was a 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 characte ...

Japanese Japanese may refer to: * Something from or related to Japan, an island country in East Asia * Japanese language, spoken mainly in Japan * Japanese people, the ethnic group that identifies with Japan through ancestry or culture ** Japanese diaspor ...

samurai were the hereditary military nobility and officer caste of medieval and early-modern Japan from the late 12th century until their abolition in 1876. They were the well-paid retainers of the '' daimyo'' (the great feudal landholders). They h ...

, and the 5th ''

daimyō were powerful Japanese magnates, feudal lords who, from the 10th century to the early Meiji period in the middle 19th century, ruled most of Japan from their vast, hereditary land holdings. They were subordinate to the shogun and nominal ...

'' of

Iwakitaira Domain was a feudal domain under the Tokugawa shogunate of Edo period Japan.,Jansen, Marius B. (1994)''Sakamoto Ryōma and the Meiji Restoration,'' p. 401 based at Iwakitaira Castle in southern Mutsu Province in what is now part of modern-day Iwaki, F ...

in the

Tōhoku region The , Northeast region, or consists of the northeastern portion of Honshu, the largest island of Japan. This traditional region consists of six prefectures (''ken''): Akita, Aomori, Fukushima, Iwate, Miyagi, and Yamagata. Tōhoku reta ...

of Japan, and the 10th hereditary chieftain of the Andō clan. He was the eldest son of Andō Nobuyori and his mother was a daughter of Matsudaira Nobuakira of Yoshida Domain. His childhood names were Kinnoshin and Kinnosuke and he was known most of his life as Andō Nobuyuki, taking the name of Nobumasa only after he became a ''

rōjū The , usually translated as ''Elder'', was one of the highest-ranking government posts under the Tokugawa shogunate of Edo period Japan. The term refers either to individual Elders, or to the Council of Elders as a whole; under the first two ''shō ...

.''

Biography

Nobumasa was born at the domain's Edo residence, and was received in formal audience by

Shōgun , officially , was the title of the military dictators of Japan during most of the period spanning from 1185 to 1868. Nominally appointed by the Emperor, shoguns were usually the de facto rulers of the country, though during part of the Kamak ...

Tokugawa Ienari Tokugawa Ienari ( ja, 徳川家斉, November 18, 1773 – March 22, 1841) was the eleventh and longest-serving ''shōgun'' of the Tokugawa shogunate of Japan who held office from 1787 to 1837.Hall, John Whitney ''et al.'' (1991) ''Early Modern J ...

in 1835. He became daimyō in 1847 on the death of his father. In 1848, he was promoted to the post of ''

sōshaban were officials of the Tokugawa shogunate in Edo period Japan. Conventional interpretations have construed this Japanese title as "master of ceremonies" Created in 1632, this '' bakufu'' title identified an official selected from the ranks of the ...

'' within the shogunal administration. In 1858, he rose to the post of ''

jisha-bugyō was a "commissioner" or an "overseer" of the Tokugawa shogunate in Edo period Japan. Appointments to this prominent office were always ''fudai daimyōs'', the lowest-ranking of the shogunate offices to be so restricted.Beasley, William G. (1955) ...

'', and subsequently was appointed a ''

wakadoshiyori The ', or "Junior Elders", were high government officials in the Edo period Japan under the Tokugawa shogunate (1603-1867). The position was established around 1633, but appointments were irregular until 1662. The four to six ''wakadoshiyori'' we ...

'' under the ''

Tairō ''Tairō'' (, "great elder") was a high-ranking official position in the Tokugawa shogunate government of Japan, roughly comparable to the office of prime minister. The ''tairō'' presided over the governing '' rōjū'' council in the event of an ...

Ii Naosuke was ''daimyō'' of Hikone (1850–1860) and also Tairō of the Tokugawa shogunate, Japan, a position he held from April 23, 1858, until his death, assassinated in the Sakuradamon Incident on March 24, 1860. He is most famous for signing the ...

. In 1860 he was appointed a ''

,'' and placed in charge of foreign affairs. Ii Naosuke was assassinated in the Sakuradamon Incident in 1860 and Andō Nobumasa became a leading councilor of state together with

Kuze Hirochika was a Japanese ''daimyō'' of the late Edo period, who ruled the Sekiyado Domain. He served as a rōjū in the Tokugawa shogunate The Tokugawa shogunate (, Japanese 徳川幕府 ''Tokugawa bakufu''), also known as the , was the military gove ...

