was a Japanese samurai of the late

Edo period The or is the period between 1603 and 1867 in the history of Japan, when Japan was under the rule of the Tokugawa shogunate and the country's 300 regional '' daimyo''. Emerging from the chaos of the Sengoku period, the Edo period was characteriz ...

, who served the Shimazu clan of

Satsuma Satsuma may refer to: * Satsuma (fruit), a citrus fruit * ''Satsuma'' (gastropod), a genus of land snails Places Japan * Satsuma, Kagoshima, a Japanese town * Satsuma District, Kagoshima, a district in Kagoshima Prefecture * Satsuma Domain, a sou ...

, and went on to become a government official of the early

Meiji period The is an era of Japanese history that extended from October 23, 1868 to July 30, 1912. The Meiji era was the first half of the Empire of Japan, when the Japanese people moved from being an isolated feudal society at risk of colonization ...

. He was also commonly known as . Komatsu ruled the fief of Yoshitoshi, which was a part of the

Satsuma Domain The , briefly known as the , was a domain (''han'') of the Tokugawa shogunate of Japan during the Edo period from 1602 to 1871. The Satsuma Domain was based at Kagoshima Castle in Satsuma Province, the core of the modern city of Kagoshima, ...

. Appointed ''

karō were top-ranking samurai officials and advisors in service to the ''daimyōs'' of feudal Japan. Overview In the Edo period, the policy of ''sankin-kōtai'' (alternate attendance) required each ''daimyō'' to place a ''karō'' in Edo and anoth ...

'' in 1862, he held high office in the Satsuma domain until its dissolution in 1871. Komatsu was also a descendant of the

Sengoku The was a period in Japanese history of near-constant civil war and social upheaval from 1467 to 1615. The Sengoku period was initiated by the Ōnin War in 1467 which collapsed the feudal system of Japan under the Ashikaga shogunate. Various ...

-era samurai Nejime Shigenaga."Nejime-shi" on Harimaya.com
(15 August 2008)

Early life and adoption

Komatsu Tatewaki was born the third son of Kimotsuki Kaneyoshi of Kiire (5500 koku) who were high-ranking Satsuma retainers. His birth name was Kimotsuki Kaneshige He was adopted by Komatsu Kiyomichi as a young man and married Komatsu Ochika, and inherited the headship in 1856, immediately after his adoption and became Komatsu Kiyokado (Tatewaki)

Satsuma career

Komatsu became a ''

'' in the service of

Shimazu Tadayoshi was a ''daimyō'' (feudal lord) of Satsuma Province during Japan's Sengoku period. He was born into the Mimasaka Shimazu family (伊作島津家), which was part of the Shimazu clan, but after his father Shimazu Yoshihisa died, his mother ma ...

, the daimyō of Satsuma, in 1862. He was the official advocate of low-ranking men such as

Ōkubo Toshimichi was a Japanese statesman and one of the Three Great Nobles regarded as the main founders of modern Japan. Ōkubo was a ''samurai'' of the Satsuma Domain and joined the movement to overthrow the ruling Tokugawa Shogunate during the ''Bak ...

. He also helped shelter

Sakamoto Ryōma was a Japanese ''samurai'', a '' shishi'' and influential figure of the ''Bakumatsu'' and establishment of the Empire of Japan in the late Edo period. He was a low-ranking ''samurai'' from the Tosa Domain on Shikoku and became an active oppon ...

Meiji era

In the first few years of the Meiji era, Komatsu served as an official in the Imperial government.J. Morris, ''Makers of Japan'', p. 274.

Later life and death

While in Kagoshima, Komatsu fell ill and died in 1870. Before he died he wrote a letter to Okoto, his concubine in Kyoto, directing her to give their son Komatsu Kiyonao to his wife Ochika to be raised as the head of the Komatsu family. He was buried in the Komatsu family shrine beside both Ochika and Okoto. The Komatsu family shrine is located in the city of Hiyoki, known in modern-day as the

Kagoshima Prefecture is a prefecture of Japan located on the island of Kyushu and the Ryukyu Islands. Kagoshima Prefecture has a population of 1,599,779 (1 January 2020) and has a geographic area of 9,187 km2 (3,547 sq mi). Kagoshima Prefecture borders Kumamoto P ...

Notes

References

*''This article was derived in part from corresponding content on the

Japanese Wikipedia The is the Japanese-language edition of Wikipedia, a free, open-source online encyclopedia. Started on 11 May 2001, the edition attained the 200,000 article mark in April 2006 and the 500,000 article mark in June 2008. As of , it has over ar ...

.'' * Beasley, William G. (1972). ''The Meiji Restoration''. Stanford: Stanford University Press. *Black, John R. (1881). ''Young Japan: Yokohama and Yedo''. London: Trubner & co. *Morris, J (1907). ''Makers of Japan''. London: Methuen & Co.
"Nejime-shi" on Harimaya.com
(15 August 2008) {{DEFAULTSORT:Komatsu, Kiyokado Shimazu retainers Samurai Karō People of the Boshin War People from Satsuma Domain Meiji Restoration Japanese politicians 1835 births 1870 deaths