While the Shogun Still Breathed ―― Ii Naosuke’s Punishment of Owari, Mito, and Echizen on the Fifth Day of the Seventh Month of Ansei 5 (1858)

The Ōoku at Half Past the Hour of Nine on the Night of the Third Day of the Seventh Month

Ii Naosuke went to the castle at the usual hour, and his departure that day extended to half past the hour of nine at night, reaching one in the morning.Original
The reason was that the beriberi of the shogun Tokugawa Iesada had worsened.Original
“The shogun’s beriberi symptoms are such that he is not recovering” — meaning that the shogun’s beriberi was severe and he was not improving.Original
That night, the great elder and the senior councilors were summoned to the sleeping chamber of the Ōoku.Original
The next day, the fourth, the same men were again summoned to the Ōoku.Original
The business conveyed there was not an inquiry after the shogun’s illness.Original
Tokugawa Yoshikumi’s retirement and confinement, Tokugawa Nariaki’s confinement, Matsudaira Yoshinaga’s retirement and confinement.Original
Here Tokutomi Sohō reads the character of Ii Naosuke.Original
His immediate concern, Tokutomi Sohō writes, was neither foreign affairs nor Kyoto, but what might be called “the elimination of the schemers.”Original
Tokutomi Sohō writes that the fundamental spirit of this lay not in Abe Masahiro’s manner, which aimed at national unity, but in a single-minded insistence on pushing his own way through to the end.OriginalOriginal

The Ii Side Regarded Tokugawa Nariaki as the Root Cause

It is said that Tokugawa Nariaki said, “Today I will surely make Kamon no kami cut open his belly.”Original
This amounts to saying that today, of all days, he would make Ii Naosuke commit seppuku.Original
On that occasion, it is said that Tayasu Yoshiyori declared as follows.Original
Matsudaira Yoshinaga is my younger brother, but until now I never thought him such a villain.Original
It is disloyal, an outrageous act beyond words.Original
He wished that severe punishment be ordered.Original
Tokutomi Sohō states that from this one document it can be seen that the Ii side regarded Tokugawa Nariaki as the sole root cause of everything.OriginalOriginal

Kuze Hirochika, Sleepless Through the Night

At dawn on the fifth day of the seventh month.Original
The steward Utsugi Kagetoshi was summoned, and Kuze Hirochika, coming out to the barred entrance, ordered him to read a letter.Original
Its contents were a recommendation for postponement.Original
Kuze wrote that should the worst happen, since Tokugawa Yoshitomi was young, a guardian would have to be appointed, and that in any case the matter should be held off for today.Original
And at the end.Original
“Though yesterday I gave my assent, and today I say this and that about it, I am deeply abashed in every way” — meaning that, having consented yesterday, to raise objections today was most regrettable.Original
He also stresses that he is by no means in agreement with the other side.Original
Tokutomi Sohō surmises that Kuze, who had once given his assent under pressure from Ii, reconsidered, realized the impropriety of it, and wrote this after a sleepless night.Original
Ii’s reply was short.Original
He stated that because the shogun was gravely ill, leaving matters as they were, should the worst happen, would become “the foundation of great disorder” — the source of great upheaval — and that this was precisely why the order had been issued; and he dismissed such a message as reflecting “a mistaken understanding.”OriginalOriginal

Utsugi Kagetoshi Makes the Rounds of the Senior Councilors

Ii moved quickly.Original
Once at the castle it would become a matter for deliberation, and it would be troublesome if someone emerged who agreed with Kuze.OriginalOriginal

He therefore gave orders to Utsugi Kagetoshi.Original
First Manabe Akikatsu, second Ōta Dōjun, third Matsudaira Noriyasu.Original
He was to call on them in this order.OriginalOriginal

Manabe Akikatsu immediately cleared the room of others and met him.Original
Having looked over the letter, he responded that leaving matters as they stood would become the source of great upheaval, that word of the intent had already been conveyed to the various offices, that it would be a grave matter if delay let word leak to the other side, and that upon arriving at the castle he would issue the official document, and even if night fell it must be settled today, or it would be a grave matter.OriginalOriginal

Ōta also agreed.Original
Moreover, before Utsugi arrived, Ōta had already received a notice from Kuze declining attendance on grounds of illness, and had sent word back that he should force himself to come to the castle.OriginalOriginal

Ōta’s words have been preserved.Original
Utsugi also reported that because the hour had grown late, he did not go to Matsudaira Noriyasu’s residence.OriginalOriginal