.Harootunian, ''Toward Restoration'', p. 276. Among the many problems he faced in foreign affairs during this Bakumatsu period, was them the conclusion of a commercial treaty with Prussia, the assassination of

Henry Heusken Hendrick Conrad Joannes Heusken (January 20, 1832 – January 15, 1861) was a Dutch-American interpreter for the first American consulate in Japan, established at Gyokusen-ji in Shimoda, Shizuoka in the late Bakumatsu period.Tsushima Island is an island of the Japanese archipelago situated in-between the Tsushima Strait and Korea Strait, approximately halfway between Kyushu and the Korean Peninsula. The main island of Tsushima, once a single island, was divided into two in 1671 by ...

for the

Russian Empire The Russian Empire was an empire and the final period of the Russian monarchy from 1721 to 1917, ruling across large parts of Eurasia. It succeeded the Tsardom of Russia following the Treaty of Nystad, which ended the Great Northern War. ...

. Andō was also a supporter of the '' kobu-gattai'' policy to strengthen relations between the imperial court and the shogunate. He was instrumental in arranging for Kazunomiya, the younger sister of

Emperor Kōmei was the 121st Emperor of Japan, according to the traditional order of succession.Imperial Household Agency (''Kunaichō'')孝明天皇 (121)/ref> Kōmei's reign spanned the years from 1846 through 1867, corresponding to the final years of the ...

, to marry

Tokugawa Iemochi. All of these actions aroused the enmity of pro-'' Sonnō jōi'' samurai, and Andō himself was the target of an assassination attempt in 1862 by six former Mito Domain samurai outside the Sakashita Gate of Edo Castle also called the Sakashita Gate Incident. British counsul-general

Rutherford Alcock Sir John Rutherford Alcock, KCB (25 May 1809''London, England, Church of England Baptisms, Marriages and Burials, 1538–1812''2 November 1897) was the first British diplomatic representative to live in Japan. Early life Alcock was born in St J ...

remarked on meeting the heavily-bandaged Andō shortly afterwards and was favourably impressed with his fortitude, stating that his injuries lent credence to claims by the shogunate that the opening of the country to foreign trade had to proceed slowly due to strong domestic opposition. However, Andō was forced from office soon afterwards by his political enemies, who accused him of improper conduct in arranging for an heir to succeed Ii Naosuke and due to allegations that he had accepted bribes from American consul

Townsend Harris Townsend Harris (October 4, 1804 – February 25, 1878) was an American merchant and politician who served as the first United States Consul General to Japan. He negotiated the " Harris Treaty" between the US and Japan and is credited as the d ...

. The '' kokudaka'' of Iwakitaira Domain was also reduced by 20,000 '' koku''. He officially retired in 1863; however as his son and heir Andō Nobutami was still underage, he continued to rule the domain from behind-the-scenes. Andō Nobutami died in 1863 and was replaced by an adopted heir, Andō Nobutake. In 1868, during the Boshin War, Nobumasa took the domain into the

Ōuetsu Reppan Dōmei The was a Japanese military-political coalition established and disestablished over the course of several months in early to mid-1868 during the Boshin War. Its flag was either a white interwoven five-pointed star on a black field, or a black i ...

over the objections of Nobutake. The domain was overrun and Iwakitaira Castle was burned during the Battle of Iwakitaira, and the victorious

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 o ...

placed Nobumasa under permanent house arrest in 1868. He was released in 1869 and died in 1871 at the age of 52 years.

References

* Papinot, Edmond. (1948). ''Historical and Geographical Dictionary of Japan''. New York: Overbeck Co. * Harootunian, Harry D. (1970). ''Toward Restoration: The Growth of Political Consciousness in Tokugawa Japan''. Berkeley: University of California Press. , . . * Totman, Conrad D. (1980). ''The Collapse of the Tokugawa Bakufu, 1862–1868''. Honolulu: University of Hawai'i Press. .

External links

Kaga Domain on "Edo 300 HTML"
(3 November 2007) {{DEFAULTSORT:Ando, Nobumasa 1819 births 1871 deaths Fudai daimyo Meiji Restoration Ōuetsu Reppan Dōmei People of the Boshin War Rōjū Wakadoshiyori People of Edo-period Japan Andō clan