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110-553: In the Boshin War of 1868–69, the domain joined the Ōuetsu Reppan Dōmei , the alliance of northern domains supporting the Tokugawa shogunate , but then later defected to the imperial side. As with all other domains, it was disbanded in 1871. The Satake clan was a powerful samurai clan, who ruled Hitachi Province from the late Heian period through the end of the Sengoku period . In 1600,

220-457: A core elite force. The shōgun also relied on troops supplied by allied domains, which were not necessarily as advanced in terms of military equipment and methods, composing an army that had both modern and outdated elements. Numerous types of more or less modern smoothbore muskets and rifles were imported, from countries as varied as France , Germany , the Netherlands , Britain , and

330-467: A decent burial. James Cook was a bookbinder convicted of the murder of his creditor Paas, a manufacturer of brass instruments, in Leicester . During an attempted robbery, Cook beat Paas to death, and then took the body to his home, where he cut it into pieces and burned it to try to hide the evidence of the crime. He was executed on Friday, 10 August 1832, in front of Leicester prison. Afterwards: The head

440-468: A few Gatling guns. After an inconclusive start, an Imperial banner was presented to the defending troops on the second day, and a relative of the Emperor, Ninnajinomiya Yoshiaki , was named nominal commander in chief , making the forces officially an imperial army ( 官軍 , kangun ) . Moreover, convinced by courtiers, several local daimyōs , up to this point faithful to the shōgun , started to defect to

550-452: A head on January 3, 1868, when these elements seized the imperial palace in Kyoto, and the following day had the fifteen-year-old Emperor Meiji declare his own restoration to full power. Although the majority of the imperial consultative assembly representing all the domains was happy with the formal declaration of direct rule by the imperial court and tended to support a continued collaboration with

660-766: A more extensive attempt at modernisation with it being introduced in 1862 by graduates of 2 Samurai academies. The attempt called for the raising of a standing army from the Shogun's personal lands (Tenryo) and the Daimyo under their feudal obligations to provide troops to the Shogun. The army known as the Sampeitai or alternatively the Shinei jobigun was supposed to number 13,625 men with 8,300 infantry (2,000 with rifles) 1,068 cavalry (900 with rifles) 4,890 artillerymen with 48 8 lb field guns and 52 16 lb siege guns and 1,406 officers. The force

770-544: A much longer range than the imported smoothbore muskets, although, being also muzzle-loading, they were similarly limited to two shots per minute. Improved breech-loading mechanisms, such as the Snider , developing a rate of about ten shots a minute, are known to have been used by Chōshū troops against the shogunate's Shōgitai regiment at the Battle of Ueno in July 1868. In the second half of

880-498: A murder conviction in 1793; he later killed again in 1796 and was hanged in chains on Pinchgut in November 1796. Morgan's dead body and, later, skeleton remained on display on the island for four years. Robert Aske , who led the rebellion against Henry VIII known as Pilgrimage of Grace , was hanged in chains in 1537. The head of Oliver Cromwell was displayed on a spike after his death, after monarchists disinterred his body during

990-514: A nominal void at the highest level of government, his apparatus of state continued to exist. Moreover, the shogunate government, the Tokugawa family in particular, remained a prominent force in the evolving political order and retained many executive powers. Satow speculated that Yoshinobu had agreed to an assembly of daimyōs on the hope that such a body would restore him, a prospect hard-liners from Satsuma and Chōshū found intolerable. Events came to

1100-732: A reminder of York's treachery in 1587. He had handed over the Zutphen sconce to the Spaniards after the English army under the Earl of Leicester was defeated by the Spaniards in the Battle of Zutphen . In 838, the Iranian hero Babak Khorramdin had his hands and feet cut off by the Abbasid Caliphate and was then gibbeted alive while sewn into a cow's skin with the horns at ear level to crush his head gradually as

1210-475: A result of this drop in income (to 205,000 koku , or less than half of their previous kokudaka of around 540,000 koku ), the Satake had to lay off many retainers, and institute a general stipend reduction for those it kept. The domain also struggled through agricultural crises, which resulted in several peasant uprisings throughout the course of its history. It was also beset by an internal O-Ie Sōdō conflict,

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1320-401: A secret alliance with Satsuma. In the summer of 1866, the shogunate was defeated by Chōshū, leading to a considerable loss of authority. In late 1866, however, first shōgun Tokugawa Iemochi and then Emperor Kōmei died, succeeded by Tokugawa Yoshinobu and Emperor Meiji respectively. These events, in the words of historian Marius Jansen , "made a truce inevitable". On November 9, 1867,

1430-496: A secret order was created by Satsuma and Chōshū in the name of Emperor Meiji commanding the "slaughtering of the traitorous subject Yoshinobu". Just prior to this, however—and following a proposal from the daimyō of the Tosa Domain —Yoshinobu resigned his post and authority to the emperor, agreeing to "be the instrument for carrying out" imperial orders. This ended the Tokugawa shogunate. While Yoshinobu's resignation had created

1540-550: A smuggling gang known as the Hawkhurst Gang , operated along the South coast of England between Kent and Dorset; their violent crimes coincided with the authorities desire to punish smugglers on the South coast and deter others from smuggling. Of the 75 members of the gang that were caught and convicted 14 were sentenced to gibbeting. Unusually the bodies were distributed around the area as a deterrent, rather than near where they lived, or

