Kobe Incident
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The , also known in Japanese as the and in English as the Bizen affray or Bizen affair, was a diplomatic incident between
Imperial Japan The also known as the Japanese Empire or Imperial Japan, was a historical nation-state and great power that existed from the Meiji Restoration in 1868 until the enactment of the post-World War II 1947 constitution and subsequent forma ...
and several Western powers, caused by a skirmish on February 4, 1868 between Bizen soldiers and foreign sailors. It developed into a crisis in Franco–Japanese relations, becoming the first major international affairs challenge for the fledgling
Meiji government The was the government that was formed by politicians of the Satsuma Domain and Chōshū Domain in the 1860s. The Meiji government was the early government of the Empire of Japan. Politicians of the Meiji government were known as the Meiji ...
. The incident occurred during a period of time that Hyōgo Port was open to foreign trade, with a community of foreign merchants and soldiers living and working in the
Kobe foreign settlement The , also known as the Kobe foreign concession, was a foreign settlement located about 3.5 kilometers east of the Port of Kobe, in the future Chūō-ku of Kobe, Japan. Established based on the Ansei Treaties, it existed from January 1, 1868, t ...
. In response, the foreign militaries seized nearby Japanese warships and occupied the center of the city under the pretense of protecting their settlement. The Imperial court sent a representative to negotiate and inform the Westerners that power had shifted from the
Tokugawa Shogunate The Tokugawa shogunate (, Japanese 徳川幕府 ''Tokugawa bakufu''), also known as the , was the military government of Japan during the Edo period from 1603 to 1868. Nussbaum, Louis-Frédéric. (2005)"''Tokugawa-jidai''"in ''Japan Encyclopedia ...
to the newly-formed
Meiji government The was the government that was formed by politicians of the Satsuma Domain and Chōshū Domain in the 1860s. The Meiji government was the early government of the Empire of Japan. Politicians of the Meiji government were known as the Meiji ...
. The Western representatives demanded Taki Zenzaburo, who was involved, be executed; Taki committed ceremonial
seppuku , sometimes referred to as hara-kiri (, , a native Japanese kun reading), is a form of Japanese ritual suicide by disembowelment. It was originally reserved for samurai in their code of honour but was also practised by other Japanese people ...
on March 3.


Initial incident

On January 27, 1868, with the outbreak of the
Boshin war The , 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 clique seeking to seize political power in the name of the Imperi ...
, the new
Meiji government The was the government that was formed by politicians of the Satsuma Domain and Chōshū Domain in the 1860s. The Meiji government was the early government of the Empire of Japan. Politicians of the Meiji government were known as the Meiji ...
ordered that
Nishinomiya 270px, Nishinomiya City Hall 270px, Aerial view of Nishinomiya city center 270px, Hirota Shrine is a city located in Hyōgo Prefecture, Japan. , the city had an estimated population of 484,368 in 218948 households and a population density ...
in Settsu be guarded in order to check the pro-Shogunate forces of
Amagasaki Domain file:Amagasaki Castle Tenshu 20181125.jpg, 250px, Reconstructed Amagasaki Castle tenshu was a Han (Japan), feudal domain under the Tokugawa shogunate of Edo period Japan, located in Settsu Province in what is now the southeastern portion of mod ...
. By the 29th, 2,000 troops had been raised in Bizen Domain to the west, and among these were 500 (alternately 800) troops under the command of the domain's ''
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 anothe ...
'' , accompanied by cannons, who marched over land for their destination. Because the port of Hyōgo had been opened on January 1, the troops advanced on the road rather than that built by the
Tokugawa shogunate The Tokugawa shogunate (, Japanese 徳川幕府 ''Tokugawa bakufu''), also known as the , was the military government of Japan during the Edo period from 1603 to 1868. Nussbaum, Louis-Frédéric. (2005)"''Tokugawa-jidai''"in ''Japan Encyclopedia ...
, in an effort to avoid encounters with enemy forces or foreigners. Sometime after 1 o'clock on February 4, as the line of Bizen troops marched along in the vicinity of Sannomiya Shrine, two French sailors emerged from a nearby building and attempted to cross the line. The Japanese troops saw this as constituting , an act of extreme disrespect under the Laws for the Military Houses, and Taki Zenzaburo, in charge of the third cannon group, took a spear and attempted to stop them. However, neither side could understand the other, and when the sailors attempted to force their way through, Taki stabbed at them with his spear, inflicting light wounds. The sailors briefly retreated indoors but reemerged with handguns. Taki, seeing this, shouted out "Guns, guns!", which his troops took as an order to shoot, beginning a firefight. The roadside skirmish soon also targeted the European and American dignitaries who were inspecting the adjacent planned site of a foreign settlement, and several full volleys were fired. Most of the bullets missed and flew over the heads of their intended targets, but did pierce the various foreign flags flying over the old Shogunate customs house on the other side of the planned site. Whether this was warning fire or simply badly aimed shots intended to kill was unclear even in the testimony of Western witnesses.