Tokugawa Yoshikumi’s Punishment of Retirement

That day, Ii Naosuke remained at the castle until half past the hour of eight at night, three in the morning.Original
It amounted to his having spent a full day and night within the castle.Original
The punishment handed down to Tokugawa Yoshikumi was retirement, residence at the Toyama mansion, and quiet, peaceful self-restraint.Original
The succession to the Owari house went to Matsudaira Yoshichika.Original
It was added that all meetings with close relatives and all exchange of letters were forbidden, and that the chief retainers were to be strictly informed of this.Original
To begin with, Tokugawa Yoshikumi could hardly be called a member of Tokugawa Nariaki’s faction.Original
He had not readily responded even to Matsudaira Yoshinaga’s solicitation to support Hitotsubashi.Original
He was a man who had come from Takasu domain to succeed to the Owari house, and it is said there were those who remarked that “the only merit of the lord of Owari is his skill in Chinese-style calligraphy.”Original
Even so, he had the pride befitting the Owari house and views of his own, and on matters of foreign policy there were points on which he agreed with Nariaki.Original
The view was that, so long as the Owari house reformed its attitude going forward, no further trouble was likely.Original
Yet on the fifth day of the seventh month this punishment came.Original
Tokutomi Sohō asks whether Owari had not been caught up as a consequence of Mito, whether it was not out of a sense that it would be unfair to punish Mito alone and not extend it to Owari.Original
In any case, Tokugawa Yoshikumi’s retirement was, he says, utterly unexpected.OriginalOriginal

The Arrival of the Shogunal Envoy and Word of Confinement

As for the situation on the Mito side, the notes of Kayane Yasushi are detailed.Original
A document was passed along from Yokoyama Jinzaemon, the castle liaison.Original
Tokugawa Nariaki found it suspicious that the chief retainer of Owari was omitted.Original
Having seen the document, Nariaki and Tokugawa Yoshiatsu said that since the three related lords—Matsudaira Yoritane, Matsudaira Yorinobu, and Matsudaira Yorinawa—together with Hosokawa Narimori and Niwa Nagakuni had come, there could be no doubt they were going to strike them.Original
At the fourth watch, Takeda Shuri returned and presented the document that had been handed to him.Original
It was a shogunal order placing the lord of Owari under house confinement.Original
While everyone present was in deep distress, another report came from the castle liaison.Original
It said that, besides the related lord serving as shogunal envoy, the senior inspector Ikeda Harima no kami would also be accompanying him.Original
A senior inspector had not even come at the time of Nariaki’s shogunal censure in the fifth month of Kōka 1 (1844), and this sounded like an inquest.Original
Though they debated exhaustively, no answer emerged.Original
It was therefore decided that they would meet privately with Matsudaira Yorinobu to sound out his intentions, and only then receive the envoy.Original
Nariaki did not go out to meet him; Yoshiatsu went in his place.Original
Depending on its content, there might be cases where it could not be accepted—just as the discussion had reached this point, the envoy arrived.Original
Matsudaira Yoritane, it is said, claimed a stomachache partway through and returned to his own residence.Original
There were three documents.Original
The chief retainers Okada Shinano no kami and Takeda Shuri received them, reported to the two lords, and wrote out and delivered a statement of acceptance.Original
“The hour had already passed the fifth watch.”Original
Dawn was about to break.Original
Tokutomi Sohō writes that, since a senior inspector was accompanying him, they had worried an order to commit seppuku might be given, but must have felt relieved on learning that it was confinement at the Komagome residence.Original
The next day, the sixth.Original
The Komagome residence was badly damaged, and they wished to request a delay before moving in, but it was difficult to petition for this directly.Original
So they had Matsudaira Yorinobu stop by on his way to the castle and asked him.Original
But he said it would be difficult to raise the matter with the senior councilors.Original
Kayane Yasushi writes that he saw him off in the inner chambers of the Matsu Palace, closing with the words “unable to bear the grief.”Original
These are words meaning that one cannot endure the depth of feeling.Original
On the same sixth day, Tokugawa Yoshiatsu too was forbidden to attend the castle.Original
Yoshiatsu intended to petition for retirement, but was strongly dissuaded by his retainers and abandoned the idea.OriginalOriginal

“To confine a related domain without proof of guilt”

Who bore responsibility for the punishment?Original
The Mito-side records state as follows.Original
The shogun’s illness had struck suddenly on the first day of the seventh month, and by the second and third days he was already near death.Original
A shogun who was frail and silent even in ordinary times could not possibly, amid the agony of life and death, have judged the rightness of so great a punishment.Original
The responsibility for deciding this alone must be attributed to Ii Naosuke.OriginalOriginal

Tokutomi Sohō agrees, saying that no one could object to this argument.Original
What was called the shogun’s wish, he says, was nothing more than Ii’s own wish announced under the shogun’s name.OriginalOriginal

