As advisor to the Japanese foreign office, Thomas Baty lived much of his adult life in Japan, along with his sister, even during the Manchurian crisis and World War Two, while continuing to pursue his gender activism.
The decoration above is a Japanese honour, awarded by the emperor for special merit in in civil or military fields. Thomas Baty was awarded the third class of the order in 1920, and the second class, in 1936, for his distinguished legal services to the Japanese government. Born in Stanwix, Cumberland, in 1869, Thomas Baty spent much of his adult life in Japan. He lived in Japan from 1916 until his death in 1954, serving the Japanese government in the capacity of legal advisor to the Japanese foreign office. He is of principal interest to this blog for his LGBTQ+ activities, but it is worthwhile taking a sideways look at this intriguing figure who grew up in Carlisle.
For some of the information below, I have drawn upon two comprehensive articles by Peter Oblas, cited in the acknowledgements.
When Thomas took the voyage to Japan in 1916, to take up his post, his mother, Mary, and his sister, Anne, travelled along with him. Sadly, his mother died, not long after their arrival, and her death was noted in the Penrith Observer, “An Old Penrithian Buried in Japan”. Mary was a daughter of the Matthews family in Penrith, and her father had been a watchmaker there. Anne, however, Thomas’s sister, shared house, or rather, houses – they had a ministerial house in Tokyo, and a lakeside retreat near Nikko – until her death in 1944. The Batys had brought the effects from their home in Carlisle with them.
Thomas must have developed an early interest in Japanese culture, for already in December 1902, before he moved to Japan, he is recorded in the Carlisle Journal as giving a lecture in Tullie House, Carlisle, for the Scientific and Literary Society on “Japanese Heraldry and Poetry”. Once installed with his sister, in their house in Tokyo, and with their summer home near Nikko, by Lake Chuzenji, he carried out his duties and took part in the social life there. Thomas and Anne seem to have enjoyed a comfortable life, with pleasant homes and servants. They socialised with Japanese officials and with the expatriate community, while Thomas even took part in sailing races, in his boat on the lake by their summer retreat.
During these years, Thomas continued to publish and to advise the Japanese foreign office. He also pressed on with his genderqueer and radical feminist activities, continuing to edit and write for the journal, “Urania“, under the pseudonym, Irene Clyde, along with his fellow editors. He also wrote a book of essays as Irene Clyde: Eve’s Sour Apples, published in 1934. This book is now very hard to get hold of, but Sonja Tiernan has listed the chapter titles, which sound tantalising: “1. The essence of sex: domination. 2. How it comes. 3. How it must go. 4. Vanishing sex. 5. The dynamics of sex. 6. The humiliation of the body: Clothes and no clothes. 7. The humiliation of the thong: flagellation. 8. What is progress?” Here, sex refers to gender, and relations between the sexes.
It seems also, that Thomas adopted unorthodox ways of living for himself to some extent. He was indeed a vegetarian; he was a member of the Humanitarian League, and became Vice President of the Vegetarian Society. This was at a time when vegetarianism was much more uncommon than it is today. Thomas also adopted feminine modes of dress on occasion. As Peter Oblas notes, the Canadian diplomat in Japan, Hugh Keenleyside, mentions in his memoirs that:
“Like most people, Dr. Baty had his emotional quirks. He was an active transvestite; even when having guests for he would sometimes appear in a flowing and low-necked gown.” (Keenleyside, p. 331)
One of Thomas’s precepts in international law was to be used by Japanese officials in an important controversy, with long term consequences. Thomas espoused the view that a territory without an effective government or controlling authority, was not entitled to be considered a state, and therefore not entitled to have its sovereignty protected in international law and recognised by other nations. This was to be of profound importance when Japanese troops entered and occupied Manchuria in 1931. This area was under Chinese rule at the time. Thomas considered that China did not have a unified controlling force, and so did not qualify as a state; the Japanese influenced province, Manchuria, could be recognised as the supposedly independent state of Manchuko; and that Japanese troops might be there without violating international treaties. Japan was called on to defend its actions before the League of Nations, and rejected demands to withdraw its troops. During this international incident, Japanese officials used Thomas’s legal contributions as part of their defence at the League of Nations, and in 1933, Japan, in fact, left the League. This incident was one of many complex and interlocking developments before World War Two.
