience:** [Domestic public](https://propagandaarchive.org/collection/#audience=domestic-public) - **Purpose:** [Commemorate](https://propagandaarchive.org/collection/#purpose=commemorate) - **Theme:** [War and the military](https://propagandaarchive.org/collection/#theme=war-military) - **Event:** [Russo Japanese War](https://propagandaarchive.org/collection/#event=russo-japanese-war) - **Techniques:** [Glittering generalities](https://propagandaarchive.org/techniques/glittering-generalities/) - **Source:** Identified Openly sourced: the speaker is who they say they are - **Source:** [Wikimedia Commons](https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:1904_Meiji_Japan_Navy_seventy_seven_brave_soldiers_decide_die_company_get_in_the_transportation_ships_and_themselves_sink_is_picture_stoppaged_Port_Ryojun_LCCN2009631611.jpg), retrieved September 28, 2026 - **Rights:** Public domain (per Wikimedia Commons) Library of Congress Catalog: https://lccn.loc.gov/2009631611 Image download: https://cdn.loc.gov/service/pnp/jpd/02500/02525v.jpg Original url: https://www.loc.gov/pictures/item/2009631611/ ## Text on the object Original (Multiple) · read from the image, not independently checked ``` 大日本海軍決死隊七十七勇士旅順口閉塞之光景 二月廿四日 勅語 [illegible — dense vertical text in the boxed inset] 日露戦役大殺絶紀念画 第六号 [illegible — smaller vertical text beneath the series title, right edge] [illegible — publisher's imprint, bottom left] 1904 Meiji Japan Navy seventy seven brave soldiers decide die coorpony get in the transportation ships and themself sink is picture stoppaged Port Ryojun ``` English translation (machine translation by Claude, not verified by a fluent reader) ``` Great Imperial Japan Navy Death-Defying Squad of Seventy-Seven Brave Soldiers: The Scene of the Blockading of the Port Arthur Harbor Mouth February 24 Imperial Rescript [illegible] Russo-Japanese War Great Battle Commemorative Picture, No. 6 [illegible] [illegible] (The final line is the print's own English-language caption, already in English and reproduced above exactly as printed on the object, unedited.) ``` This is a photograph/scan of a woodblock or lithograph print with dense vertical Japanese text (an imperial-rescript inset and series/publisher information) too small to read reliably at this resolution; only the large title, the date, and the print's own garbled English caption at the bottom are transcribed with confidence. The 'Multiple' language reflects the print's mix of Japanese text and an English caption printed on the same sheet. [← Японский Император и его лукавые доброжелатели (The Japanese Emperor and His Cunning Well-Wishers): Russian Russo-Japanese War print](https://propagandaarchive.org/collection/japanese-mikado-cunning-well-wishers-1904/) ["Il congresso socialista di Bologna" (L'Asino cover, 1904) →](https://propagandaarchive.org/collection/lasino-congresso-socialista-bologna-1904/) ## Using the same techniques - [Gold solidus of Constantine I, reverse RESTITVTORI LIBERTATIS](https://propagandaarchive.org/collection/solidus-constantine-i-restitutori-libertatis-0313/) (0313 · Glittering generalities) - [Gold solidus of Justinian I, reverse VICTORIA AVGGG with Victory holding a Christogram staff](https://propagandaarchive.org/collection/solidus-justinian-i-victoria-avggg-0538/) (0538 · Transfer, Glittering generalities) - [Frontispiece to Eikon Basilike, The Pourtraicture of His Sacred Majestie in his Solitudes and Sufferings (Hollar, 1649)](https://propagandaarchive.org/collection/eikon-basilike-frontispiece-hollar-1649/) (1649 · Transfer, Glittering generalities) - [Trois Tetes sous l'meme bonnet (three heads under the same cap)](https://propagandaarchive.org/collection/trois-tetes-sous-le-meme-bonnet-1789/) (1789 · Plain folks, Glittering generalities) - [Proclamation by the Queen in Council, to the Princes, Chiefs, and People of India (printed sheet, Allahabad, 1 November 1858)](https://propagandaarchive.org/collection/queens-proclamation-to-the-people-of-india-1858/) (Nov 1, 1858 · Glittering generalities, Scapegoating) - [The Great Battle of Ansong Ford: The Valor of Captain Matsuzaki](https://propagandaarchive.org/collection/ansong-ford-toshikata-1894/) (1894 · Glittering generalities) - ['The Congress Cross or "Swastik"' (Pickings from the Hindi Punch, Bombay, February 1896)](https://propagandaarchive.org/collection/hindi-punch-congress-swastik-1896/) (Feb 1896 · Transfer, Glittering generalities) - [Un combate en el río Zapote (A Fight on the Zapote River), Blanco y Negro](https://propagandaarchive.org/collection/un-combate-en-el-rio-zapote-1898/) (Jul 9, 1898 · Transfer, Glittering generalities)