Saga Rebellion

Saga Rebellion
	Part of the Meiji period
	; An ukiyo-e of the Saga Rebellion
Date	16 February 1874 – 9 April 1874
Location	Saga Prefecture
Result	Government victory; rebellion crushed
Belligerents
Meiji Government Imperial Japanese Army Imperial Japanese Navy	Rebels of former Saga Domain
Commanders and leaders
Ōkubo Toshimichi Prince Komatsu Akihito Shizuo Nozu Yamada Akiyoshi	† † †
Strength
906,679 Imperial soldiers (7 divisions, 10 brigades, & 12 battalions) 16,066 police troopers from Tokyo 6,239 naval marines 423 artillery pieces 15 warships	11,000 Saga rebels 3,000 members of the Seikantō Party & Ugoku League
Casualties and losses
147 killed 209 wounded	173 killed 160 wounded Other leaders were executed in Nagasaki Prison

The Saga Rebellion (佐賀の乱, Saga no ran) was an 1874 uprising in

Hizen

.

Background

Following the 1868

Japanese culture, language, dress and society, and appeared to many samurai to be a betrayal of the jōi (“Expel the Barbarian”) portion of the Sonnō jōi justification used to overthrow the former Tokugawa shogunate

.

Hizen Province, with a large samurai population, was a center of unrest against the new government. Older samurai formed political groups rejecting both overseas expansionism and westernization, and calling for a return to the old feudal order. Younger samurai organized the group Seikantō political party, advocating militarism and the invasion of Korea.

Prelude

Saga

where both the traditionists and the Seikantō samurai rallied to his support.

Alarmed by growing rumors of unrest,

Home Minister Ōkubo Toshimichi dispatched his henchman Iwamura Takatoshi to Saga to restore order. Iwamura only made the situation worse with his overbearing attitude. On the ship to Saga, he made an enemy of Shima Yoshitake, the former governor of Akita Prefecture, who was traveling to Saga at the request of Sanjō Sanetomi

. Iwamura so outraged Shima that Shima decided to throw his lot in with Etō and his rebels.

The Rebellion

Etō decided to take action on 16 February 1874, by raiding a bank and occupying government offices within the grounds of the old Saga castle. Etō had expected that similarly disaffected samurai in

Satsuma and Tosa

would stage insurrections when they received word of his actions, but he had miscalculated badly, and both domains remained calm.

On February 19, Ōkubo set up his headquarters in Hakata and issued a proclamation condemning the Saga rebels as traitors. Government troops marched into Saga the following day. After losing a battle on the border of Saga and Fukuoka on February 22, Eto decided that further resistance would only result in needless deaths, and disbanded his army.

Etō told his followers that he intended to escape to Kagoshima to obtain help from Saigō Takamori and his Satsuma samurai. If Saigō refused, he intended to go to Tosa, and if Tosa likewise refused, he would make his way to Tokyo to commit seppuku.

Although the Saga rebels were greatly demoralized by Etō's flight,^{[citation needed]} they continued to fight on, with some of the most violent combat occurring in the streets of Saga on February 27. Shima, who announced his decision to die fighting at Saga castle, fled that night for Kagoshima with his staff. Government forces seized Saga Castle on March 1 without further bloodshed.

Arrest warrants were circulated for Etō and Shima, and it is ironic that Etō was on the run as a fugitive from the very police force which he had helped create. Etō was refused support in Kagoshima, and fled to Tosa in a fishing boat, where he was received coldly. While attempting to find a boat to take him to Tokyo, he was apprehended on March 28.