The Satsuma Rebellion, known in Japan as the Seinan War or Southwestern War, was an uprising of former samurai against the new imperial government, fought on the island of Kyushu from 29 January to 24 September 1877. Led by Saigō Takamori, one of the heroes of the Meiji Restoration, it was the last and largest of several samurai revolts. Its defeat by a conscript army marked the end of the samurai as a fighting class, and it remains the most recent civil war fought in Japan.
Discontent in Satsuma
The Satsuma domain, in the far south-west, had played a leading part in overthrowing the Tokugawa shogunate and in the Boshin War, and many of its men held high office in the new government. Yet the reforms that followed stripped the samurai of their privileges and income, and the rapid adoption of Western ways struck many of them as a betrayal. Saigō shared some of these grievances. In 1873 he pressed for war with Korea; when the government rejected the plan, he resigned and went home to Kagoshima, followed by many Satsuma officers and police.
Saigō's academies
In 1874 Saigō founded a network of private schools in Kagoshima, which soon had over a hundred branches across the prefecture. Alongside the Chinese classics, students drilled with weapons and studied tactics, and the schools came to act as a political and military movement. With the backing of the local governor, their members took over much of the prefecture's administration, so that by the end of 1876 Satsuma was in effect beyond the control of Tokyo.
The outbreak
Alarmed, the government sent police agents to investigate in December 1876. They were seized and, under torture, confessed to a plot to kill Saigō. Their leader later retracted the confession, but many in Satsuma believed it. When a government ship arrived at the end of January 1877 to remove weapons from the Kagoshima arsenal, students raided arsenals and naval yards. Saigō, reluctant at first, agreed to lead the movement and in February marched north, saying he meant to put questions to the government in Tokyo.
Kumamoto and the long retreat
The rebels laid siege to Kumamoto Castle, held by about 3,800 soldiers and 600 police under General Tani Tateki, but could not take it. Local samurai joined Saigō, raising his force to about 20,000. Government troops landed behind the rebel lines, and after a hard-fought battle at Tabaruzaka in March, in which each side suffered more than 4,000 killed or wounded, relief forces reached the castle in mid-April. Saigō retreated south to Hitoyoshi and then to Miyazaki, fighting rearguard and guerrilla actions. By August his army had shrunk to some 3,000 men with almost no artillery. Surrounded near Mount Enodake, most surrendered or took their own lives, but Saigō slipped through with some 500 followers and reached Kagoshima on 1 September.
Shiroyama
Saigō's men occupied the hill of Shiroyama above the city. The imperial forces under Yamagata Aritomo, vastly outnumbering them, surrounded the hill with trenches and shelled it, supported by warships in the harbour. On 24 September they attacked. Saigō was badly wounded by gunfire and was beheaded by his companion Beppu Shinsuke; tradition says he first committed ritual suicide, but this is doubted. His last followers died charging down the hill.
Consequences
Government losses are given as about 15,000 killed and wounded, while the rebel army was almost destroyed. The war was ruinously expensive, forcing the government to print paper money and later to sell state enterprises cheaply to well-connected businessmen, which helped give rise to the great industrial conglomerates. The victory of conscripts with rifles and artillery showed that the age of the samurai was over. Saigō himself was pardoned after his death, in 1889, and became a popular tragic hero, honoured with a statue in Tokyo's Ueno Park.
On our maps
Our 1878 and 1880 maps show the Empire of Japan soon after the rebellion, under the government of Emperor Meiji.
In pictures
1 images · scroll →Key dates
- 1873Saigō resigns over the rejected plan for war with Korea and returns to Kagoshima.
- 1874He founds a private academy in Kagoshima that soon has 132 branches.
- 1876Government agents sent to investigate are seized and confess under torture to a plot.
- 1877On 30 January a government ship arrives to remove arms; students raid the arsenals.
- 1877In February Saigō marches north, and his army besieges Kumamoto Castle.
- 1877A bloody eight-day battle at Tabaruzaka begins on 4 March.
- 1877Imperial relief forces reach Kumamoto on 12 April, and the rebels retreat south.
- 1877Surrounded at Mount Enodake in August, most rebels surrender, but Saigō escapes.
- 1877Saigō and about 500 men reach Kagoshima on 1 September and occupy Shiroyama.
- 1877The final assault on Shiroyama on 24 September kills Saigō and ends the war.
- 1889Emperor Meiji posthumously pardons Saigō on 22 February.
From the atlas
Satsuma Rebellion in time and on the map
Satsuma Rebellion lasted from 1877 to 2005. Borders of Time has 12 world maps from those years: 1878, 1880, 1900, 1914, 1920, 1930, 1938, 1945, 1960, 1985, 1994 and 2000. The nearest maps from before and after are 1815 and 2010; compare them side by side.
Living through it, among others on this site: Võ Nguyên Giáp (1911–2013), Bertrand Russell (1872–1970), Deng Xiaoping (1904–1997), Ronald Reagan (1911–2004), Karl Popper (1902–1994), Pablo Picasso (1881–1973), Rosa Parks (1913–2005), Augusto Pinochet (1915–2006), Konrad Adenauer (1876–1967) and Chiang Kai-shek (1887–1975).
Other events of the same years: Indian independence movement (1757–1947), Australian frontier wars (1794–1899), Romanticism (1800–1900), Anglo-Burmese Wars (1824–1886), French conquest of Algeria (1830–1904), Second Industrial Revolution (1860–1890), Self-Strengthening Movement (1861–1895), Reconstruction era (1863–1877), Meiji Restoration (1868–1889) and Ten Years' War (Cuba) (1868–1878).
Next to it in time on this site: before, Battle of the Little Bighorn (1876) and Russo-Turkish War of 1877–1878 (1877–1878); after, Congress of Berlin (1878) and Anglo-Zulu War (1879).
Satsuma Rebellion comes up in the guided tour Japan: From the Jōmon to Today.
Quick answers
- When did Satsuma Rebellion happen?
- It began in 1877 and ended in 2005, lasting 128 years.
- Where did Satsuma Rebellion take place?
- Kyushu and Empire of Japan.
- How did the map change?
- Compare the atlas’s maps of 1815 and 2010 side by side.
- What caused the Satsuma Rebellion?
- Meiji reforms abolished the samurai's privileged status and stipends, and many resented rapid Westernisation. After Saigō Takamori left the government in 1873, his Kagoshima academies grew into a quasi-military movement, and a government attempt to remove weapons from the Kagoshima arsenal in January 1877 provoked open revolt.
- How did Saigō Takamori die?
- During the final assault on Shiroyama on 24 September 1877 he was badly wounded by a bullet and was beheaded by his companion Beppu Shinsuke. Tradition says he first performed seppuku, but his autopsy found no abdominal wound consistent with it.
- Why is the Satsuma Rebellion important?
- It was the last and most serious samurai revolt against the Meiji government. Victory by a conscript army with modern rifles and artillery ended the samurai as a military class, and its heavy cost pushed the government to print money and sell state industries cheaply.
- Is The Last Samurai about the Satsuma Rebellion?
- Only loosely. The 2003 American film directed by Edward Zwick blends situations from the Boshin War, the Satsuma Rebellion and other early Meiji samurai uprisings into one fictional story, so it should not be read as an accurate account of Saigō's revolt.