1650-628: A subsidiary domain of Kubota Domain until his retirement in 1720. He was succeeded by Satake Yoshikata, who ruled until May 1732. He was adopted by Satake Yoshimine, the 5th daimyo of Kubota Domain to be his heir, and Kubota Shinden Domain was absorbed back into Kubota Domain. Boshin War Imperial victory [REDACTED] [REDACTED] Meiji [REDACTED] Prince Komatsu The Boshin War ( 戊辰 戦争 , Boshin Sensō ) , sometimes known as

1760-527: A tidal section of a river. Their bodies would be left dangling until they had been submerged by the tide three times. In London , Execution Dock is located on the north bank of the River Thames in Wapping ; after tidal immersion, particularly notorious criminals' bodies could be hung in cages a little farther downstream at either Cuckold's Point or Blackwall Point , as a warning to other waterborne criminals of

1870-477: A total of 36 infantry battalions amounting to 14,400 men which formed the core of the Pro-Imperial Army when war broke out. In April 1868 Emperor Meiji himself called for the dispatch of 60 men per 10,000 koku (150 kg of rice, the amount needed for a man for one year) produced in his domain, of the 60 man drafts one-sixth were to be sent to Kyoto to form an Imperial army and the remaining 50 to garrison

1980-519: A total of 50,000 troops. Apart from those core domains, most of the northern domains were part of the alliance. In May 1868, the daimyō of Nagaoka inflicted high losses on the Imperial troops in the Battle of Hokuetsu , but his castle ultimately fell on May 19. Imperial troops continued to progress north, defeating the Shinsengumi at the Battle of Bonari Pass , which opened the way for their attack on

2090-814: A warning to sailors coming into the harbor and approaching Boston. In 1755, a slave named Mark was hanged in Cambridge, Massachusetts , and then gibbeted in chains in Charlestown, Massachusetts ; twenty years later, Paul Revere passed the remains of Mark on his famous ride. Six men were executed by gibbeting under civil authority in the Southern Colonies . In Virginia, three men accused of piracy were executed by gibbeting in 1700. In South Carolina, three men were executed by gibbeting: one accused of poisoning in 1744, and two accused of murder in 1754 and 1759. There have been no recorded executions using this method under

2200-642: Is associated with that particular year in the sexagenary cycle. The war started in the fourth year of the Keiō era , which also became the first year of the Meiji era in October of that year, and ended in the second year of the Meiji era. For the two centuries prior to 1854, Japan had a strict policy of isolationism , restricting all interactions with foreign powers, with the notable exceptions of Korea via Tsushima , Qing China via

2310-422: Is the location of Fort Denison and a former gibbeting site. Thomas Hill, a convict, was sentenced to a week on the rock in iron chains with only bread and water to consume; these conditions are said to have "literally pinched his gut", giving the island its current name. The rock was levelled in the 1790s, and a gibbet installed in 1796. Another convict, Francis Morgan, was sent to New South Wales for life following

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2420-643: Is the subject of numerous books and plays. During the Napoleonic Wars, the Royal Navy used Hangman's Beach on McNab's Island in Halifax Harbour to display the hanged bodies of deserters, in order to deter the crews of passing warships. Pinchgut Island (originally Mat-te-wan-ye in the local Aboriginal language ; later, Rock Island when renamed by Governor Arthur Phillip ), a rocky outcrop within Port Jackson ,

2530-529: The Atwater Kent Museum in Philadelphia , Pennsylvania. The cage, created in 1781, was intended to be used to display the body of convicted pirate Thomas Wilkinson, so that sailors on passing ships might be warned of the consequences of piracy; Wilkinson's planned execution never took place, so the gibbet was never used. An example of an iron cage used to string up bodies on a gibbet can still be seen in

2640-566: The Japanese Revolution or Japanese Civil War , was a civil war in Japan fought from 1868 to 1869 between forces of the ruling Tokugawa shogunate and a coalition seeking to seize political power in the name of the Imperial Court . The war stemmed from dissatisfaction among many nobles and young samurai with the shogunate's handling of foreigners following the opening of Japan during

2750-608: The Ryukyu Islands , and the Dutch through the trading post of Dejima . In 1854, the United States Navy Commodore Matthew C. Perry 's expedition opened Japan to global commerce through the implied threat of force, thus initiating rapid development of foreign trade and Westernization . In large part due to the humiliating terms of the unequal treaties , as agreements like those negotiated by Perry are called,

2860-716: The Sakai incident on March 8, 1868. Fifteen days later, Sir Harry Parkes , the British ambassador, was attacked by a group of samurai in a street of Kyoto. Beginning in February, with the help of the French ambassador Léon Roches , a plan was formulated to stop the Imperial Court's advance at Odawara , the last strategic entry point to Edo, but Yoshinobu decided against the plan. Shocked, Léon Roches resigned from his position. In early March, under

2970-828: The Satake disturbance ( 佐竹騒動 , Satake-sōdō ) , which was brought on by financial issues. The domain had a population of 56,813 people per the 1730 census. It maintained its primary residence ( kamiyashiki ) in Edo at Uchi-Kanda Asahi-cho until a fire in 1682, after which the residence was moved to Shichigen-cho in Shitaya. The domain’s secondary residence ( shimoyashiki ) was in Fukagawa (later moved to Sakumachō ), and its tertiary residences ( nakayashiki ) in Torigoe, Honjo and Nippori. Satake Yoshiatsu (better known by his nom-de-plume "Satake Shozan"),

