Fushimi can perhaps be considered one of the most “unfortunate” castles of the Sengoku Jidai period. The original castle was built by Toyotomi Hideyoshi in the southeast of Kyoto in 1594 as his residence in the imperial city.
Fushimi was more like a place of rest than a military stronghold. It housed the famous Golden Tea Room, where Hideyoshi loved to spend time, as he was a great fan of the tea ceremony.
However, two years later, the castle was destroyed by a powerful earthquake. Hideyoshi ordered the residence to be rebuilt, moving the new keep about 500 meters north. He managed to see the rebuilt fortress, but died shortly thereafter.
Fushimi also became the place where Chinese ambassadors arriving in Japan for negotiations to end the war in Korea were received. But soon the castle was doomed to fall again during the Sekigahara campaign in 1600.
Fushimi under the rule of Tokugawa Ieyasu
Shortly before the start of the campaign, Fushimi Castle fell to Tokugawa Ieyasu, and his long-time vassal, Torii Mototada, was appointed its commander.
Mototada had served his lord since childhood and went down in Japanese history as one of the few examples of true samurai loyalty.
Fushimi Castle occupied a strategically important position: thanks to its location, it dominated the approaches to the capital and was therefore a logical target for the Western Coalition forces as they moved east.
Leaving Mototada to defend the fortress, Ieyasu expressed concern that there would not be enough forces for the defense. However, Torii declared that the castle would fall anyway, even if the garrison were increased tenfold, and insisted that Ieyasu take most of the warriors with him.
Both understood perfectly well that they would never see each other again. They spent their last evening together reminiscing about their past exploits.
The Siege of Fushimi
The vastly superior army of Ishida Mitsunari and Konishi Yukinaga laid siege to the castle on August 27. The Western Coalition's army numbered about 40,000 soldiers, while the fortress's garrison barely reached 2,000.
By the time of the siege in 1600, Fushimi was a typical late Sengoku period castle with a developed system of fortifications. It had about ten courtyards protected by earthen ramparts (dorui) and stone walls (ishigaki). The southern side of the fortress was adjacent to a mountain, and the northern part was additionally covered by two moats filled with water.
In addition to the main and small donjons, Fushimi boasted powerful yagura towers and yaguramon gates.
The defenders fought bravely, repelling the attackers' assaults time and time again. Some sources mention that the attackers had several cannons, but there is no reliable information about the success of their use.
Betrayal and death of the defenders
On the tenth day of the siege, the commanders of the Western Coalition secretly contacted one of the castle's defenders and informed him that his wife and children had been taken hostage and would be executed if he did not betray his lord.
On September 8, the traitor set fire to one of the towers, and the besiegers managed to break through the outer perimeter of the fortifications.
The defenders retreated to the inner courtyard. Mototada's comrades advised him to commit suicide to preserve his honor, but he refused. “It is not my honor that is important,” he remarked, “but that I be able to delay Mitsunari's troops as long as humanly possible.”
Gathering the remaining 300 warriors, Mototada led them in a counterattack. The defenders managed to make five sorties, after which only ten men remained alive.
Exhausted, Mototada retreated to the keep, where he was overtaken by a young samurai from the Western Coalition forces, who was hoping to take the commandant's head.
Mototada gave his name, and the attacker, showing respect, waited for him to commit seppuku, and then cut off his head. The castle garrison was completely destroyed, but the besiegers lost about three thousand men.
The legacy of Fushimi
Torii Mototada's sacrifice was not in vain. While Mitsunari was tied up with the siege of Fushimi, Ieyasu managed to capture a number of important fortresses along the Tokaido and Nakasendo roads, as well as regroup his forces for the decisive battle at Sekigahara.
The fate of some parts of the destroyed castle is interesting. Although Fushimi was completely destroyed during the siege, the floorboards of the keep, which still bore traces of the defenders' blood, were sent to the temples of Yogenin, Shōdenji, Hosenin, and Genkōan. There, they were used to decorate the ceilings.
Today, these boards, known as “bloodstained ceilings,” are objects of worship for the spirits of the fallen warriors and are considered a landmark of these temples.
See also
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Siege of Shuri Castle
The Ryukyu Kingdom was established in 1429 on Okinawa, the largest island of the Ryukyu (Nansei) archipelago, as a result of the military unification of three rival kingdoms. In the following years, the state's control spread to all the islands of the archipelago.
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The Siege of Otsu Castle
The siege of Otsu Castle was part of the Sekigahara campaign, during which the so-called Eastern Coalition, led by Tokugawa Ieyasu, fought against the Western Coalition, led by Ishida Mitsunari. Otsu Castle was built in 1586 by order of Toyotomi Hideyoshi near the capital Kyoto, on the site of the dismantled Sakamoto Castle. It belonged to the type of “water castles” — mizujō — as one side of it faced Japan's largest lake, Lake Biwa, and it was surrounded by a system of moats filled with lake water, which made the fortress resemble an island.
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The Siege of Shiroishi Castle
The siege of Shiroishi Castle was part of the Sekigahara campaign and took place several months before the decisive battle of Sekigahara. The daimyo of Aizu Province, Uesugi Kagekatsu, posed a serious threat to Tokugawa Ieyasu's plans to defeat the Western Coalition, and Ieyasu decided to curb his actions with the help of his northern vassals. To this end, he ordered Date Masamune to invade the province of Aizu and capture Shiroishi Castle.
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The Second Siege of Jinju Castle
During the two Korean campaigns of the 16th century, the Japanese repeatedly had to capture enemy fortresses and defend occupied or constructed fortifications from the combined Korean and Chinese forces. Among all the operations of that time, the second siege of Jinju Castle is considered the most interesting from the point of view of siege warfare.
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The Siege of Takamatsu Castle
The siege of Takamatsu Castle in Bitchu Province is considered the first mizuzeme, or “water siege,” in Japanese history. Until then, such an original tactic had never been used.
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The Third Siege of Takatenjin Castle
The history of the castle prior to the conflict between the Tokugawa and Takeda clans is rather unclear. According to one version, the castle was built in 1416, when Imagawa Sadayoshi (1325–1420) was governor of Suruga Province and half of Totomi Province. Allegedly, it was he who ordered Imagawa Norimasa (1364–1433) to build this fortification. However, no reliable evidence has been found to support this. Another version is considered more plausible, according to which the castle was built during the conquest of Totomi Province at the end of the 15th century by Imagawa Ujitsuna (1473–1526) and his general Ise Shinkuro (Hojo Soon). In this case, another of Ujitsuna's generals, Kusima Masashige (1492–1521), is considered responsible for the construction.
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Battle of Mimigawa
In 1556, the Shimazu clan launched a campaign aimed at systematically conquering the island of Kyushu. In the same year, the province of Osumi was annexed and a war began with the Ito clan for control of the province of Hyuga. In 1577, Ito Yoshisuke was defeated and fled north, where he sought help from Otomo Sorin, the Christian daimyo of Bungo Province.
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The Siege of Kozuki Castle
The battle for Kozuki Castle was a consequence of Oda Nobunaga's expansion in the Chugoku region. Toyotomi Hideyoshi was appointed to lead the campaign, which aimed to weaken the influence of the Mori clan in these lands. Under his command were famous samurai: Kuroda Kanbei, Takenaka Shigeharu, and Hachisuka Koroku. Amago Katsuhisa, who cherished the hope of one day restoring the Amago clan's lost dominance in western Japan, also joined Oda's army.