When the Second World War did break out, Thomas and Anne stayed on in Japan, even after the declaration of war between Britain, the Us, and Japan in 1941. Thomas had also been exempt in 1941, from having his assets frozen, while those of other British and US nationals were. After the Manchurian incident, the British government had taken the view that Thomas Baty had done it a disservice, rather than otherwise. (Oblas, p.122) Following World War Two, given Thomas’s continuous residence in Japan, and his possible work for that government, Thomas was investigated for treason by British officials. Sir William Eric Beckett, the legal adviser to the British foreign office, believed that Thomas Baty had been treasonous, but also, that he had identified himself so completely with Japan, that he had in effect, become Japanese, and moreover, was an old man – in 1946, he would have been 77. Therefore, it was decided to revoke Thomas’s passport, and remove from him the protections of being a British subject.
Anne, Thomas’s sister died in 1944, and was buried alongside her mother in the Aoyama cemetery in Tokyo. But Thomas lived on until 1954, writing his memoirs, Alone in Japan. He too is buried in Tokyo, by his mother and sister. British newspapers mentioned Thomas’s death, especially after the publication of his will – “No collaborator…He Says in Will” was the headline in the Aberdeen Evening Express, 11 August 1955. Thomas Baty had recorded in his will a lengthy denial of any collaboration with the government of Japan.
In retrospect, it seems remarkable, if not an enigma, how Thomas, who was severe on unthinking masculine aggression which he associated with the fostering of gender stereotypes, and who supported pacifism, as in “Urania” and in Eve’s Sour Apples, should have been part of the unfolding of international crisis. A different light on his character is provided by the fact that in his will also, he left the toys with which he and his sister had used to play when young, to a Japanese friend, Taga Kiku Sama. In 1934, Thomas had given a lecture on the writer, Thomas Carlyle, entitled “Carlyle’s Human Side”, in which he notes with approval how Carlyle “took the side of love and mercy in his attitude towards war, the poor, and the animal creation”.
Thomas was a many-sided character, listing his recreations in Who’s Who as ” ‘music, heraldry, the sea; extreme feminist; would abolish all sex distinctions; conservative; vegetarianism’ ” (Hamer, p. 67). He was also interested in literature, and in localism, the creations of communities of manageable size.
It is impossible to reach a finished view on this complex and enigmatic figure. Perhaps living in Japan gave Thomas Baty/Irene Clyde personal lifestyle freedoms, which might have been harder to realise had he remained in Britain, for pursuing his projects of feminism and of gender transgression.
Acknowledgements:
Peter Oblas. “Britain’s First Traitor of the Pacific War: Employment and Obsession”, New Zealand Journal of Asian Studies 7, 2 (December, 2005): 109-133. This gives much important information about Thomas Baty, including the removal of the house effects from Cumberland to Tokyo, the trajectory of his legal career, and investigation for treason, and references to memoirs of Hugh Keenleyside which mention Thomas Baty’s transvestitism. This can be downloaded here.
Peter Oblas. “In Defence of Japan in China: One Man’s Quest for the Logic of Sovereignty”, New Zealand Journal of Asian Studies 3, 2 (December, 2001): 73-90. This gives much useful information on Thomas Baty and the Manchurian Incident. This can be downloaded here.
Emily Hamer. Britannia’s Glory: A History of Twentieth Century Lesbians. London: Bloomsbury, 2016 Chapter Four, “Lesbians after the great war”, discusses Thomas Baty’s interests in Who’s Who, as well as much else about him.
Karen Knop. “Eunomia is a Woman: Philip Allott and Feminism”, European Journal of International Law · February 2008. This can be read or downloaded here.
Sonja Tiernan. ” ‘Engagements Dissolved’: Eva Gore-Booth, Urania, and the Radical Challenge to Marriage”, chapter seven, in Eds Mary McAuliffe and Sonja Tiernan, Tribades, Tommies and Transgressives: Histories of Sexualities Volume I. Newcastle: Cambridge Scholars Publishing, 2008, pp. 128-44. This discusses Eve’s Sour Apples, and gives the chapter headings; chapter seven can be downloaded here, by creating a free account with academia.edu.
Lincolnshire Echo, Saturday, 15 November, 1913. This notes a lecture by Thomas Baty about localism.
The Scotsman, Saturday, November 3, 1934. This describes Thomas Baty’s lecture on Thomas Carlyle.
Aberdeen Evening Express, Thursday, 11 August, 1955 This reports the will of Thomas Baty.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Thomas_Baty
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mukden_Incident
Hugh L. Keenleyside. Memoirs of Hugh L. Keenleyside, Vol. 1, Hammer the Golden Day. Toronto: McClelland and Stewart 1981-1982, pp. 330-331. As noted by Peter Oblas, these pages provide the Canadian diplomat’s reminiscences of Thomas Baty and his sister, Anne Baty. I have consulted these pages myself.
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