Kuroda Kiyotaka
Videos
Count Kuroda Kiyotaka was a Japanese politician and general who served as prime minister of Japan from 1888 to 1889. He was one of the genrō, or senior statesman of the Meiji era. Born in the Satsuma
Kiyotaka Kuroda formal
Nishiki-e painting of Kuroda Kiyotaka
Kiyotaka Kuroda at a young age
Boshin War
Videos
The Boshin War, sometimes known as the Japanese Revolution or Japanese Civil War, was a civil war in Japan fought from 1868 to 1869 between forces of the ruling Tokugawa shogunate and a coalition seek
Kuroda Kiyotaka
…to Satsuma, Kuroda became an active member of the Satsuma-Chōshū joint effort to overthrow the Tokugawa shogunate. Later, as a military leader in the Boshin War, he became famous for sparing the life of Enomoto Takeaki, who had stood against Kuroda's army at the Battle of Hakodate. Under the new Meiji government…
The Battle of Ueno
The shogunate's Kanrin Maru, Japan's first screw-driven steam warship, 1855. The shogunate pursued modernization, but was faced by growing internal discontent against the harm to national sovereignty brought on by contact with Westerners.
Bakufu troops near Mount Fuji in 1867. The painting by French officer Jules Brunet shows an eclectic combination of Western and Japanese equipment.
Guns of the Boshin War, from top to bottom: a Snider, a Starr, and an Minié rifle