3080-414: The Tokugawa shogunate soon faced internal dissent, which coalesced into a radical movement, the sonnō jōi (meaning "revere the Emperor, expel the barbarians"). Emperor Kōmei agreed with such sentiments and, breaking with centuries of Imperial tradition, began to take an active role in matters of state: as opportunities arose, he vehemently protested against the treaties and attempted to interfere in

3190-476: The United Kingdom and France , were deeply involved in the country's politics, the installation of Imperial power added more turbulence to the conflict. Over time, the war was romanticized as a "bloodless revolution", as the number of casualties was small relative to the size of Japan's population. However, conflicts soon emerged between the western samurai and the modernists in the Imperial faction, which led to

3300-543: The United States , and coexisted with traditional types such as the tanegashima matchlock . Most shogunate troops used smoothbore muskets, about 200,000 of which had been imported or domestically produced over the years since around 1600. The first modern firearms were initially imported about 1840 from the Netherlands by the pro-Western reformist Takashima Shūhan . The daimyō of Nagaoka Domain , however, an ally of

3410-586: The abolition of the han system in 1871, the former domain was absorbed into the new Akita Prefecture and Satake Yoshitaka was ordered to relocate to Tokyo . He subsequently received the kazoku peerage title of koshaku ( marquis ). As with most domains in the han system , Kubota Domain consisted of several discontinuous territories calculated to provide the assigned kokudaka , based on periodic cadastral surveys and projected agricultural yields. Iwasaki Domain ( 岩崎藩 , Iwasaki han ) , also known as Akita Shinden Domain ( 秋田新田藩 , Akita Shinden han )

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3520-403: The gibbet ( / ˈ dʒ ɪ b ɪ t / ) was also used as a method of public execution , with the criminal being left to die of exposure, thirst and/or starvation. The practice of placing a criminal on display within a gibbet is also called "hanging in chains". Gibbeting was a common law punishment, which a judge could impose in addition to execution. As a sentence for murder, this practice

3630-675: The shōgun ' s Army Minister, negotiated the surrender. Some groups continued to resist after this surrender but were defeated in the Battle of Ueno on July 4, 1868. Meanwhile, the leader of the shōgun ' s navy, Enomoto Takeaki , refused to surrender all his ships. He remitted just four ships, among them the Fujiyama , but he then escaped north with the remnants of the shōgun ' s navy (eight steam warships: Kaiten , Banryū , Chiyodagata , Chōgei , Kaiyō Maru , Kanrin Maru , Mikaho and Shinsoku ), and 2,000 personnel, in

3740-487: The shōgun , possessed two Gatling guns and several thousand modern rifles. The shogunate is known to have placed an order for 30,000 modern Dreyse needle guns in 1866. Napoleon III provided Yoshinobu with 2,000 state-of-the-art Chassepot rifles, which he used to equip his personal guard. Antiquated tanegashima matchlocks are also known to have been used by the shogunate, however. Imperial troops mainly used Minié rifles, which were much more accurate, lethal, and had

3850-447: The 8th generation lord of Kubota, was an accomplished artist. Yoshiatsu painted a number of paintings in the Dutch style, and also produced three treatises on European painting techniques, including the depiction of perspective. He was also a student of Dutch studies ( rangaku ) scholar Hiraga Gennai , who he had invited up to Akita to advise him on management of the domain's copper mines. It

3960-597: The Americans, French, and Russians , but was not able to garner any international recognition or support. Enomoto offered to confer the territory to the Tokugawa shōgun under Imperial rule, but his proposal was declined by the Imperial Governing Council. Gibbet Gibbeting is the use of a gallows -type structure from which the dead or dying bodies of criminals were hanged on public display to deter other existing or potential criminals. Occasionally,

4070-532: The Aylestone Tollgate. According to The Newgate Calendar : Thousands of persons were attracted to the spot, to view this novel but most barbarous exhibition; and considerable annoyance was felt by persons resident in the neighbourhood of the dreadful scene. Representations were in consequence made to the authorities, and on the following Tuesday morning instructions were received from the Home Office directing

4180-493: The Daimyo's domain. On January 27, 1868, shogunate forces attacked the forces of Chōshū and Satsuma, clashing near Toba and Fushimi , at the southern entrance to Kyoto in the Battle of Toba–Fushimi . Some parts of the 15,000-strong shogunate forces had been trained by French military advisers. Among their numbers during this battle were the noted Shinsengumi . The forces of Chōshū and Satsuma were outnumbered 3:1 but fully modernized with Armstrong howitzers, Minié rifles and

4290-553: The Emperor's court was, but were repelled by shogunate forces under the future shōgun Tokugawa Yoshinobu . The shogunate further ordered a punitive expedition against Chōshū, the First Chōshū expedition , and obtained Chōshū's submission without actual fighting. At this point the initial resistance among the leadership in Chōshū and the Imperial Court subsided, but over the next year the Tokugawa proved unable to reassert full control over

4400-525: The French. Despite the bombardment of Kagoshima, the Satsuma Domain had become closer to the British and was pursuing the modernization of its army and navy with their support. The Scottish merchant Thomas Blake Glover sold quantities of warships and guns to the southern domains. American and British military experts, usually former officers, may have been directly involved in this military effort. The British ambassador, Harry Smith Parkes , supported

