Yamamoto Yaeko - Heroic defender of AizuIf you want to read about another heroine of this battle, yo

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”