The discovery of the Ogasawara Islands dates back to the age of discovery from the 16th to 17th centuries when the Kazan (Volcano) Islands were discovered by a Spanish vessel, and the Ogasawara Islands were first sighted by a Dutch vessel. The first Japanese to discover the islands were the crew of a ship that was shipwrecked and drifted to Hahajima in 1670, and based on their account of the islands the Shogunate subsequently ordered an field exploration and implemented a formal survey of the islands as the government

In 1830, five westerners from the Sandwich Islands (present-day Hawaii), together with a group of native men and women from the Sandwich Islands settled on the Ogasawara Islands.
Thereafter, in 1862 the Shogunate dispatched a mission to Ogasawara headed by foreign affairs commissioner Mizuno Tadanori, who surveyed such matters as the names and ages of the islanders and whether they were married and had children.

In 1876 Foreign Minister Terashima Munenori notified other countries that the Ogasawara Islands came under the jurisdiction of Japan, thus determining Japan’s sovereignty over it.

After the end of World War II, the Ogasawara Islands were placed under the administration of the United States as a result of the Treaty of Peace with Japan. Thereafter, on April 5, 1968, the Agreement Between Japan and the United States of America Concerning Nanpo Shoto and Other Islands (Ogasawara Reversion Agreement) was signed, and on June 26 the agreement entered into force, with the result that administrative rights of the islands was returned to Japan.

This section provides facts and figures from the discovery of the Ogasawara Islands to its reversion to Japan and the establishment of village administration.

*Click the links to go to the individual pages./p>

(1) From the discovery of Ogasawara to the Meiji era

(2) Rule by Japan (from the Meiji era onwards)

(3) U.S. occupation and reversion (post-war)