#Nakano Yaeko

[city-of-ladies]

Yamamoto Yaeko - Heroic defender of Aizu

If you want to read about another heroine of this battle, you can check out my article on Nakano Takeko.

In autumn 1868 the domain of Aizu, Japan, was under attack by the imperial troops. Women within the castle actively took part in the defense. 

They prepared ammunition, cooked meals, nursed the wounded, but also risked their lives in extinguishing the fires and rushed to cover the enemy canon balls with wet mats before they exploded. Young girls also collected the enemy ammunition for the defenders to reuse it. A 60 years old woman went out of the castle to retrieve food, but encountered an enemy soldier on the way. She stabbed him with her dagger and safely went back to the castle. A female bodyguard unit also protected Matsudaira Teruhime, the lord’s sister.

Some of them also fought. A contemporary witness depicts them as ready to don their white kimono and fight naginata  in hand. An observer also said that they shared all the men’s burden, took on watches and shouldered a rifle if needed.

Among them was Yamamoto Yaeko (1845-1932), who distinguished herself through her leadership and her skills with firearms, though she wasn’t the only woman to use  them in the defense. She was the daughter of an artillery instructor and her brother Kakuma had taught her to use firearms. She was particularly competent, being able to use recent models like the Spencer rifle and had also learned to fight with a naginata. 

On October 8, Yaeko began to take part in night sorties. She had asked another female defender, Takagi Tokio, to cut her hair short like a male samurai. Armed with her Spencer rifle, she was dressed like a man and had two swords at her belt. She also commanded the men in charge of one of the cannons and didn’t abandon her post, even as cannon balls rained on the castle.

In spite of this fierce resistance, Aizu surrender on November 5, 1868. In an ultimate gesture of defiance, Teruhime ordered the women to clean the whole castle in order to humiliate the enemy as soon as they would set a foot in it and to show that the Aizu spirit was still unbroken. 

When the castle fell, Yaeko was made prisoner with the men. After being freed, she divorced from her first husband went to Kyoto to find her brother Kakuma. There, she met and married Nijima Jô, converted to Christianity and helped him to found Doshisha university. She later became a nurse for the Red Cross and served as such during the Russo-Japanese war in 1905. Another woman who fought in Aizu’s defense, Yamakawa Futaba, also became a promoter of women’s education.

(Yamamoto Yaeko in her later years, c.1929)

Today, a statue of Yamamoto Yaeko can be seen in Aizu. There’s also a TV-show based on her life: Yae no Sakura. 

Here’s the link to my Ko-Fi if you want to support me.

Bibliography:

Shiba Gorô, Remembering Aizu: the testament of Shiba Gorô

“Samurai warrior queens” documentary

Wright Diana E., “Female combatants and Japan’s Meiji restauration: the case of Aizu”

[ladyniniane]

Tag inspiration

J’ai été taguée par @haweke pour décliner les inspirations ( personnages de films/séries/livres ou même réels) qui ont servi à la construction de mes personnages. Merci beaucoup, j’adore ce tag ! 

Sighild 

Pour les personnages historiques, il y a deux grands axes. Le premier, c’est celui de la femme de la classe guerrière dans le Japon féodal. C’est une figure qui m’évoque la droiture, la noblesse et le courage de regarder la mort droit dans les yeux.

A partir de là, un personnage émerge surtout : la générale Tomoe Gozen (active à la fin du XIIème siècle),décrite dans les chroniques comme une terreur sur le champ de bataille, samouraï parmi les samouraïs, stratège de talent. Il y a aussi toutes les informations archéologiques et textuelles  qui laissent penser que dans certains cas des femmes ont pu faire partir intégrante des armées japonaises (notamment la mention d’une force de cavalerie “majoritairement féminine”).

Autre personnage de femme samouraï notable : Nakano Takeko (1847-1868). Héroïne de la bataille d’Aizu (1868) cette jeune femme profondément déterminée, à la fois guerrière, poétesse et calligraphe, incarne pour moi cet esprit de courage indomptable. Je te laisse une vidéo dans un documentaire qui reconstitue sa charge désespérée contre l’ennemi : * . Et je suis admirative du poème qu’elle avait accroché à sa naginata avant de partir au combat :

“Jamais je n’oserais me compter parmi tous ces célèbres guerriers, bien que mon cœur soit aussi vaillant que le leur”

En parlant de poèmes, j’ai été très marquée par les poèmes d’adieux de femmes de la classe guerrière qui ont choisi de se donner la mort pendant cette bataille. Leur destin est absolument glaçant, mais ces mots révèlent une grande force et une dignité dans l’épreuve :

“J’ai vécu le chemin / Qu’on m’indiquait comme / Le chemin du samouraï /Alors je vais suivre ce chemin/ Que l’on m’indique comme /Le chemin du samouraï pour /Le voyage au pays des morts”

“Voilà, je suis / Vous devez constater qu’il existe/Un bambou dont le nœud ne casse pas / Bien que le bambou incline/ Selon la direction du vent”

Autre personnage qui représente pour moi cet esprit de résistance : Yamamoto Yaeko (1845-1932) qui s’illustre dans la défense du château d’Aizu et devient plus tard une grand pionnière de l’éducation des femmes au Japon.

