Japan: From the Japanese Government History

by Unknown

The imperial cause seemed completely lost, but about this time a warrior destined to become a celebrated hero with the loyal sons of Japan, Kusunoki Masashige, raised the standard of revolt in Kawachi and declared in favor of the exiled emperor. He constructed a castle at Akasaka, and when it was destroyed, retired to Mount Kongō and there held his ground, subsequently developing sufficient strength to restore the fortifications at Akasaka. Meanwhile Prince Morinaga raised troops and fought against the Hōjō at Yoshino in Yamato, and afterward at Kōya in Kii. The time had now come for the Hōjō to put forth their strength. In February, 1333, a large army was sent from Kamakura against Kyōto, but great numbers of fighting men flocked to the imperial standard in Sanyō and Nankai, and in the following month the exiled emperor escaped from the Island of Oki and proceeded to Hōki, being supported by Nawa Nagatoshi, who raised troops in the San-in districts. The provinces of Hizen and Higo were also on the emperor's side, as was the powerful Yūki family of Mutsu. The Hōjō's army which had been dispatched against Kyōto suffered defeat in several engagements. Takatoki now sent Ashikaga Takauji to assume charge of the campaign in Kyōto and its neighborhood. This was a fatal choice. For not only was Takauji closely related to the Minamoto clan whom the Hōjō had overthrown, but he also viewed with strong disfavor the oppressive arbitrariness of the latter. No sooner had he reached Kyōto than he declared for the imperial cause, and, in concert with other loyalists, attacked and destroyed Rokuhara, the headquarters of the Hōjō administration in Kyōto. This event occurred in May, 1333. The imperial forces then reoccupied Kyōto. About this time Nitta Yoshisada, a renowned member of the Minamoto, laid siege to the fortress which Kusunoki Masashige had constructed on Mount Kongō, combining the forces of the Hōjō for the purpose. But Prince Morinaga opened relations with him, and in obedience to the prince's secret instructions he pretended illness, retired to his own province of Kōzuke, and after consultation with his relatives and partisans, raised the standard of revolt against Kamakura. Events now marched rapidly. All the blood relatives of the Minamoto family in Echigo and Shinano came together, and marching against Kamakura in great numbers, demolished or burned all the offices and public buildings there. The Regent Takatoki, together with all the members of his family, committed suicide, and the rule of the Hōjō came to an end.

A month later the exiled emperor reëntered Kyōto in state and resumed the reins of government. The eastern provinces, some of which were still loyal to the memory of the Hōjō, were also greatly reduced. No sooner was, however, the imperial prestige assured, than difficulties arose which might long have been expected. The restoration had been effected by warriors of feudal tenure, whose merits had to be rewarded, and whose ambitions were hardly compatible with a centralized civil administration such as would naturally follow the return of the imperial government. At this juncture the emperor's conduct was not calculated to perpetuate his success. The estates of the late Hōjō which he had confiscated were rather indiscriminately parceled among his personal favorites, so that when the case of the warriors who had rendered real service to his cause had to be considered, there was little left with which to reward their merits. Also, private soldiers and landlords of the provinces flocked to Kyōto to obtain confirmed possession of their holdings or additional grants for the service they claimed to have done to the sovereign. Under these circumstances it was inevitable that discontent and disappointment should be keenly felt in many quarters, and men's minds should once more turn from an artificial reign of peace to a period of unrest and plunder. Nor was a leader of exceptional ability lacking to take advantage of this state of affairs.

Of the two great soldiers of noble descent, Nitta Yoshisada was comparatively little known, owing to the fact that his ancestor, being on bad terms with Yoritomo, had lived in retirement at Nitta in Kōzuke. The other, Ashikaga Takauji, who was, like Yoshisada, of the historic clan of Minamoto, was well known otherwise for the marriage relations of his ancestors with the Hōjō. By nature winning and brilliant, he enjoyed both influence and popularity. The emperor himself was highly pleased by Takauji's achievements, for which he conferred on him rewards such as no one else received, and authorized him, among other things, to use for the first part of his name one of the ideograms in the name of the sovereign himself, which was likewise pronounced "Taka." Nothing, however, arouses the indignation of the nation of the present day more than the story of the way in which Takauji attracted the emperor and warriors to his side for selfish interests, and wrought the ruin of one after another of all the truly upright and loyal persons of the day. The first victim of Takauji's growing ambition was Prince Morinaga, who had already doubted the sincerity of his motives. Takauji so prevailed upon the emperor as to cause the prince to be arrested and confined in Kamakura, where he was later assassinated. When the remaining partisans of the Hōjō assembled in Shinano and marched against Kamakura, and Tadayoshi, Takauji's brother, finding himself unable to defend it, retreated to Mikawa, Takauji at once affected a union with Tadayoshi, destroyed the Hōjō partisans, reoccupied Kamakura, and bestowed rewards lavishly on the captains and warriors who had aided him. Now he threw away the mask. Established on the vantage ground of Kamakura, he called himself shōgun, and under pretense of subduing Nitta Yoshisada, sent orders throughout the provinces directing that troops should be raised. The emperor, whose eyes were at last opened, appointed Prince Takanaga to the chief command of a large army against Takauji, with Nitta Yoshisada as chief of staff, and at the same time instructed Kitabatake of Mutsu to attack Takauji's rear. So began the dramatic campaign, the incidents of which still appeal to the hearts of the Japanese people.