4510-466: The Sampeitai adding at least 1,500 men to the army. The Shogunate, aiming to modernise its forces, hired 17 French officers in 1867. These 17 officers trained 900 men who formed the elite Denshutai . The French officers brought with them 3,000 Chassepot rifles and 12 artillery pieces. Three separate military schools were constructed for the infantry, artillery and cavalry with limited engineer instruction, they also introduced carbine and lance cavalry to

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4620-526: The Satake family. One was the North Satake (Satake-hokke) family, stipended at 10,000 koku ; the other the West Satake (Satake-nishi ke) family, stipended at 7200 koku . The North Satake family had its landholdings around Kakunodate, one of the fortified estates mentioned above; the West Satake resided in and had their landholdings around Ōdate. Yokote Castle was in the care of another hereditary karō family,

4730-465: The Satake had political difficulties with the alliance, which culminated in the murder, in Akita, of a delegation from Sendai on August 21, 1868, and the display of the messengers' gibbeted heads in the Akita castle town. The delegation, led by Shimo Matazaemon, was dispatched to request the Akita domain to hand over Kujō Michitaka and other officials of an imperial delegation that had been originally sent to

4840-465: The Satake sided with the pro-Toyotomi cause at the Battle of Sekigahara . After the defeat of the pro-Toyotomi forces by Tokugawa Ieyasu and the establishment of the Tokugawa shogunate, the Satake clan was punished by a severe reduction in its kokudaka . and by being ordered to relocate from their ancestral territories in Hitachi Province to a much smaller fief in inhospitable northern Japan. As

4950-710: The Satsuma navy in Awa Bay near Osaka. This was Japan's second engagement between two modern navies. The battle, although small in scale, ended with a victory for the shogunate. On the diplomatic front, the ministers of foreign nations, gathered in the open harbour of Hyōgo (present day Kobe ) in early February, issued a declaration according to which the shogunate was still considered the only rightful government in Japan, giving hope to Tokugawa Yoshinobu that foreign nations (especially France) might consider an intervention in his favour. A few days later however an Imperial delegation visited

5060-508: The Tokugawa (under the concept of "just government" ( 公議政体 , kōgiseitai ) ), Saigō Takamori threatened the assembly into abolishing the title " shōgun " and ordering the confiscation of Yoshinobu's lands. Although he initially agreed to these demands, on January 17, 1868, Yoshinobu declared that he would not be bound by the Restoration proclamation and called for its repeal. On January 24, he decided to prepare an attack on Kyoto, which

5170-526: The Tomura. Norihisa Satake, the current mayor of the city of Akita, is a descendant of the North Satake. During the Boshin War of 1868–69, the Satake clan was a signatory to the pact that formed the Ōuetsu Reppan Dōmei , the alliance of northern domains led by the Sendai Domain . The Satake clan's delegation at Shiroishi , the alliance's headquarters, was led by the clan elder ( karō ) Tomura Yoshiari. However,

5280-547: The US refused to release the ship, but once neutrality was lifted, the imperial faction obtained the vessel and employed it in engagements in Hakodate under the name Kōtetsu ("Ironclad"). Following a coup d'état within Chōshū which returned to power the extremist factions opposed to the shogunate, the shogunate announced its intention to lead a Second Chōshū expedition to punish the renegade domain. This, in turn, prompted Chōshū to form

5390-555: The Western powers. Due to the persistence of Saigō Takamori , a prominent leader of the Imperial faction, the Tokugawa loyalists were shown clemency , and many former shogunate leaders and samurai were later given positions of responsibility under the new government. When the Boshin War began, Japan was already modernizing, following the same course of advancement as that of the industrialized Western nations. Since Western nations, especially

5500-470: The Westgate Museum at Winchester . The Old Testament and Torah law forbid gibbeting beyond sunrise of the next day that the body is hanged on the tree. Public crucifixion with prolonged display of the body after death can be seen as a form of gibbeting. Gibbeting was one of the methods said by Tacitus and Cassius Dio to have been used by Boudica 's army in the massacre of Roman settlers in

5610-485: The ankles, the knees, the thighs, the bowels the breast and the shoulders; the hands were hung by the side and covered with pitch, the face was pitched and covered with a piece of white cloth. The gibbet was a one-foot (30 cm) in diameter with strong bars of iron up each side. The post was fixed into a one-and-a-half-long-ton (1,500 kg) stone base sunk into the Slake. The body was soon removed by fellow miners and given

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5720-502: The anti-shogunate forces in a drive to establish a legitimate, unified Imperial rule in Japan , and to counter French influence with the shogunate. During that period, southern Japanese leaders such as Saigō Takamori of Satsuma, or Itō Hirobumi and Inoue Kaoru of Chōshū cultivated personal connections with British diplomats, notably Ernest Mason Satow . Satsuma domain received British assistance for their naval modernisation, and they became

5830-584: The authority of the United States. However, a gang of Cuban pirates were gibbeted in New York c.  1815 . The January 1921 issue of The National Geographic Magazine contains two photographs of gibbet cages, referenced as "man-cages," in use in Afghanistan. Commentary included with the photograph indicates that the gibbet was a practice still in active use. Persons sentenced to death were placed alive in

5940-466: The betrayal by Yodo and Tsu, shogunate forces retreated, resulting in an Imperial victory, although it is often considered the shogunate forces should have won the encounter. Osaka Castle was soon invested on March 1 (February 8 in the Tenpō calendar ), putting an end to the battle. The day after the battle of Toba–Fushimi commenced, the naval Battle of Awa took place between the shogunate and elements of

