Takechi Hanpeita, the leader of the Tosa Loyalist Party who was determined to overthrow the Tokugawa Bakufu and restore Imperial rule, had languished in prison for nearly two years. On the 29^th day of the Fifth Month of the Japanese year corresponding to 1865, he wrote to his wife from his squalid prison cell that “to lay down one’s life for one’s country or for one’s liege lord is true bushido.” Soon thereafter he was ordered to commit seppuku on the evening of the 11^th day of the intercalary Fifth Month. Sentenced to die by his own hand based on trumped up charges of political crimes, he nonetheless took solace in the fact that he was at least given the honor of dying as a samurai, rather than be beheaded as a common criminal.“ [T]he heart of a samurai [must be] as solid as a rock,” he wrote. Now he would have the chance to live up to his words. His stunning seppuku, which he performed with such bravery that even his enemies witnessing the event “were left speechless,” is depicted in detail in Chapter 14 of Samurai Assassins.

[Takechi Hanpeita is the focus of Part II of Samurai Assassins. His self-portrait, which he produced in his prison cell, appears in Samurai Assassins courtesy of Kochi Prefectural Museum of History.]

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“Went up to the castle.” Katsu Kaishū, “the shogun’s last samurai,” repeated this phrase often in his journal, as vice commissioner and later commissioner of warships. He was, of course, recording his visits to the shogun’s castle, during the heady and dangerous years leading up to the revolution. “Went up to the castle” is the title of Samurai Revolution, Chapter 13, which opens as follows:

“ . . . I frequently encountered danger, which sometimes encouraged me. But sometimes it was difficult to endure the misery, and even when I hoped for death I survived only to suffer numerous more hardships.” (Katsu Kaishū)

The tide of revolution had been on the rise this past decade. The swirl began in Edo with the arrival of Perry’s “Black Ships” in 1853. Occasionally the tide ebbed, as during the reign of Ii Naosuké, only to surge again with the regent’s murder at the castle gate and the spree of assassinations of foreigners in Edo and Yokohama. As the Bakufu attempted in vain to stem the tide—through a union with the Imperial Court, consummated by the marriage between the young shogun and the Emperor’s sister—the architect of the marriage plan was nearly assassinated. Then sometime around the end of 1862 the tide suddenly turned, and the center stage of the gathering revolution shifted from the shogun’s stronghold at Edo to the Emperor’s capital at Kyoto.

[The photo of Katsu Kaishū, taken just before surrender of Edo Castle, is used in Samurai Revolution, courtesy of Yokohama Archives of History.]

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Katsu Kaishu is the “shogun’s last samurai” of Samurai Revolution, the only full-length biography of him in English.

Like many Americans of conscience I am distressed over the current politics and society of our country. And so here are some words of wisdom from Saigō Takamori for these difficult times (slightly edited from Samurai Revolution, without footnotes):

Saigō Takamori, the quintessence of samurai morality, taught that “a great man,” unlike the average man, “never turns away from difficulty or pursues [his own] benefit.” He “takes the blame for mistakes upon himself and gives credit [for meritorious deeds] to others.” He “was physiologically unable to bear” even being suspected of any sort of underhandedness. He had a deep-seated repugnance of “love of self,” which, in his own words, he described as “the primary immorality. It precludes one’s ability to train oneself, perform one’s tasks, correct one’s mistakes,” and “it engenders arrogance and pride.” The ideal samurai “cares naught about his [own] life, nor reputation, nor official rank, nor money,” Saigō taught, even if such a man “is hard to control.”

[The image of Saigo is used in Samurai Revolution, courtesy of Japan’s National Diet Library.]

Recently I’ve been discussing Takéchi Hanpeita, while Sakamoto Ryōma has often been a subject of this blog. The two were distant relatives. Ryōma was among the first to seal his name in blood to the manifesto of the revolutionary Tosa Loyalist Party, established and led by Hanpeita. Following is an excerpt from Samurai Assassins:

Though Mito Loyalists triggered the revolution with the assassination of Ii Naosuké, as samurai of one of the Three Tokugawa Branch Houses they would never oppose the Bakufu. After the Incident Outside Sakurada-mon, the revolution was led by samurai who felt no allegiance to the Tokugawa. Most of them hailed from han in the west and southwest, ruled by outside lords, most notably Satsuma, Chōshū, and Tosa. Around this time in Tosa emerged two men who would inform the revolution—both charismatic swordsmen originally from the lower rungs of Tosa society. Takéchi Hanpeita, aka Zuizan, was a planner of assassinations and stoic adherent of Imperial Loyalism and bushidō, whose struggle to bring Tosa into the Imperial fold led to his downfall and death. Sakamoto Ryōma, one of the most farsighted thinkers of his time, had the guts to throw off the old and embrace the new as few men ever have—and for his courage, both moral and physical, he was assassinated on the eve of a revolution of his own design. But while Ryōma abandoned Tosa to bring the revolution to the national stage, Takéchi, remaining loyal to his daimyo, was determined to position Tosa as one of the three leaders of the revolution.

Takéchi Hanpeita is the focus of Part II of Samurai Assassins, while Part III focuses on Ryōma’s assassination.

Below is a transcription of the poem on his self-portrait, followed by my English translation:

花依清香愛

人以仁義栄

幽囚何可恥

只有赤心明

A flower is cherished for its pure fragrance./A man glories in humanity and justice./Imprisonment brings no shame,/As long as one’s heart is sincere.

[Takéchi Hanpeita’s self-portrait appears in Samurai Assassins, courtesy of Kochi Prefectural Museum of History.]

Takéchi Hanpeita is the focus of Part II of Samurai Assassins. Also see this recent post.