In order to understand what follows, it is necessary to give Colonel Neale's account of the arrangements which were in force for the protection of the British Legation:—
I found on my arrival that the usual precautions had been taken by the authorities, and which consisted in placing numerous guards, entirely surrounding this residence, in detached wooden huts: the number of these guards, according to the Japanese return which I obtained, amounted to no less than 535 men, partly of the Tycoon's bodyguard, but chiefly composed of the retainers of a Daimio named Matsudaira Temba no Kami, who had been chosen and charged by the Government with the protection of this Legation.
Small parties of these men came down at short intervals during the night to the very doors of this residence, and remained for a short time with our own sentries, leaving behind them one man at each post to aid in challenging persons approaching and demanding the parole, which was in the Japanese language, and issued at sunset each evening.
These dispositions were uninterruptedly observed up to the evening of the 26th June. At midnight on that day the several British sentinels were at their post, and challenging with vigilance the Japanese guards, who, in parties of two or three, descended from the heights overhanging this building at the back for the purpose of relieving their men.
What took place at midnight on the 26th June may also be best described in Colonel Neale's own language:—
At half an hour after midnight the British sentry posted at the door adjoining my bedroom challenged some approaching object in my hearing, and received in answer the right parole; but the sentry sharply challenged again in an anxious and eager manner, as if some circumstance excited his suspicion, after which he walked three or four steps towards the object approaching. I rose in bed to hear the result, and in an instant the deadened sound of a rapid succession of heavy blows and cuts reached my ears, given in less than two minutes, and at every one of which followed a cry of anguish from the unfortunate sentry. Silence succeeded for the moment, and was followed by the beating of drums from the heights and the gathering of Japanese guards with their red lanterns.... The assassin having left the sentry at my door, went on towards the corner of the residence occupied by the guard, a distance of twenty paces, where he met Corporal Crimp, R.M., coming alone on his rounds to visit the sentry at my door. A conflict appears instantly to have taken place between them: a revolver-shot was heard about the moment the guard was turning out, but nothing further.
The corporal was found dead with sixteen sword and lance wounds: the sentry had nine sword-wounds—"every cut had severed the member it was aimed at"; but he survived long enough to tell of the instant desertion of the Japanese sentry who was posted with him.
This attack was marked by several distinguishing features:—
1. The assassins belonged to the Legation guard, or were their comrades; the only weapon found on the ground was a lance of the precise pattern of those of the Daimio's guard, which was twelve feet long, and, according to Colonel Neale, no man carrying such a weapon could have passed the strong barricade or crawled through the brushwood: presumably, therefore, the lance was supplied from the armoury within the Legation. According to the Japanese Ministers, there was but a single assassin. In their anxiety to maintain their contention that the wounds were all inflicted by the same man, the Ministers explained to Colonel Neale a little of the science of Japanese sword-play. "They have attained the climax of dexterity. The sword is always carried at the side, and adepts in the use of it wound the moment it is drawn." The fatal stroke, upwards, is given in the act of drawing. Hence, placing the hand on the hilt is equivalent to presenting a cocked revolver, and if the assailant is not disabled in the act it is too late for defence. One only, being wounded by a pistol-bullet and having committed suicide, was found, and though they could not help admitting that the man was a retainer of the Daimio who supplied the guard, the Ministers yet drew a vain distinction between him and the men actually on duty. It could not, however, be denied that he, or they, were allowed free ingress and egress through hundreds of men carefully posted as described by Colonel Neale, and already alert and sounding the alarm, or that the huts of the Japanese were within 150 feet of the spot where two Englishmen were murdered, and while the assassin (or assassins) was inflicting sixteen wounds on one victim and nine on the other.
2. The intended attack was publicly known beforehand: for several days the Japanese servants had refused to remain in the Legation overnight, absenting themselves against orders. The Government also were aware of the plot, and of the day when it was to be put in execution, which was on the recurrence of a festival, and, according to the Japanese calendar, the anniversary of the attack in 1861. The actual day having passed, one of the Governors of Foreign Affairs was deputed by the Council to call and congratulate Colonel Neale on his escape. Colonel Neale remarked that he had no reason for anxiety. The Governor smiled and took leave. But the "ides of March ... had not gone," In the darkness of that very night the attack was made. Colonel Neale, recounting the circumstances to the Council of Foreign Affairs, asked why the Governor had not warned him of what was impending, instead of congratulating him on his supposed escape; but "the Gorogiu, to my great surprise, replied that I was quite right in my observations, and they regretted they had not thought of warning me."