Normanton incident: As the British merchant vessel Normanton sinks off the coast of Japan, her European officers appear to commandeer the ship's lifeboats for themselves, leaving her Asian crew and passengers to die and conjuring significant political outrage in Japan.

The Normanton incident was a series of events surrounding the sinking of the British merchantman Normanton of the coast of Japan's Wakayama Prefecture on 24 October 1886. Normanton, which had a mixed crew of Europeans and Asians along with 25 Japanese passengers onboard, was sailing from Yokohama to Kobe when it ran aground in bad weather and began sinking. The ship's British captain, John William Drake, escaped in Normanton's lifeboats along with his European crew members. None of the Asian crew or Japanese passengers survived the sinking, and three European sailors died of hypothermia while making their way back to the shore.