Among the senior councilors, Ōta Dōjun too seems to have initially been among those who objected.Original
“To confine a related domain without proof of guilt—what of the troubles this will bring later?” That is, if a related domain were shut away without evidence, how would one deal with the misfortune that would follow?Original
Ii answered as follows.Original
If Kyoto were investigated, there would surely be charges to be found; and if there were none, he himself would bear the responsibility.Original
Ōta could not argue against this.OriginalOriginal

Sohō raises the suspicion that this wily Ōta may have deliberately objected in the council chamber the day before, in order to make Ii bear the responsibility.Original
But the conclusion does not change.Original
Whether the senior councilors as a whole approved or objected, the one responsible was Ii Naosuke himself—Sohō writes that, on this one point, the views of the Mito side and the Ii side unexpectedly coincide.OriginalOriginal

Sohō suggests that such extreme caution must have stemmed from some deep fear within Ii himself.OriginalOriginal

Hitotsubashi Yoshinobu was ordered to refrain from attending the castle.Original
Even so, he was told to refrain from attending the castle for the time being.OriginalOriginal

Three men misled by an investigation

The sixth day of the seventh month was, compared to the previous day, again a day of many events.OriginalOriginal

The junior councilor Honda Yasukata was dismissed from office.Original
The attendant Ishiko Masahira was discharged from service and placed in retirement and confinement.Original
The inner physician Oka Rekisen’in was likewise discharged from service and placed in retirement and confinement.Original
His son Oka Ryōsetsu was granted a stipend of two hundred fifty bales of rice and entered the Kobushin corps.OriginalOriginal

Oka’s offense, it is said, lay in having misdiagnosed the shogun’s illness.Original
Honda was a man who had enjoyed the favor of Tokugawa Ieyoshi, serving close to him for several decades, and who had been promoted to junior councilor under the Hotta administration.Original
Ishiko had held various offices and was known for his ability; on the recommendation of Matsudaira Tadakata, he moved from the Hitotsubashi tutorship into the ranks of attendants.Original
Both, it is said, were men whom Ii disliked.OriginalOriginal

On the third day of the seventh month, on the occasion of Iesada’s illness, Totsuka Seikai, Itō Genboku, Tōda Chōan, and Aoki Shuntai were summoned and ordered to serve as physicians-in-attendance, each being granted two hundred bales and thirty portions.Original
Takeuchi Gendō and Itō Kansai were subsequently summoned as well.Original
Oka Rekisen’in had at first diagnosed the illness as a colic.Original
At the morning audience on the sixth, when asked whether it would be all right for the shogun to go out to the outer hall that day, he answered that it would be fine.Original
It is said that in that outer hall the condition suddenly worsened, bringing him to the point of death.OriginalOriginal

Concerning the punishment of these three men, Sohō cites Katsu Kaishū’s “Thorns on the Wall.”OriginalOriginal

Katsu added the following remark to it.
There were those who slandered two or three people, suspicion arose, and in the end it brought disorder to the nation.Original
Because he wished this to serve as a warning for later generations, he could not bear to discard this small, unsightly record.OriginalOriginal

Sohō confirms Katsu’s position.Original
At the time, Katsu was engaged with the navy the shogunate was founding, and had no connection whatsoever to the political strife.Original
Even on the question of the shogunal successor, he was not of the Hitotsubashi faction.Original
He was a man with no risk of favoring the Mito faction too much.Original
That Katsu says the following.
Therefore, how greatly Ii was misled by intelligence reports was something outsiders equally regarded with regret, and Tokutomi Sohō sees this as rather the beginning of a blunder.OriginalOriginal

If I Do Not Control Him

Whether the death of Shogun Iesada occurred on the fourth day or the sixth day, whether the imperial letter from Kyoto arrived on the fourth day or the sixth day—Original
the accounts of the Mito side and the Ii side differ.Original
But Sohō dismisses this as not a major issue.OriginalOriginal

Ii’s motive for punishing his relatives was not necessarily because of the contents of the imperial letter.Original
At the very least, he must have recognized the need for this degree of punishment even before the shogun’s death, Tokutomi Sohō writes.OriginalOriginal

And he says the following.
Ii resolved that he and the Mito faction could never coexist.Original
If I do not control him, he will surely control me.
Assuming this, he took the initiative and controlled the other side first.OriginalOriginal

A castle with lamps lit until half past the eighth hour of the night.Original
In the evening, Tokugawa Nariaki, dressed in formal attire, moving on to Komagome.OriginalOriginal

Between the side that controlled and the side that was controlled, which spent more sleepless nights?

This article is a reading of Kinsei Nihon kokuminshi, vol. 39: The Administration of Ii Naosuke. Tokutomi Sohō’s views are those of the 1920s and 1930s and may differ from current scholarship. The source text is a century old and may differ from current scholarship.