General Nogi's Home Tokyo/Russo-Japanese War/ Tokyo 2020

Address: 8-11-32 Akasaka, Tokyo, Open everyday 9:00 - 16:00 on Sep 12 and 13th you can enter the house.
Nogi Maresuke was born in Tokyo to a Samurai family in 1849. He joined the new Imperial Army one year after the Meiji restoration that ended the Edo period and saw Japan rapidly modernize. As a young officer he fought die hard Samurai traditionalists in the Satsuma Rebellion ( Last Samurai the movie is very loosley based on this rebellion). Nogi's unit became lost and the unit standard was lost. He was disgraced and sentenced to die/ he was good to go getting ready to gut himself in traditional fashion but the Emperor spared him / ordered him not to kill himself. He devoted himself to the Emperor but still saw suicide as a possible 'to do' in planning for the rest of his life.
His military career went better after a rocky start. He was sent to Germany (Prussia) to study modern war and was greatly impressed by the barracks apparently. He designed his home based on the clean minimalistic lines of European barracks. He rose through the ranks and was already a general in 1894. This is when he gained national acclaim during the Sino Japanese War for the capture Lüshunkou ( later called Port Arthur / today Liaoning)
The capture of the fortified port Lushunkou was accomplished with minimal Japanese casualties.
In 1904 for the world the main story of the Rus Jap war was General Nogi and the siege of Port Arthur. Everyone had reporters with the Japanese because you couldn't file stories from Port Arthur. General Nogi proved adept at PR and hosted lunches for foreign military advisors and the press/ champagne was served. General Nogi became known around the world. Please remember people were racist as hell back then. The Russians underestimated the Japanese assuming a European power would crush Asians. It is obvious the size of nation Navy manpower etc was not the only reason all bets were on Russia early on. The press at the time echoed overt racism but that also made Japan the underdog and Russia and the absolute monarchy of the Romanov's was not wildly popular anywhere except some salons of St. Petersburg. General Nogi did order tactically idiotic infantry attacks across open ground on entrenched wired elevated positions with machine guns. He was a 19th century guy and as happened in 1914 that was the way they rolled. The press was confused by the slaughter as well as mechanized war with smokeless powder repeating rifles and machine guns was pretty new stuff. Nogi was almost relived of command in the early siege due to the mounting casualties. However the top brass thought he (Nogi) would surely kill himself if relieved and that would be nasty and all as he was likable but also not do the PR Machine any good. As it stood in mid 1904 the plucky Japanese had the Russian bear on its heels.
The remnants of the Pacific Russian Fleet were trapped in Port Arthur. The Russian Baltic Fleet was on the journey from hell around the horn of Africa. The idea being when the Baltic Fleet arrived the Pacific would join up defeat Japan at sea cut off resupply also by then Russia could mobilize huge numbers of men and get them east on the single rail line stretching across the 1000s of kilometers from European Russia to Manchuria.
So General Nogi was talked into or realized taking Port Arthur by direct assault wasn't going to work. The siege was begun. horrific losses still occurred as steady siege work and advancing trenches wore down Russian defenses. The Siege culminated at 203 meter hill a Russian strong point that if captured would give a direct view of the entire harbor.
The Russians knew what was at stake and defended the hill heroically. Until 11 inch (28cm) guns arrived from Japan. They fired 500lbs ( 226kg) shells and blew holy hell out of the Russians defences. The hill fell, contrary to film, they didn't drag the guns up but rather sent observers with telephones up to the summit to call in indirect fire on the fleet. within a few days the fleet was sunk. Russians messily surrendered as their commander was awful, General Strossel. Most defenders we're ready to fight on. He surrendered and had to ask Nogi for protection from his own troops who were outraged and drunk.
So General Nogi won. He was hailed as a hero at home and lauded globally. On return He offered to ... kill himself for the losses. Emperor forbid it. 8 years later the Emperor died so after the funeral Maresuke and the Mrs messed the floor. For this he
gained real fame and he revived the samurai practice of seppuku.or ritual suicide. This is not in keeping with the Meiji reign he served one of reform. it inspired radical militants in the 20s and 30s.
resources below
www.tracesofwar.com/sights/89...
www.oldtokyo.com/count-general...
onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/a...

[@richardlew5316]

Visited Port Arthur and been to Aoyama cemetery