L’autre axe majeur est constitué par les récits dans les sagas nordiques mettant en scène des guerrières. Ont-il un fond de vérité ou pas ? Il y a tout un débat académique là-dessus. Mais j’ai été marquée par la découverte de la guerrière de Birka . Le fait qu’elle ait été enterrée avec un jeu de plateau m’a inspirée de faire jouer mon personnage à des jeux de stratégie.

Au niveau des personnages de fiction, pas d’inspirations cette fois mais une réaction en opposition à ce qui m’agaçait dans la représentation des femmes guerrières en Fantasy. J’ai déjà abordé ce sujet ici donc je te laisse aller lire si tu le souhaites ;) Je ne prétends pas bien sûr avoir inventé l’eau chaude ni révolutionner quoi que ce soit, j’ai simplement crée le personnage que j’aurais aimé voir.

Ari

Son personnage doit beaucoup à une personne réelle : la nonne bouddhiste japonaise Maruko Tsuyuno dont on peut suivre le parcours dans le documentaire “Japon les chemins du pèlerinage”. J’avais adoré suivre cette femme lumineuse, qui est mariée, a un enfant, et vit pleinement sa pratique spirituelle et ses activités artistiques.

Son personnage doit beaucoup à la figure de la nonne savante et lettrée que l’on peut rencontrer pendant le Moyen-âge européen, Herrade de Landsberg, Hildegarde von Bingen, Hrotsvita de Gandersheim etc. Au début, je cherchais une occupation à mon personnage et je pensais lui faire copier/ enluminer des manuscrits. Du coup la présence d’enlumineuses m’a fortement inspirée (Guda, Claricia, la nonne à la dent bleue etc.). Finalement, j’ai décidé de faire d’elle une peintresse et ce choix m’a l’a aussi été inspiré par les nonnes artistes, notamment à la renaissance.

Il y a aussi des nonnes et artistes japonaises qui m’ont inspirée, notamment Dame Nijô (lisez son Splendeur et misères d’une favorite) et Abutsu-ni, qui sont des voyageuses intellectuellement accomplies.

[shinsengumi-archives]

Fujita family people

Introducing the family of the "Fujita family" built by Goro Fujita.

Goro Fujita

After the Meiji era, Hajime Saito was renamed Goro Fujita. The history of the Fujita family began here.

Tokio Fujita

Fujita Goro's wife. Born on April 15th, 3rd year of Koka, as the eldest daughter of Kojuro Takagi and Katsuko Takagi of the Aizu clan.

His real name is "Sada", and he was a Yuhitsu with Teruhime and Nakarattan. The name "Tokio" is the real name of the source at that time.

In the Battle of Aizu in the 4th year of Keio, he was a castle with many Aizu clan men. At that time, Tokio's name appears in a retrospective of Yaeko (later Mrs. Neesima), the younger sister of Kakuma Yamamoto, who was also a castle.

"After entering the castle, the concubine was caring for the injured in the daytime, but in the evening, I heard that she was going to sortie tonight, so I started cutting my hair with Wakizashi to get the concubine out, but I couldn't cut it easily. because I do, Takagi Morino’s sister, I had cut into Tokio-san. "(Hiraishi Benzo" Aizu Boshin ")

the end of a fierce Rojo warfare, Aizu is Rakujo surrender, after the war many of Aizu He moved to Tonan with a concubine and lived a harsh and extremely poor life.

After that, around the 7th year of the Meiji era, he married Goro Fujita and gave birth to three children, Tsutomu, Tsuyoshi, and Tatsuo.

In October 1890, we planted cherry trees at Amidaji Temple in Nanokamachi, Aizu with ten women from Aizu to commemorate the war dead in the Battle of Aizu.

The following year, in the 41st year of the Meiji era, he solicited donations for the purchase of grave fields from women and girls from Aizu, and he himself became the president of the founder of Wakamatsu, opened an account at Yasuda Bank, and donated 2.5 yen.

Tokio is described in the "Dainippon Women's Record" surveyed in March, 1891.

"Tokioko Fujita First-year Koka Women's Higher Normal School Secretary Mrs. Goro Fujita Female Student Director Dormitory Owner Hongo-ku Masago-cho 30"

The owner of the dormitory for female students was the wife of Tsutomu Nishino, the wife of Tsutomu Nishino, who was also boarding here in the sense that she had a high school girl boarding at home with the consent of the school. Thirty, Masago-cho, Hongo-ku, is the address, where Tokio died at the age of seventy-five.

Tsutomu Fujita

Born on December 15, 1897, as the eldest son of Goro Fujita and Tokio.

After graduating from Prefectural Shichu, he went through a childhood school and a military academy, and became a soldier.

He worked for the Wakamatsu Regiment in the military and fought on the "Mikasa" during the Battle of Tsushima.

