16 Facts About Enomoto Takeaki

Viscount Enomoto Takeaki was a Japanese samurai and admiral of the Tokugawa navy of Bakumatsu period Japan, who remained faithful to the Tokugawa shogunate and fought against the new Meiji government until the end of the Boshin War.

Enomoto Takeaki later served in the Meiji government as one of the founders of the Imperial Japanese Navy.

Enomoto Takeaki started learning Dutch in the 1850s, and after Japan's forced "opening" by Commodore Matthew Perry in 1854, he studied at the Tokugawa shogunate's Naval Training Center in Nagasaki and at the Tsukiji Warship Training Center in Edo.

At the age of 26, Enomoto Takeaki was sent to the Netherlands to study western techniques in naval warfare and to procure western technologies.

Enomoto Takeaki stayed in Europe from 1862 to 1867, and became fluent in both the Dutch and English languages.

Enomoto Takeaki returned to Japan on board the Kaiyo Maru, a steam warship purchased from the Netherlands by the Shogunal government.

Enomoto Takeaki hoped to create an independent country under the rule of the Tokugawa family in Hokkaido, but the Meiji government refused to accept partition of Japan.

Enomoto Takeaki became one of the few former Tokugawa loyalists who made the transition to the new ruling elite, as politics at the time was dominated by men from Choshu and Satsuma, who had a strong bias against outsiders in general, and former Tokugawa retainers in particular.

However, Enomoto Takeaki was an exception, and rose quickly within the new ruling clique, to a higher status than any other member of the former Tokugawa administrations.

In 1874, Enomoto Takeaki was given the rank of vice-admiral in the fledgling Imperial Japanese Navy.

Enomoto Takeaki was Japan's first Minister of Communications after the introduction of the cabinet system in 1885.

Enomoto Takeaki was Minister of Agriculture and Commerce from 1894 to 1897, Minister of Education from 1889 to 1890 and Foreign Minister from 1891 to 1892.

In 1887, Enomoto Takeaki was ennobled to the rank of viscount under the kazoku peerage system, and was selected as a member of the Privy Council.

Enomoto Takeaki was especially active in promoting Japanese emigration through settler colonies in the Pacific Ocean and South and Central America.

Two years later, after leaving the government, Enomoto Takeaki helped to establish a private organization, the "Colonial Association", to promote external trade and emigration.

Enomoto Takeaki's grave is at the temple of Kissho-ji, Bunkyo-ku, Tokyo.