6050-491: The bloodier Satsuma Rebellion nine years later. Boshin ( 戊辰 ) is the designation for the fifth year of a sexagenary cycle in traditional East Asian calendars. Although the war lasted for over a year, Boshin refers to the year that the war started in. The characters 戊辰 can also be read as tsuchinoe-tatsu in Japanese , literally "Elder Brother of Earth-Dragon". In Chinese , it translates as " Yang Earth Dragon", which

6160-464: The bones would be scattered. In cases of drawing and quartering , the body of the criminal was cut into four or five portions, with the several parts often gibbeted in different places. So that the public display might be prolonged, bodies were sometimes coated in tar or bound in chains. Sometimes, body-shaped iron cages were used to contain the decomposing corpses. For example, in March ;1743 in

6270-464: The cage and remained there until some undefined time weeks or months after their deaths. In 1837, five years after the practice had ceased in England, the body of John McKay was gibbeted near the spot where he had murdered Joseph Wilson near Perth , in the colony of Van Diemen's Land . There was a great outcry, but the body was not removed until an acquaintance of Wilson passed the spot and, horrified by

6380-657: The castle of Aizuwakamatsu in the Battle of Aizu in October 1868, thus making the position in Sendai untenable. Enomoto's fleet reached Sendai harbour on August 26. Although the Northern Coalition was numerous, it was poorly equipped, and relied on traditional fighting methods. Modern armament was scarce, and last-minute efforts were made to build cannons made of wood and reinforced with roping, firing stone projectiles. Such cannons, installed on defensive structures, could only fire four or five projectiles before bursting. On

6490-439: The changing attitudes toward the practice. William Jobling was a miner hanged and gibbeted for the murder of Nicholas Fairles, a colliery owner and local magistrate , near Jarrow , Durham . After being hanged, the body was taken off the rope and loaded into a cart and taken on a tour of the area before arriving at Jarrow Slake, where the crime had been committed. Here, the body was placed into an iron gibbet cage. The cage and

6600-510: The conflict, in the northeast theater, Tosa troops are known to have used American-made Spencer repeating rifles . American-made handguns were also popular, such as the 1863 Smith & Wesson Army No 2 , which was imported to Japan by Glover and used by Satsuma forces. For artillery, wooden cannons , only able to fire 3 or 4 shots before bursting, coexisted with state-of-the-art Armstrong guns using explosive shells . Armstrong guns were efficiently used by Satsuma and Saga troops throughout

6710-431: The country as most daimyōs began to ignore orders and questions from the Tokugawa seat of power in Edo . The Shogun had sought French assistance for training and weaponry since 1865. Léon Roches, French consul to Japan, supported the Shogunal military reform efforts to promote French influence, hoping to make Japan into a dependent client state. This caused the British to send their own military mission to compete with

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6820-403: The destruction of Camulodunum (Colchester), Londinium (London) and Verulamium (St. Albans) in AD 60–61. During the 17th and 18th centuries, gibbets were a common sight in Bermuda. Located in Smith's Parish at the entrance to Flatt's Inlet is Gibbet Island , which was used to hang the bodies of escaped slaves as a deterrent to others. The small island was used for this purpose because it

6930-412: The district, where such a spectacle would be likely to prove a warning, and prevent a repetition of the murders which have of late been prevalent in the neighbourhood". Hanging a body in chains was a post execution punishment that was used for those criminals who had committed heinous crimes such as murder. Smugglers were not usually hung in chains post execution. However during the mid eighteenth century

7040-430: The domain: Kakunodate , Yuzawa, Hiyama, Jūniso, and In'nai. Each of these was given to a senior retainer who ran it as his own small castle town. The senior retainers had personal retainers who resided in these castle towns. Kubota Domain had two sub-domains: Iwasaki (20,000 koku ) and the short-lived Kubota-shinden (10,000 koku ). Two of the clan elder ( karō ) families serving the Kubota domain were branches of

7150-432: The emperor. Yoshinobu had hoped that by doing this the House of Tokugawa could be preserved and participate in the future government. However, military movements by imperial forces, partisan violence in Edo , and an imperial decree promoted by Satsuma and Chōshū abolishing the House of Tokugawa led Yoshinobu to launch a military campaign to seize the emperor's court in Kyoto . The military tide rapidly turned in favour of

7260-434: The end of the war. The Satsuma domain in 1840 contained 25,000 samurai and being more open to the world at large underwent a more rapid process of modernisation than the Shogunate. In 1854 a foundry was already founded for firearms production, soon joined by an artillery foundry and three ammunition plants. The Anglo-Satsuma war of 1863 gave the Satsuma officials a further incentive for more extensive military reforms due to

7370-406: The force. It was intended for the 900 men of the Denshutai to be dispersed amongst the myriad of Shogunate armies to train and re-organise them though this did not occur due to the outbreak of hostilities. The Shogun additionally possessed 302 Shinsengumi police forces who were intensely loyal to the Shogunate. The Shogunate navy also contained 3,000 sailors who acted as infantry on Hokkaido towards

7480-461: The general revenues of the parent domain. The daimyō of Iwasaki Domain participated in the sankin kotai system, and used Kubota Domain’s tertiary residence in Edo, located in Torigoe. Kubota Shinden Domain ( 久保田新田藩 , Kubota Shinden han ) was founded in 1701 for Satake Yoshikune, the grandson of Satake Yoshitaka, the 2nd daimyō of Kubota Domain. Satake Yoshizumi, the 3rd daimyō of Kubota domain assigned him 10,000 koku , which he ruled as

