パペットホームズ、大河ドラマなどの好きなテレビ番組やラグビーについて書いています。アフィリエイトはやっていません。／Welcome to my blog. I write about some Japanese TV programmes including NHK puppetry and Taiga Drama, Sherlock Holmes and rugby. I don't do affiliate marketing.
He was born as a son of ETŌ Tanemitsu in Saga, 1834. His father was a low-class samurai of Hizen (Saga) domain. He studied at Kōdōkan, a school established by the domain and was a bright pupil. However, he had to leave school because his father was ordered to shut himself up in his house on the grounds of neglect of duty.
Then he studied at a school established by EDAYODSHI Shinyō, elder brother of SOEJIMA Taneomi, one of his comrades. In 1850, he joined Gisai Dōmei, a kind of political organisation with Taneomi and ŌKUMA Shigenobu. He wrote an opinion called "Tokai-saku" that emphasises the necessity of opening the country. On the following year, he married EGUCHI Chiyoko and held the positions of gunnery and trade.
In 1862, he left his domain and interacted with KATSURA Kogorō (KIDO Takayoshi) from Chōshū and ANENOKŌJI Kintomo, an aristocrat. He returned home about two months later. Though leaving the domain without permission was a capital crime, NABESHIMA Naomasa (Narimasa, Kansō) lord of the domain reduced his sentence and he was told to be confined to his house. He taught children there and kept offering his opinions to Naomasa.
After the Declaration of Imperial Rule in December 1867, he was sent to Kyoto with Taneomi and participated in the Battle of Ueno. In this battle, Armstrong guns of hid domain was used to attack Shōgi-tai. After the Boshin War, he returned home but was asked to join the new government. He went to Tokyo then and held the positions including judge and minister of justice. He insisted that Japan should introduce the legal system of France and opposed some officials who preferred that of Prussia.
After the argument over Seikanron, he resigned his position and left the government with Taneomi, ITAGAKI Taisuke, GOTŌ Shōjirō and SAIGŌ Takamori. His comrades warned him that it's a plot of ŌKUBO Toshimichi but he never listened to them. In 1874, he became a leader of a party called Saga Seikan-tō and started a riot against the government with former samurais who were dissatisfied with the new era (Saga no Ran). But they were defeated by the troops of the government. He then asked Takamori or former samurais of Tosa to help them but was refused.
He was arrested in April. Then he was judged guilty at a temporary court in Saga and was executed only five days later. The system of wanted photographs enabled his swift arrest but ironically, the system was adopted by him when he was a minister of justice.
Though he valued legal system, he had an extreme opinion in diplomacy and is said to have in diplomacy and intended to invade Qing Dynasty and Russian Empire.
In this series, he insists development of legal systems in the government and opposes Ōkubo Toshimichi. Besides he denounces the scandal of YAMAGATA Aritomo from Chōshū and attempts to lead the government in the absence of Toshimichi who join the Iwakura Mission and travels European countries and the US.
(*) Sakoda is from Kagoshima and is one of the instructors of Satsuma dialect in the series.
