Makers of Japan

by J. Morris

Your Highness is wise enough to take this advice into consideration.”

The full name of the writer of this remarkable epistle was Yama-no-uchi Yodo, daimio of Tosa province.

It was not until the close of December 1867 that the Emperor received the formal abdication of the Shogun’s powers, and it was foreseen that among his adherents there would be many who would resist to the uttermost what they could but regard as their chieftain’s degradation, voluntary or otherwise. For the resignation of his prerogatives involved also the surrender of his lands and possessions, and his followers’ fortunes were so inseparably linked with his that it meant to them the deprivation in like manner of all those privileges on which they had thereunto placed the highest value. The Satsuma and Choshiu leaders were willing to avail themselves, however, of their proximity to the throne by seizing the person of the Emperor, and this coup d’état was carried out.

On the 3rd of January 1868, suddenly appeared an imperial edict giving to the three chiefs of Satsuma, Tosa, and Geishiu the charge of the Nine Gates of Kioto,—in other words the guardianship of the Emperor’s palace,—an office which had previously been held by the Lord of Aidzu, a northern province, and who ceased to occupy it by reason of his having espoused the cause of the Shogun in the Kai-koku versus Jo-I discussion.

It is due to Aidzu to acknowledge that the clan, from the time when, in 1862, it had been given the charge by the Shogun Iyemochi of the imperial city, had evinced the utmost loyalty and energy in its defence. In repelling the attack of the Choshiu men in 1864 the Aidzu chieftain’s retainers had shown the greatest bravery and determination, and as honest, staunch protectors of the Emperor’s person and guardians of the palace the clansmen had had no sympathy with the agitators who had sought to sow discord between the monarch and his deputy. Both sides, indeed, had reason to value the lord of Aidzu’s fidelity to the trust reposed in him. When, therefore, the edict appeared by which Aidzu was relieved of his functions, the adherents of the Shogunate were incensed, for they saw, or believed that they saw, in the coup d’état the clearest possible indications of a Satsuma and Choshiu intrigue. The rescript is remarkable as having definitely decreed the end of the old regime, and it brought about the ascendency of the southern clans, for which the way had been paved in great measure during the previous Emperor’s reign. The old distinctions between the court lords (kuge) and the territorial magnates were at one stroke swept away, new titles were introduced, and while some of the princes, the kuge, and many of the samurai, found places under the new regime, the adherents of the Tokugawa were for the most part dismissed from office and their positions given to men of the opposing side.