Foreign response

The British envoy
Harry Smith Parkes Sir Harry Smith Parkes (24 February 1828 – 22 March 1885) was a British diplomat who served as Envoy Extraordinary and Minister Plenipotentiary and Consul General of the United Kingdom to the Empire of Japan from 1865 to 1883 and the Chinese ...
, who happened to be present at the skirmish, was enraged, and notified the vessels of various nations present to celebrate the opening of the port of Hyōgo of a state of emergency. U.S. Marines, British guardsmen, and French sailors pursued the Bizen troops outside of the foreign settlement and exchanged fire at . On the Bizen side, Heki ordered his troops to cease fire and withdraw. There was one "
coolie A coolie (also spelled koelie, kuli, khuli, khulie, cooli, cooly, or quli) is a term for a low-wage labourer, typically of South Asian or East Asian descent. The word ''coolie'' was first popularized in the 16th century by European traders acros ...
" killed, and a few wounded on either side. On that same day, the Great Powers that possessed consulates in Kobe militarily occupied central Kobe under the pretext of protecting the foreign settlement, and seized the Tokugawa warships anchored off the Hyōgo port. At this point in time, the Japanese imperial court had not yet informed foreign countries of the transition of power from the Shogunate to the Meiji government, and
Itō Hirobumi was a Japanese politician and statesman who served as the first Prime Minister of Japan. He was also a leading member of the '' genrō'', a group of senior statesmen that dictated Japanese policy during the Meiji era. A London-educated sa ...
attempted negotiations that quickly broke down. On February 8, the imperial court hurriedly announced the transfer of power to the Meiji government and declared the opening of Japan. Higashikuze Michitomi was assigned as a representative and reopened negotiations. The foreign countries demanded safety for their people and harsh punishment for the Japanese person responsible for the incident—in short, Taki's execution. There was some complaint that this was too harsh for an incident in which no one had actually died, and to the Japanese Taki's response to the foreign troops' ''tomowari'' seemed altogether natural, but in the face of a demand from the Great Powers there was nothing to be done.
Date Munenari __NOTOC__ The Marquis was the eighth head of the Uwajima Domain during the Late Tokugawa shogunate and a politician of the early Meiji era. Early life Munenari was born in Edo, the 4th son of the hatamoto Yamaguchi Naokatsu. Munenari, then known ...
sent an appeal for clemency via Itō Hirobumi and Godai Tomoatsu, which arrived just in time, but was rejected by a vote of the foreign ministers, beginning with the French Consul General Léon Roches. Finally, on February 24, Bizen Domain acceded to the foreign countries' demands. Taki committed
seppuku , sometimes referred to as hara-kiri (, , a native Japanese kun reading), is a form of Japanese ritual suicide by disembowelment. It was originally reserved for samurai in their code of honour but was also practised by other Japanese people ...
before the assembled foreign officials at Eifuku-ji Temple in Osaka on March 3. Heki, who had been in command of the troops, was simultaneously placed under house arrest, and the incident was tentatively resolved.


Significance

The Kobe Incident represented the first international diplomatic incident faced by the new government after the restoration of Imperial rule. Though this incident was ultimately resolved when the foreign powers forced the execution of Taki Zenzaburo ( jp), it did demonstrate to them that the new Meiji government was now the ruling administration to deal with in terms of Japan's foreign policy. Furthermore, this incident showed the court's foreign-relations philosophy turning quickly from that of to . However, as the ''jōi'' faction did retain support in the new administration, the new foreign policy was not made clear internally. An official declaration of the change was finally made the next year, on July 7, 1869, based on a decision by the national council.


See also

* Diplomatic (contractual or in treatise) faux-pas *The Robinson Affair ( Namamugi Incident)


Notes


References


Japanese sources

*, held by the
Diplomatic Archives of the Ministry of Foreign Affairs of Japan The (formerly Diplomatic Record Office of the Ministry of Foreign Affairs) in Tokyo, Japan, is the office of the Ministry of Foreign Affairs in charge of archiving Japan's diplomatic documents. An exhibition hall near the archives building ( ...
, available online via the Japan Center for Asian Historical Records with reference number B08090131500. * * * * * * * * * *


Western sources

* * * * * * * * * {{Authority control 1868 in Japan Boshin War Japan–United Kingdom relations France–Japan relations Japan–United States relations Francophobia Anti-Americanism