The was a naval training institute in Bakumatsu period

Japan Japan is an island country in East Asia. Located in the Pacific Ocean off the northeast coast of the Asia, Asian mainland, it is bordered on the west by the Sea of Japan and extends from the Sea of Okhotsk in the north to the East China Sea ...

, established by the Military Commissioner of the

Tokugawa shogunate The Tokugawa shogunate, also known as the was the military government of Japan during the Edo period from 1603 to 1868. The Tokugawa shogunate was established by Tokugawa Ieyasu after victory at the Battle of Sekigahara, ending the civil wars ...

, Katsu Kaishū in May 1864, and dissolved in 1865.

Institutional History

Following the closure of the Nagasaki Naval Training Center by his political opponents within the

, Katsu Kaishū made a visit to the

United States The United States of America (USA), also known as the United States (U.S.) or America, is a country primarily located in North America. It is a federal republic of 50 U.S. state, states and a federal capital district, Washington, D.C. The 48 ...

aboard the Japanese steamship '' Kanrin Maru'', and returned even more determined that Japan needed to build a modern navy in order to prevent colonization by the Western imperialist powers. He obtained official permission to establish a training school at what was then the small fishing village of

Kobe Kobe ( ; , ), officially , is the capital city of Hyōgo Prefecture, Japan. With a population of around 1.5 million, Kobe is Japan's List of Japanese cities by population, seventh-largest city and the third-largest port city after Port of Toky ...

in Settsu Province with the three-fold purpose of creating an officer’s training academy, a shipyard for the construction of modern warships, and a modern seaport. From the beginning, Katsu encountered opposition to his plans from within the shogunate, and as official funding was withheld, he was forced to support the center largely out of his own funds and the donations of a few sympathetic daimyō. The presence of a large number of pro-'' Sonnō jōi

rōnin In feudal Japan to early modern Japan (1185–1868), a ''rōnin'' ( ; , , 'drifter' or 'wandering man', ) was a samurai who had no lord or master and in some cases, had also severed all links with his family or clan. A samurai became a ''rō ...

'' within the membership of the center also brought the project under suspicion, especially in the wake of the Kinmon Incident and the Ikedaya Incident (wherein one of its students, Mochizuki Kameyata of Tosa was among the ''jōi'' '' shishi'' casualties). The center was closed in mid-1865. A number of students of the Kobe Naval Training Center subsequently went on to play a major role in the

Meiji Restoration The , referred to at the time as the , and also known as the Meiji Renovation, Revolution, Regeneration, Reform, or Renewal, was a political event that restored Imperial House of Japan, imperial rule to Japan in 1868 under Emperor Meiji. Althoug ...

, including Sakamoto Ryōma,

Mutsu Munemitsu Count was a Japanese diplomat and politician. He became Minister for Foreign Affairs (Japan), Minister of Foreign Affairs in 1890 and worked to revise unequal treaties. He served as plenipotentiary at the Treaty of Shimonoseki, peace conference ...

and

Itō Sukeyuki Marshal-Admiral Count (20 May 1843 – 16 January 1914) was a Japanese career officer and admiral in the Imperial Japanese Navy in Meiji-period Japan. Biography Born in what is now part of Kagoshima City as the son of a ''samurai'' of the ...

. Sakamoto and Mutsu would be later instrumental in the foundation of the Kaientai, a shipping company that would play a major part in bridging the alliance between the domains of Satsuma and Choshu. Indirectly, the activities of Sakamoto and the Kaientai would also influence Tosa trading official Iwasaki Yatarō in contributing to Japan's naval expansion–which became one of the central industries

Mitsubishi The is a group of autonomous Japanese multinational companies in a variety of industries. Founded by Yatarō Iwasaki in 1870, the Mitsubishi Group traces its origins to the Mitsubishi zaibatsu, a unified company that existed from 1870 to 194 ...

(the company he will found) will be involved.

References

* Frédéric, Louis. Japan Encyclopedia. Belknap Press of Harvard University Press (2005).

External links

EDUCATION DURING THE LATE EDO AND EARLY MEIJI PERIODS

Notes

{{coord, 34, 41, 08.75, N, 135, 11, 36.54, E, region:JP_type:landmark, display=title Naval history of Japan Bakumatsu Military schools Naval academies Shipyards of Asia Meiji Restoration 1864 establishments in Japan Buildings and structures in Kobe

Institutional History

See also

References

External links

Notes