THE INTERIOR OF SHIBA TEMPLE

Acting under the authority of the sovereign, the perpetrators of the coup d’état proceeded to set up a provisional government, and the Shogun was directed to surrender his fiefs and hold himself entirely at the disposal of the Emperor, whose pleasure would in due course be made known to him. This decisive stroke was delivered by the combined agency of the leaders of the clans of Satsuma, Choshiu, Hizen, and Tosa, and the Shogun was on the verge of yielding to the demand made upon him when hostilities broke out between his adherents and the followers of the Satsuma chieftain. The Shogun was in this way driven into the position of seeming antagonism to the Imperial Government as provisionally constituted, and the fact that he was in great measure the victim of circumstances was in after years most generously recognised by his imperial master. The Shogun, acting no doubt on the advice tendered to him by his supporters, quitted Kioto on horseback, accompanied by only a few mounted attendants, on the 6th January, and reached the castle of Osaka early in the morning of the 7th, just four days after the coup d’état and though he has by some been blamed for allowing himself to be ousted from his position at the Emperor’s side, as the principal adviser of his sovereign, it is difficult to censure him for so doing seeing that the monarch had already begun to issue decrees without consulting his customary adviser. In fact, the decree which was issued as a result of the coup d’état expressly stated that thenceforward everything connected with the government of the country would emanate from the Cho-Tei—i.e. the Imperial Court at Kioto—and strict obedience to the terms of the proclamation was enjoined upon all. The chiefs of the Aidzu and other clans which held allegiance to the Tokugawa side throughout its vicissitudes were summoned to a conference the night previous to the Shogun’s departure for Osaka, and a letter was written to the Cho-Tei by the Shogun in which he declared that it being evident that some deceiver stood at the young sovereign’s side he would, for the safety of the nation, resume the duties of his office, and the better to secure for himself due freedom of action he would remove to the city of Osaka, where he could in his Majesty’s interests venture to take upon himself once more the direction of affairs as Shogun. History relates that at the meeting of his supporters held in the Shogunal palace at Kioto it was urged on his Highness that it would be better to retain control of the neck of the bottle by holding Osaka, the key of Kioto, than wait to fall into the trap which had been set for them. The formal resignation of the Shogun had been tendered by him to the Emperor at the close of 1867, but not definitely accepted, and when it was found that he had quitted the capital an imperial messenger was despatched to Osaka to request his return and the lords of Owari and Echizen were ordered to furnish an escort. Preparations were at once made to obey the sovereign’s command, but the Aidzu and Kuwana clansmen, who had followed their chiefs to Osaka, declared that they would form the escort necessary, and set out in the van of the force which was to constitute the Shogunal procession on the short journey northward. The Shogun himself was to start with the last of his little army, some four days later than the vanguard. To the experienced eyes of the Satsuma and Choshiu leaders, who now had entirely the ear of the young ruler, and whose troops were at this time in full possession of the capital, this march back of the Shogun’s whole army had for them the most sinister of meanings, and accordingly their combined regiments were thrown forward, to challenge the advance of the Tokugawa men, as far as Fushimi, a village seven miles from Kioto on the highway east of the river Yodo. The Commander-in-chief of these imperialist forces was the prince who then bore the title of the Ninnaji-no-miya, a close relative of the Emperor, and before him was carried the gold brocade banner which is emblematic of delegated sovereign authority. The prince afterwards took by imperial order the name of Higashi Fushimi-no-miya, and he is elsewhere referred to as having subsequently spent some time in England. Marshal Saigo Takamori, as he afterwards became, held a position equivalent to that of Chief of Staff in modern campaigns. The main body of the Shogun’s army marched by the Fushimi-kai-do, or eastern road, though a portion took the western one, and there was a contingent of the followers of the lord of Idzumi on that road also, on whose fealty the Shogun believed he might rely. As the sequel showed, the defection of this force was his undoing, for at the critical moment it allowed itself to be won over bodily by the imperialists. At the village of Fushimi the Shogun’s men found that barriers had been erected to stay their progress, and though when challenged the leading company made answer “this is the procession of his Highness the Shogun, who is going to Kioto by the Emperor’s express command,” passage was refused by the imperialist guard. The Shogun’s men were ordered to advance, and an engagement commenced which lasted for three whole days without intermission. The treachery of the men of Tsu, retainers of Todo Idzumi-no-kami, turned the scale, and the Shogun’s army was compelled to retreat from Fushimi towards Osaka, where the Chiefs of Aidzu and other clans loyal to the Tokugawa house found the warships belonging to their side, under the command of Admiral Enomoto, lying off the mouth of the Yodo at Tempo-san. The Shogun himself received the distressing news of the defeat of his forces at Fushimi when about to set out with the last of his army for Kioto, on the 27th of January 1868, and on the afternoon of that day, realising that irremediable disaster had befallen his arms, he quietly took his departure from Osaka castle attended by a few faithful friends, and safely reached the Kaiyo Maru.

This was a Dutch-built frigate which had been purchased for him in Europe and brought out to Japan shortly before. In order to reach the ship the Shogun had had to take boat at the Shin-Sei bridge in Osaka, whence the distance to Tempo-san is about four miles by river.

But before he set out he penned a letter to the foreign representatives then present in Osaka, to the effect that the battle having gone against him, they must provide for their own safety, and they accordingly did so to the best of their ability. The British Minister, Sir Harry Parkes, was staying in a temple in the northern part of the city, and, with his mounted escort of ex-constables of the London police, he rode into the newly established foreign settlement at Kawaguchi that night. At this crisis in the affairs of Japan it was advisable, to prevent mishap, that the British and other foreign ministers should be well guarded, and Sir Harry had with him in addition to his own escort a detachment of the Ninth Regiment, then quartered at Yokohama, always at his disposal. The ships of the powers also lay at Tempo-san, within hail, but the weather being at the moment exceptionally stormy the ministers could not get aboard the vessels. It has to be recorded that Osaka city was held by the men of Choshiu, who showed every disposition to befriend the foreign residents and protected them against any possible violence of the mob, though only four years had elapsed since the bombardment of Shimonoseki by the allied squadrons, and that incident could not have been entirely forgotten. The Tokugawa men had quitted Osaka on the day following the departure of the Shogun, and the mob seized the opportunity, prior to the entry of the Choshiu troops, to pillage the castle and set it afire. The men wounded in the battle of the 27th painfully made their way along the roads from Fushimi, and many were attended by the medical officer of the British Legation who had accompanied Sir Harry Parkes from Tokio. Dr Willis, the genial Irishman and accomplished surgeon here alluded to, is doubtless remembered to this day by many of his patients. He was at a later date in charge of the hospital at Kagoshima, belonging to the Satsuma clan, and was universally respected in Japan. When, in 1877, the clan was declared to be in rebellion, and all foreigners in the country and at out-ports were directed to repair to the nearest “treaty port” for safety, where they would be under the protection of their own warships, he declined to quit his post at the hospital, where he could be of use to his Satsuma friends, and the British cruiser sent to bring away the foreign residents had to leave him behind. But as a bombardment was imminent a Japanese government steamer was sent to fetch him away, and he was then induced to yield.