Shimazu Hisamitsu

Shimazu Hisamitsu
In this Japanese name, the family name is "Shimazu".

Prince Shimazu Hisamitsu (島津 久光, November 28, 1817 – December 6, 1887), also known as Shimazu Saburō (島津 三郎), was a Japanese samurai of the late Edo period. The younger brother of Shimazu Nariakira, Hisamitsu served as regent for his underage son Tadayoshi (島津 忠義), who became the 12th and last lord. Hisamitsu was instrumental in the efforts of the southern Satsuma, Chōshū, and Tosa clans to bring down the Tokugawa Shogunate. Hisamitsu held the court title of Ōsumi no Kami 大隈守. In the Meiji Era, he was created prince in the Meiji-era kazoku nobility.

Biography

Hisamitsu was born in Kagoshima Castle in 1817, the son of Shimazu Narioki, the 10th lord of the Satsuma domain; Hisamitsu's name at birth was Kanenoshin; his mother was Yura, Narioki's concubine. He was briefly adopted by the Tanegashima clan as an heir, but was returned to the Shimazu family while still a child. At age eight, he was adopted into the Shigetomi-Shimazu, a branch family of the main Shimazu house. Kanenoshin, now named Matajirō, came of age in 1828, and took the adult name Tadayuki (忠教). At age 22, following his marriage to the daughter of the previous Shigetomi lord, Tadakimi, he inherited family headship. He was supported as a candidate for succession to the main Shimazu house during the Oyura Disturbance (お由羅騒動 Oyura sōdō). His half-brother Nariakira won the dispute and succeeded their father as lord of Satsuma; however, following Nariakira's death in 1858, Tadayuki's young son Mochihisa (later known as Shimazu Tadayoshi (島津 忠義)) was chosen as the next lord of Satsuma. Tadayuki gained a position of primacy in Satsuma, due to his status as the lord's father. He returned to the main Shimazu house in 1861, and it was then that he changed his name to Hisamitsu.

In 1862, Hisamitsu went to Kyoto, and took part in the increasingly Kyoto-centered politics of the 1860s; he was a part of the kōbu-gattai political faction. It was during Hisamitsu's return from a stay in Edo, when three English men on horseback offended his retainers by refusing to dismount or stand aside. The Englishmen`s failure to observe proper etiquette resulted in some argument, a chase, and they were killed, in what came to be known as the Namamugi Incident. Hisamitsu remained at the core of the kōbu-gattai movement in Kyoto, until Satsuma's secret alliance with men of the Chōshū Domain. He supported the Satsuma domain's military actions in the Boshin War, and retired soon after the Meiji Restoration. In the Meiji era, he was given the rank of Duke(kōshaku (公爵)). Hisamitsu died in 1887, at age 70; he is buried in Kagoshima Prefecture.

Honours

From the article in the Japanese Wikipedia

Order of precedence

Published works

Notes

    Further reading

    See also