7590-504: The guerilla corps ( yugekitai ) under Hitomi Katsutarō , as well as several more French advisers (Fortant, Garde, Marlin, Bouffier). On October 26, Edo was renamed Tokyo , and the Meiji period officially started. Aizu was besieged starting that month, leading to the mass suicide of the Byakkotai (White Tiger Corps) young warriors. After a protracted month-long battle, Aizu finally admitted defeat on November 6. Following defeat on Honshū , Enomoto Takeaki fled to Hokkaidō with

7700-467: The hope of staging a counter-attack together with the northern daimyōs . He was accompanied by a handful of French military advisers, notably Jules Brunet , who had formally resigned from the French Army to accompany the rebels. After Yoshinobu's surrender, he was placed under house arrest , and stripped of all titles, land and power. He was later released, when he demonstrated no further interest and ambition in national affairs. He retired to Shizuoka ,

7810-461: The influence of the British minister Harry Parkes , foreign nations signed a strict neutrality agreement, according to which they could not intervene or provide military supplies to either side until the resolution of the conflict. Saigō Takamori led the victorious imperial forces north and east through Japan, winning the Battle of Kōshū-Katsunuma . He eventually surrounded Edo in May 1868, leading to its unconditional defeat after Katsu Kaishū ,

7920-568: The military prestige of Napoleon III at that time, acquired through his successes in the Crimean War and the Second Italian War of Independence . The shogunate took major steps towards the construction of a modern and powerful military: a navy with a core of eight steam warships had been built over several years and was already the strongest in Asia . In 1865, Japan's first modern naval arsenal

8030-433: The ministers declaring that the shogunate was abolished, that harbours would be open in accordance with International treaties, and that foreigners would be protected. The ministers finally decided to recognize the new government. The rise of anti-foreign sentiment nonetheless led to several attacks on foreigners in the following months. Eleven French sailors from the corvette Dupleix were killed by samurai of Tosa in

8140-550: The other hand, the daimyō of Nagaoka managed to procure two of the three Gatling guns in Japan and 2,000 modern French rifles from the German weapons dealer Henry Schnell . The coalition crumbled, and on October 12, 1868, the fleet left Sendai for Hokkaidō , after having acquired two more ships ( Oe and Hōō , previously borrowed by Sendai from the shogunate), and about 1,000 more troops: remaining shogunate troops under Ōtori Keisuke , Shinsengumi troops under Hijikata Toshizō ,

8250-529: The place to which his ancestor Tokugawa Ieyasu had also retired. Most of Japan accepted the emperor's rule, but a core of domains in the North, supporting the Aizu clan, continued the resistance. In May, several northern daimyōs formed an Alliance to fight Imperial troops, the coalition of northern domains composed primarily of forces from the domains of Sendai , Yonezawa , Aizu , Shōnai and Nagaoka Domain , with

8360-501: The poor military performance of its forces. The Daimyo therefore hired several French officers and began enrolling peasants into the military. The Choshu domain in 1840 contained 11,000 samurai and was also more amenable to reform, and more ambitious than Satsuma in reform and the recruitment of peasantry with the formation of the 300 strong Kihetai, a mixed formation of samurai, townsmen, and peasants, with ronin officers with tough discipline and western uniforms. A second and third company

8470-515: The possible consequences of their actions (such a fate befell Captain William Kidd in May 1701). There were objections that these displays offended foreign visitors and did not uphold the reputation of the law, though the scenes even became gruesome tourist attractions. In some cases, the bodies would be left until their clothes rotted or even until the bodies were almost completely decomposed, after which

8580-459: The prior decade. Increasing Western influence in the economy led to a decline similar to that of other Asian countries at the time. An alliance of western samurai, particularly the domains of Chōshū , Satsuma , and Tosa , and court officials secured control of the Imperial Court and influenced the young Emperor Meiji . Tokugawa Yoshinobu , the sitting shōgun , realizing the futility of his situation, abdicated and handed over political power to

8690-409: The public response was complex. Samuel Pepys expressed disgust at the practice. There was Christian objection that prosecution of criminals should end with their death. The sight and smell of decaying corpses was offensive and regarded as "pestilential", so it was seen as a threat to public health. Pirates were sometimes executed by hanging on a gibbet erected close to the low-water mark by the sea or

8800-458: The region to gather support for the imperial cause. The Satake then backed out of the alliance and supported the imperial army; eleven days later, on September 1, 1868 the Tsugaru clan of the neighboring Hirosaki Domain followed suit. In response, the pro-alliance domains of Morioka and Ichinoseki Domains sent troops to attack Kubota. Kubota forces were hard-pressed to defend their territory, with

8910-547: The remnants of the navy and his handful of French advisers. Together they organized a government, with the objective of establishing an independent island nation dedicated to the development of Hokkaidō. They formally established the Republic of Ezo on the American model, Japan's only ever republic, and Enomoto was elected as president, with a large majority. The republic tried to reach out to foreign legations present in Hakodate, such as

9020-546: The restoration of the monarchy. The leaders of the Anabaptist movement in Münster were executed in 1536; their dead bodies were gibbeted in iron cages hanging from the steeple of St. Lambert's Church, and the cages are still on display there today. Similarly, following his execution by hanging in 1738, the corpse of Jewish financier Joseph Süß Oppenheimer was gibbeted in a human-sized bird cage that hung outside of Stuttgart on