Later, he married Midori Nishino and had seven children, Element, Minoru, Ritsu, Kyoko, Susumu, Kazuko, and Toru.

He lived in Masago-cho, Hongo, Tokyo, but built a new house in Yayoi-cho, Nakano-ku in 1918. However, when I was just starting to build this house, I was hit by the Great Kanto Earthquake, and when I rebuilt it, I dug a basement and dug a well there to keep water on hand, miso, soy sauce, sugar, and many other preserved foods. It was stored and was very popular with the neighbors as "a military man".

However, this house was also destroyed by the air raids of World War II and moved to Ogikubo after the war.

In his later years, Kazuko's husband was a physician, and he was cured there.

In 1952, just before his death, Tsutomu dictated what he had heard from his father Goro and had his wife Midori write it down. This is the so-called "History of the Fujita Family", which is a valuable documentary material in the Fujita Family's collection.

He left behind the precious historical materials, and in 1958, he was taken care of by his daughter Kazuko and her husband, and died.

Tsuyoshi Fujita

Born on October 4, 1902, as the second son of Goro Fujita and Tokio.

It is said that he lived abroad a lot.

In the 3rd year of the Taisho era, he married Yuki Asaba (Yukiko), the granddaughter of Tosa Tanaka, an old Aizu clan, and had a second son and a second daughter.

Hideki, the eldest son, was a second lieutenant of the Navy, but after the end of the war, he served in the building section of Yokohama City Hall.

The second son, Toei, and the second daughter, Takako, were adopted by the Asaba family in consideration of the disconnection of the Asaba family.

He died in the New Year of 1945.

Tatsuo Numazawa

Born as the third son of Goro Fujita and Tokio, the family register does not mention it.

This is because Tatsuo was adopted by Kohachiro Numazawa and Mr. and Mrs. Kuni, the 13th head of the Aizu clan's old Numazawa family, immediately after birth.

This Numazawa family is the older sister of Tokio's mother Takagi (formerly Kimoto) Katsuko, and has Michiko Numazawa, whose mother-in-law and daughter both slashed themselves in the Aizu castle battle, and their son Kohachiro and Tokio are cousins. ..

The Numazawa family, who had no children between Kohachiro and Kuni and were worried about the disconnection, had been hoping that Tatsuo would be adopted by all means if he was a boy, since he was still hungry.

The Fujita family agreed, and as soon as the long-awaited boy was born, he was adopted by the Numazawa family.

The secret of this birth was firmly kept between the two families, and Tatsuo grew up completely unaware of his birth.

When he was a college student, Tatsuo, who was suspicious of his birth, asked his aunt Iduka, but he knew the truth. Tatsuo, who first learned the secret of his birth, shed tears like a child and listened to the story.

Later, he married a woman named Tatsu and had a child.

This story of Tatsuo's knowledge of the secret of his birth is a story that Professor Shizuko Akama heard directly from Mr. Eiko Numazawa, the second daughter of Mr. and Mrs. Tatsuo.

Midori Fujita

Born on March 29, 1897, as the second daughter of the Nishino family, a well-known family in Sakata, one of the 36 people who originated in Sakata, a merchant who used to be a rice wholesaler and a ship wholesaler.

When asked by his father, "Would you like to have a fortune or an education?", Midori wanted to be educated and entered the Women's Higher Normal School to study science.

When I was a student of the high school girl, the boarding house was the Fujita family, who was the superintendent of the high school girl at that time. So, Tokio, who liked Midori very much, finally made that promise by setting up three people to apply for marriage to his son's daughter-in-law and stepping on Hyakudoishi.

Midori, who graduated from a high school girl as the fifth graduate, married Tsutomu Fujita and gave birth to seven children.

In his later years, when Goro Fujita suffered from gastric ulcer, Midori was said to have taken good care of him with Tokio.

It is also this Midori who wrote down the "History of the Fujita Family", which his husband Tsutomu told about what he had heard from his father Goro just before his death in 1958.

According to the story of his descendants, he was a quiet, well-educated person.

Yuki Fujita (Yukiko)

Born as the eldest daughter of the Asaba family, a former deadhead wholesaler in Kugo, Yokosuka.

My mother was a concubine of Tosa Tanaka, a feudal lord of the Aizu clan, and became the wife of Aizu people Sakae Ishikawa around the 12th and 3rd years of the Meiji era. rice field. It is said that he traveled to the United States.

After that, he married the Asaba family and gave birth to a second daughter and a first son. The eldest daughter is Yuki (Yukiko).

Yuki (Yukiko) married Tsuyoshi Fujita in the 3rd year of the Taisho era and gave birth to a second son and a second daughter.

Among them, the second son, Tamotsu, and the second daughter, Takako, were worried about the disconnection of the Asaba family and sent them out as adopted children.

In creating this section, we would like to thank the descendants of Goro Fujita's eldest son Tsutomu, the second daughter of Kazuko Mitsume, and the great-grandson of Saito Hajime, for their cooperation and advice.

We would like to express our sincere gratitude.