Who signed Japan's surrender first among the Japanese representatives aboard USS Missouri?

Mamoru Shigemitsu was the first Japanese representative to sign Japan’s surrender aboard USS Missouri.

Shigemitsu signed at approximately 9:04 a.m. Japan Standard Time on September 2, 1945. His signature was made “by Command and in behalf of the Emperor of Japan and the Japanese Government.” He was serving as Japan’s foreign minister at the time.

General Yoshijirō Umezu signed next, representing the Japanese Imperial General Headquarters. The distinction mattered because the surrender document covered both the civilian government and the armed forces. Shigemitsu’s role therefore was not interchangeable with Umezu’s military role.

Shigemitsu had previously served as a diplomat and had lost a leg in an assassination attempt in Shanghai in 1932. After the surrender, he was tried as a Class A war criminal and imprisoned. He was later released and returned to Japanese politics, serving again as foreign minister in the 1950s.