In November, 1335, Yoshisada encountered the forces of Takauji in Suruga and Mikawa, and defeated them in successive engagements; but Takauji, and Tadayoshi subsequently, established themselves at strong positions in the Hakone district, and Yoshisada's army attempting to dislodge them, suffered a signal defeat and was driven westward. This event determined the various provincial magnates whose position had been undefined to declare for Takauji, and the Ashikaga chief found himself strong enough, in the following year, to pursue Yoshisada and push on to Kyōto itself, where in the face of a stout resistance he gained the victory. The emperor retreated to the temple Enryaku-ji. Meanwhile, Kitabatake Akiiye, with an army under the command of Prince Yoshinaga, followed Takauji to Kyōto, and having effected a junction with the forces of Nitta Yoshisada and Kusunoki Masashige, succeeded in defeating the Ashikaga chief. Shortly afterward Takauji sustained another severe defeat in Hyōgo, and was compelled to retreat precipitately westward, the imperialists once more occupying Kyōto.

Under these reverses, Takauji revealed the remarkable resourcefulness of his nature. The restoration of imperial authority by Godaigo had resulted in completely thrusting the princes of the Jimyō-in line into the background. Takauji descried an opportunity in this circumstance. Addressing himself to the dethroned Emperor Kōgon, he obtained a mandate to raise an army. With remarkable energy he got together troops from all parts of the empire and once more renewed the contest, defeating Kikuchi, Aso, Akitsuki, and other supporters of the Daikaku-ji princes at Tadaranohama. Stationing a trusted general in Kiushū, with instructions to bring the provinces in that quarter under control, he himself advanced eastward by land and by sea at the head of large forces raised in the west. Yoshisada and Masahige made a desperate stand in Hyōgo against the Ashikaga army, but were defeated. It was then that the pathetic end of Masashige occurred at Minatogawa. He had always been a steadfast and unassuming servant of the emperor, ever since he rose from his retired residence at Kawachi to champion the imperial cause against the Hōjō. How with a handful of soldiers he had defended his castle upon Mount Kongō, and how his example had inspired other warriors in the land to take a stand with the emperor, is a story that the Japanese school children love to tell. To him more than to any other one person had been due the restoration of imperial rule. But his wise counsels were no longer followed when selfish ambition began to divide the sovereign's supporters. Yet Masashige did not complain. Seeing in the last campaign that his end had come, he dissuaded his son Masatsura from following him in the battle and exhorted him to grow up to gather the remnants of his followers and to die for the emperor's cause. He himself gallantly fell in battle. After his death the imperial cause, which had already begun to wane, could never again master the situation.

Takauji, who had occupied Kyōto, enthroned there a Jimyō-in prince as the Emperor Kōmyō, and established his shōgunate at Muromachi in the capital. The Emperor Godaigo shortly after repaired to Yoshino, about fifty miles south of Kyōto. For fifty-seven years subsequent to this event (1336-1393) two emperors reigned simultaneously, one at Kyōto and the other at Yoshino. The former was of the Jimyō-in line and the latter of the Daikaku-in line, now known respectively as the Northern and Southern dynasties (hoku-chō and nan-chō).[2] It was a period of perpetual conflict between the supporters of the two imperial houses. Among the partisans of the Southern dynasty the most puissant and popular were Nitta Yoshisada and Kitabatake Akiiye, of whom the former had his headquarters in Echizen, where he guarded the heir-apparent of the South, while the latter, under the auspices of Prince Yoshinaga, held Mutsu under control. Soon, however, the armies of Ashikaga overran Echizen, and Yoshisada fell in battle. This was followed by the death of the Southern emperor, Godaigo (1339), who on his deathbed summoned all the imperial princes to his side, and laid upon them his earnest injunctions never to rest until the imperial power had been restored. He was succeeded by Prince Yoshinaga, who ascended the throne as Gomurakami.

A series of reverses now overtook the imperialists. One after another their armies were defeated in the provinces, until Kitabatake Chikafusa alone remained unconquered in Hitachi. But he, too, was soon overpowered by the shōgun's forces. He effected his escape to Yoshino, and the emperor issued a summons to the warriors of Chiugoku and Nankai to reinforce the imperial army in Kiushū. The southern island was thus once more brought under the imperial sway, and this success encouraged Chikafusa at Yoshino, who now made one supreme effort. Assembling a force in Kyōto and its neighborhood, he attempted to reoccupy the city, and the suddenness of his effort seemed to him a temporary advantage. But Takauji dispatched large forces to attack the temporary palace at Yoshino, the defenders of which saw themselves utterly outnumbered. Kusunoki Masatsura, son of the great Masashige, had hitherto guarded the palace with stubborn bravery. But now he and his captains bade a final farewell to the sovereign, and, marching out to encounter the foe, fought their last battle at Shijōnawate, and fell fighting. After this victory, the shōgun's army burned the temporary palace at Yoshino, and the emperor escaped to Anau in Yamato.

Despite all these successes, the shōgun's forces were unable to crush the defense of the dynasty of the South, as his own armies were often rent by the disloyalty and mutual jealousy of his immediate followers. Even his brother Tadayoshi, to whose stout support Takauji's success was largely due, and his son Yoshiakira, were alienated from him. His generals and warriors had been attracted to him only from ambition and selfishness, and now they readily threw off their fealty. Many a soldier vacillated between the two sovereigns, serving the one who suited his own interested motives the better.

Takauji died in Kyōto in 1357, and was succeeded by his son, Yoshiakira. The latter was followed in 1368 by Yoshimitsu. In the meantime, the prestige of the Southern dynasty had further been impaired, until finally, in 1393, the Southern sovereign Gokameyama, handed over the insignia to his Northern rival, Gokomatsu, and the two dynasties being thus united, Gokomatsu ascended the throne as the hundredth emperor of Japan.