9130-404: The result that the alliance troops had made serious advances by the time the war ended in northern Honshū . In early 1869, Satake Yoshitaka formally gave up the domain's registers to the imperial government, and was made imperial governor of Kubota ( han chiji ). In mid-1869, the imperial government rewarded its service in the Boshin War with an increase in kokudaka of 20,000 koku . However, with

9240-544: The scene of the crime. In 1751, an Act of Parliament stipulated that "in no case whatsoever shall the body of any murderer be suffered to be buried"; the cadaver was either to be publicly dissected or left "hanging in chains". The use of gibbeting had been in decline for some years before it was formally repealed by statute in 1834. In Scotland, the final case of gibbeting was that of Alexander Gillan in 1810. The last two men gibbeted in England were William Jobling and James Cook, both in 1832. Their cases are good examples of

9350-418: The scene were described thus: The body was encased in flat bars of iron of two and a half inches in breadth, the feet were placed in stirrups, from which a bar of iron went up each side of the head, and ended in a ring by which he was suspended; a bar from the collar went down the breast, and another down the back, there were also bars in the inside of the legs which communicated with the above; and crossbars at

9460-583: The second largest purchaser of western ships after the Shogunate itself, of which nearly all were British-built. As Satsuma samurai became dominant in the Imperial navy after the war, the navy frequently sought assistance from the British. In preparation for future conflict, the shogunate also modernized its forces. In line with Parkes's strategy, the British, previously the shogunate's primary foreign partner, proved reluctant to provide assistance. The Tokugawa thus came to rely mainly on French expertise, comforted by

9570-453: The shelling of foreign shipping in the port of Shimonoseki . During 1864, these actions were successfully countered by armed retaliations by foreign powers, such as the British bombardment of Kagoshima and the multinational Shimonoseki campaign . At the same time, the forces of Chōshū Domain , together with rōnin , raised the Hamaguri rebellion trying to seize the city of Kyoto , where

9680-573: The shogunal succession. His efforts culminated in March 1863 with his " order to expel barbarians ". Although the shogunate had no intention of enforcing it, the order nevertheless inspired attacks against the shogunate itself and against foreigners in Japan: the most famous incident was that of the English trader Charles Lennox Richardson , for whose death the Tokugawa government had to pay an indemnity of one hundred thousand British pounds . Other attacks included

9790-445: The shogunate often wore French and British uniforms. Traditional troops however retained their samurai clothes. Some of the Imperial troops wore peculiar headgear, involving the use of long, colored, "bear" hair. The "red bear" ( 赤熊 , shaguma ) wigs indicated officers from Tosa, the "white bear" ( 白熊 , haguma ) wigs officers from Chōshū, and the "black bear" (黒熊, koguma ) wigs officers from Satsuma. The Sampeitai formed

9900-402: The shogunate, under Saigo's direction, had been hiding and creating trouble. The residence was burned down, and many opponents killed or later executed. The forces of Chōshū and Satsuma were fully modernized with Armstrong Guns , Minié rifles and one Gatling gun . The shogunate forces had been slightly lagging in terms of equipment, although the French military mission had recently trained

10010-450: The side of the Imperial Court. These included the daimyōs of Yodo and Tsu in February, tilting the military balance in favour of the Imperial side. After the defections, Yoshinobu, apparently distressed by the imperial approval given to the actions of Satsuma and Chōshū, fled Osaka aboard the Japanese battleship  Kaiyō Maru , withdrawing to Edo. Demoralized by his flight and by

10120-670: The skin dried out. On 4 February 1820, six British pirates were hanged on their vessel in the middle of the harbour at Valletta . Thereafter, their bodies were hung in gibbets erected at the bastions of Fort Ricolli . Lieutenant Hobson of HMS  Spey , in the tender Frederick , had apprehended them and their vessel in the harbour at Smyrna. During the colonial era , Bird Island and Nix's Mate island in Boston Harbor were used for gibbeting pirates and sailors executed for crimes in Massachusetts. Their bodies were left hanging as

10230-417: The smaller but relatively modernized Imperial faction, and, after a series of battles culminating in the surrender of Edo , Yoshinobu personally surrendered. Those loyal to the Tokugawa shōgun retreated to northern Honshū and later to Hokkaidō , where they founded the Republic of Ezo . The defeat at the Battle of Hakodate broke this last holdout and left the Emperor as the de facto supreme ruler throughout

10340-457: The so-called Pragsattel (the public execution place at the time) for six years, until the inauguration of Karl Eugen, Duke of Württemberg , who permitted the hasty burial of his corpse at an unknown location. After the siege and capture of the city of Zutphen in 1591 by the Anglo-Dutch army, the English dug up the body of the former English commander Rowland York and hanged and gibbeted it as

10450-750: The spectacle of McKay's rotting corpse, pleaded with the authorities to remove it. The place where this occurred was just to the right (when travelling towards Launceston, not to be confused with the private road with the same name) on the Midlands Highway on the northern side of Perth. In the Colony of Western Australia , gibbeting of executed Indigenous people continued into the mid-1850s. In 1855, Aboriginal men Yandan and Yoongal were executed in Perth for separate murders, with their bodies then "conveyed under escort to York , there to be suspended in some conspicuous part of

