Johan Willem de Stürler

He had been a tax inspector before entering military service in the Dutch army as a artillery captain.

[1] In 1797 de Sturler married Sybille Elisabeth van Biesen (1774-1807) at Tiel, the Netherlands, who gave him four children.

[2] From 20 November 1823 up to 5 August 1826 he was director (Dutch: opperhoofd) of the Dutch trading post on the island Dejima at Nagasaki, Japan, as a successor to Jan Cock Blomhoff.

Accompanied by the physician Philipp Franz von Siebold (1796-1866), he visited the Shogun at his palace in Edo in 1826.

Sturler was instrumental in bringing work by Japanese painter Katsushika Hokusai (1760-1849) to Europe which had been commissioned by Jan Cock Blomhoff.

Kawahara Keiga: "Big party". Trading post director Johan Willem de Stürler (center) and company in his residence at Desjima, Nagasaki, Japan, 8 October 1825, as a delayed celebration of the birthday of King William I . Philipp Franz von Siebold is sitting center left.
Katsushika Hokusai: Tôkaidô gojûsan tsugi, before 1827. Sturler Collection, Bibliothèque nationale de France.