Spotlight on famous Samurai – Sakamoto Ryoma

Posted On: 18 January 2017
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Born in 1836 in Tosa han, modern day Kochi prefecture, with the name Sakamoto Naonari, in previous generations the Sakamoto families highly successful Saké brewing business had furnished them with enough wealth to buy their way into the Samurai class. Despite holding the title of Samurai, these low-ranking families were shunned by the higher ranks of Bushi and isolated in their own residential zones, effectively consigned to a stagnant social structure without hope of advancement.


Having proven himself unsuited to academic studies, Sakamoto began his study of Kenjutsu in the Oguri-ryu. This system, containing both sword and unarmed practice is sadly now extinct, but was prevalent in the Tosa han after three generations of the region's Daimyo were instructed by the founder of Oguri-ryu Oguri Masanobu.


Sakamoto Ryoma excelled in his studies and became known for his prowess with the sword, to the extent that at the age of seventeen he was granted permission to travel to Edo in search of further development of his art.


He enrolled in the Hokushin Itto Ryu a system, primarily of Kenjutsu, which was one of the three largest sword schools of the period. Characterised by domination of the centre line and the principle of combining defence and offense in a single movement, the branch of Itto Ryu later went on to become one of the major influences on the development of modern Kendo.


In 1858 Sakamoto Ryoma earned a Mokuroku license from the Koryu recognizing his accomplishment in "the art of war using a long-handled sword in the Hokushin Itto-ryu style" and detailing the catalogue of the 21 techniques mastered.


On July the 9th of that very year Commodore Matthew C. Perry, carrying a letter from the President of the United States, arrived at the head of a US fleet with the aim of forcing Sakoku Japan, where foreign trespass was punishable by death, to open their ports to American vessels.


Perry steamed to Uraga at the mouth of Edo's bay with his demands of access for trade, presenting a show of major military strength and issuing threats of retribution in case of refusal. This intervention caused widespread political disruption and debate throughout Japanese society at a time when the Tokugawa Shogunate was at a particularly weak ebb. Perry's approach ultimately achieved American aims and in less than a year following first contact access to ports in Shimoda and Hakodate were opened to US trade.


Sakamoto Ryoma had moved back to Tosa han following graduation from his Kenjutsu education and soon became involved in a local political movement committed to reforming the governance of the province. However, he quickly became disillusioned with the small scale of the reform sought, wanting to shape the future of the whole of Japan, not only his local state. Without permission, Sakamoto departed from Tosa han, leaving both political movement and clan behind. This illegal action made Sakamoto an outlaw and Ronin in the eyes of the standing government and as a result his sister committed Seppuku.
Concealing his identity using the pseudonym Saitani Umetarō, Sakamoto quickly began to work in secret against the Tokugawa Shogunate. He identified a target in the Bakufu, one Katsu Kaishū, a high-ranking member of the Shogunate and advocate of modernisation, who he planned to assassinate. In a twist of fate, Sakamoto ended up becoming Katsu's protégé who managed to convince the young swordsman of the need for Japan to develop a long-term strategy to become a global military power for its own benefit.


Joining the swell of opposition to the orders of the Tokugawa Bakufu and with a driving need to help Japan emerge as a power in the modern age, Sakamoto worked with Katsu to begin the development of a modern Japanese Navy. Brokering peace between Choshu and Satsuma provinces in secret, irreconcilable enemies for generations, Sakamoto helped them to build a combined fleet to rival the sea power or the Tokugawa Shogunate.
In 1866, seeking to return power to the Emperor, the Choshu army defeated the Tokugawa on the battlefield, bringing the Shogunate to the brink of collapse. Sakamoto's former masters in Tosa han sent for him, bestowing honours upon him and asking him work as an intermediary between the failing Shogunate and the Meiji Emperor to ensure that the powerful military alliance pitted against the Bakufu did not simply seize power for themselves in the name of the Emperor only.


After these diplomatic successes Sakamoto Ryoma became embroiled in making plans for the future of Japan, proposing future models of government, a constitution, national Army and Navy and financial and trading measures. It is believed that many of these proposals formed the basis of the new Imperial government formed shortly after Sakamoto's untimely death.


On the night of the 10th of December 1867 Sakamoto Ryoma had taken lodgings in Kyoto at the Omiya inn. Late at night Sakamoto's former Sumo bodyguard answered a knock at the door to a disguised member of the Mimawarigumi, Tokugawa retainers who formed a special police force to maintain public order in Kyoto. Unwisely turning to inform his employer of this late-night caller, the bodyguard was cut down by the visitor who rushed the guest rooms with a group of assassins concealed close by.

In the confused melee that ensued the assassins stormed Ryoma's rooms, knocking over and extinguished the lamps to plunging the inn into darkness before crashing through the Shoji screens, to fatally wound both Ryoma and his friend Nakaoka Shintaro, before making their escape. With his dying words Ryoma lamented that he had been caught unawares and unprepared by the assassins.

Less than a month later, the Emperor Meiji formally came into his power, restoring governance of Japan to the imperial family for the first time in over 1000 years.

Sakamoto Ryoma's vision for a modern, independent Japan and his efforts to bring that vision to pass, left an indelible imprint on the nation as it emerged from its self-imposed feudal isolation. Known as the "father of the Imperial Japanese Navy" his influence in the development of the modern fleet helped to bring the Tokugawa Bakufu to its knees and laid the foundation for Japan to be a global power. Without his intervention it cannot be certain that the Japan forces would have unified firstly with their ancient enemies to overcome a common foe, and secondly behind the emperor to usher in a new age. In recent times Japanese industrialists have cried out for a leader with Sakamoto Ryoma's vision and drive to push their economy forward into a new age of prosperity.

His influence on the events in which he became entangled were critical to the ultimate outcome, restoration of imperial power and the ushering in of a new age of Japanese history with the 1868 Meiji restoration. Truly a giant of Japanese history!