10560-453: The town of Rye, East Sussex , Allen Grebell was murdered by John Breads. Breads was imprisoned in the Ypres Tower and then hanged, after which his body was left to rot for more than 20 years in an iron cage on Gibbet Marsh. The cage, with Breads's skull clamped within the headframe, is still kept in the town hall. Another example of the cage variation is the gibbet iron, on display at

10670-512: The war. The Shogunate as well as the Imperial side also used native Japanese cannons, with Japan making cannons domestically as far back as 1575. In the area of warships also, some of the most recent ironclads such as the Kōtetsu coexisted with older types of steamboats and even traditional sailboats. The shogunate initially had the edge in warships, and it had the vision to buy the Kōtetsu . The ship

10780-462: The whole of Japan, completing the military phase of the Meiji Restoration . Around 69,000 men were mobilized during the conflict, and of these about 8,200 were killed. In the end, the victorious Imperial faction abandoned its objective of expelling foreigners from Japan and instead adopted a policy of continued modernization with an eye to the eventual renegotiation of the unequal treaties with

10890-400: Was blocked from delivery by foreign powers on grounds of neutrality once the conflict had started, and was ultimately delivered to the Imperial faction shortly after the Battle of Toba–Fushimi . Uniforms were Western-style for modernized troops (usually dark, with variations in the shape of the helmet: tall conical for Satsuma, flat conical for Chōshū, rounded for the shogunate). Officers of

11000-703: Was built in Yokosuka by the French engineer Léonce Verny . In January 1867, a French military mission arrived to reorganize the shogunate army and create the Denshūtai elite force, and an order was placed with the US to buy the French-built ironclad warship CSS Stonewall , which had been built for the Confederate States Navy during the American Civil War . Due to the Western powers' declared neutrality,

11110-453: Was codified in England by the Murder Act 1751 . It was most often used for traitors , robbers , murderers , highwaymen , and pirates and was intended to discourage others from committing similar offenses. The structures were therefore often placed next to public highways (frequently at crossroads) and waterways. Exhibiting a body could backfire against a monarch, especially if the monarch

11220-447: Was during Yoshiatsu's lifetime that the Akita school ( 秋田派 , Akita-ha ) of art was born and briefly flourished. Kubota Domain was uncommon in that it contained more than one castle, and was an exception to the Tokugawa shogunate's "one castle per domain" rule. The main castle was Kubota Castle, but there were also castles at Yokote and Ōdate , and five fortified estates elsewhere in

11330-414: Was founded in 1701 for Satake Yoshinaga, the fourth son of Satake Yoshitaka, the 2nd daimyō of Kubota Domain, who assigned him 20,000 koku of rice revenues from newly opened fields. He built a jin'ya in what is now Yuzawa, Akita , where his descendants continued to rule until the Meiji restoration. The domain was unusual in that it did not directly control any territory, but was assigned revenues from

11440-435: Was met by the shogun. Ironically, the largest provider of men under the new system was the Satsuma domain providing 4,800 infantry, 100 cavalry and 8 guns with 100 men. In 1863 the Shogun allowed the recruitment of commoners but by 1867 this force had only reached 5,900 infantry. In order to augment this force the Shogun raised 5 battalions of Yugekitai. The Shogun also disbanded the city and legation guard units and added them to

11550-634: Was not on the mainland and therefore satisfied the beliefs of locals who did not want gibbets near their homes. Marie-Josephte Corriveau (1733–1763), better known as "La Corriveau", is one of the most popular figures in Québécois folklore. She lived in New France, was sentenced to death by a military tribunal of twelve British officers for the murder of her second husband, was hanged for it, and her body hung in chains. Her story has become legendary in Quebec , and she

11660-411: Was occupied by Satsuma and Chōshū forces. This decision was prompted by his learning of a series of arsons in Edo, starting with the burning of the outer works of Edo Castle , the main Tokugawa residence. This was blamed on Satsuma rōnin , who on that day attacked a government office. The next day shogunate forces responded by attacking the Edo residence of the daimyō of Satsuma, where many opponents of

11770-450: Was raised increasing its strength to 900 men. The usage of gunboat diplomacy brought in many volunteers and another 980 men were formed in several shotai or auxiliary militia, with 60 units in total by 1865. These shotai were added to the Choshu military and given modern weaponry by 1868. By 1868 there were 150 shotai and they were regularised and when added to the regular domain army contained

11880-491: Was shaved and tarred, to preserve it from the action of the weather; and the cap in which he had suffered was drawn over his face. On Saturday afternoon his body, attired as at the time of his execution, having been firmly fixed in the irons necessary to keep the limbs together, was carried to the place of its intended suspension. His body was to be displayed on a purpose-built gallows 33 feet (10 m) high in Saffron Lane near

11990-533: Was to contain half seishi (richer samurai) and half Kashi (poorer Samurai). The recruitment was to be men between 17 and 45 with service terms of 5 years with battalions of 600 companies of 120 and platoons of 40. The daimyo were allowed to substitute manpower with money to purchase firearms and rice to feed the soldiers something the Shoguate desperately needed both of. However, the plan immediately ran into issues as resistance to providing men and money to purchase firearms

12100-409: Was unpopular. The rebels Henry of Montfort and Henry of Wylynton, enemies of Edward II , were drawn and hanged before being exhibited on a gibbet near Bristol . However, the people made relics of these bloody and mutilated remains out of respect and later used the relics in violent protest. Miracles were even reported at the spot where the bodies were hanging. Although the intention was deterrence,

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