The Assassination of Serizawa Kamo

Serizawa Kamo and the Internal Strife of the Early Shinsengumi

In 1863 (Bunkyū 3), the Rōshigumi, a band of masterless samurai recruited in Edo ostensibly to guard Shogun Tokugawa Iemochi's journey to Kyoto, broke apart shortly after arriving in the capital over the intentions of its organizer, Kiyokawa Hachirō. A faction that refused to return to Edo and insisted on remaining in Kyoto then formed the Mibu Rōshigumi. One of its leading figures was Serizawa Kamo. Serizawa is said to have come from Mito domain, is known as a swordsman of the Shintō Munen-ryū school, and is said to have had deep ties with the Mito Tengu-tō. The Mibu Rōshigumi was an unstable alliance of two groups that differed in origin, swordsmanship, and temperament. One group, centered on Kondō Isami, Hijikata Toshizō, and Okita Sōji, came from the Shieikan dojo of the Tennen Rishin-ryū school. The other, centered on Serizawa Kamo, Niimi Nishiki, and Hirayama Gorō, came from the Mito faction. At first, Serizawa of the Mito faction stood at the top as senior commander, with Kondō ranking below him. In the third month of that year, this Rōshigumi was placed under the protection of Matsudaira Katamori, the Aizu domain lord who served as Kyoto Shugoshoku. After it was dispatched during the Coup of the Eighth Month, it was given the name "Shinsengumi" and took up the duty of policing the city. However, the struggle for leadership between Serizawa and Kondō continued to simmer beneath the surface.

During this period, assassinations of officials and attacks on foreigners by sonnō jōi activists were frequent, and public order in Kyoto had deteriorated badly. Aizu domain relied on the Shinsengumi as its active force for policing the city. For that reason, the Shinsengumi was compelled to place the discipline of the entire corps and its external reputation above all else. Serizawa was certainly skilled with the sword, but he is said to have caused many problems through his conduct. Incidents followed one after another that threatened the reputation of the Shinsengumi as a whole in the city: violent outbursts at teahouses and brothels in Gion and Shimabara, a brawl with sumo wrestlers from Osaka, and an arson incident sparked by a trumped-up grievance against the silk merchant Yamatoya Shōbei. Niimi Nishiki, the other senior commander of the Mito faction, had already been pressed to commit seppuku by the Kondō-Hijikata faction in the eighth month of the same year (some say the ninth) for violating group rules, such as unauthorized visits to teahouses. By this time, the power of the Mito faction was already beginning to be broken up. Kondō and Hijikata, who needed to keep Aizu domain's trust, came to regard Serizawa's very existence as a danger to the organization.

Furthermore, the network of the Mito faction, which Serizawa is said to have helped form in Edo, had long been a source of suspicion for Aizu domain and within the shogunate. Many also hold that, beyond Serizawa's personal violence, Kondō and Hijikata had the political aim of wiping out the Mito faction, a major force, from the Shinsengumi altogether.

The Night Before the Assassination: The Banquet at Sumiya and the Yagi Residence

On the night of the 16th day of the 9th month of Bunkyū 3 (some accounts say the 18th), the Shinsengumi held a banquet at the Sumiya, an agaya in Shimabara. While the men of the Kondō faction remained at the party, Serizawa left early together with his close associate Hirayama Gorō and returned to the Yagi Gennojō residence in Mibu, which the corps used as its headquarters. There, he is said to have continued drinking separately. Oume, Serizawa's mistress, and geisha summoned from the neighborhood are said to have joined this gathering. Late that night, the heavily drunk Serizawa and Hirayama each went to rest inside the Yagi residence. However, the prevailing view holds that the banquet at the Sumiya was itself arranged by the Kondō-Hijikata faction to lull Serizawa into complacency and create an opportunity for his assassination. Because the Shinsengumi stood under the protection of Aizu domain, it could not openly permit an internal dispute to break out. The disposal of a man within the corps therefore had to be carried out in secret and with certainty.

The Assassination

Late at night, in the midst of a violent storm, several men are said to have broken into Serizawa's sleeping quarters in the Yagi residence. Hirayama Gorō, who was sleeping in the same room, was cut down first. He is said to have died of wounds so deep that they nearly separated his torso from his head. Alerted by the noise, Serizawa, naked, tried to flee into the adjoining room, but tripped over a low writing desk and fell. The assassins then cut him down repeatedly, and he died. His mistress Oume, who was sleeping under the same bedding, was also killed in the attack. Another close associate, Hirama Jūsuke, who was in a separate room, is said to have escaped and fled.

Accounts differ as to who carried out the killings. Records based on the testimony of Shinsengumi member Nagakura Shinpachi name Hijikata Toshizō, Okita Sōji, Todo Heisuke, and Mikura Isetake, four men in all. Other traditions, however, indicate the involvement of Sannan Keisuke or Harada Sanosuke, so the exact combination of perpetrators has not been established. The date also appears as both the 16th and the 18th, and since each has limited support in the historical record, no firm conclusion has been reached at present. Nevertheless, both accounts broadly agree that at the core of the operation lay the intentions of Hijikata Toshizō, Kondō Isami's most trusted lieutenant.

The Aftermath and the Official Explanation

The Shinsengumi is said to have reported the incident to Aizu domain as an attack by hostile rōnin or radical exclusionists then roaming Kyoto. The funerals of Serizawa and Hirayama were conducted respectfully as those of members of the corps, and the matter was officially handled as the death of comrades under unexplained circumstances. As a result, the true nature of the purge within the Shinsengumi did not become public for the time being, and Aizu domain's trust is said to have been maintained. Following this incident, Kondō Isami came to command the Shinsengumi in both name and reality, and the Kondō-Hijikata system was established, with Hijikata Toshizō supporting him as vice-commander. From then on, the Shinsengumi strictly set and enforced the Kyokuchū Hatto to tighten control over its members. It was reorganized into the form known to later generations: under Kondō as the apex of its chain of command, it took up the duty of policing the streets of Kyoto.

The Sword Said to Have Been Carried by Serizawa Kamo

Serizawa is said to have been skilled in handling swords in actual combat as a practitioner of the Shintō Munen-ryū. However, because he was heavily drunk on the night of the assassination, he was cut down before he had time to take up a weapon. Among the swords associated with the Shinsengumi, Kondō Isami's Kotetsu (Nagasone Kotetsu; its authenticity is debated) is by far the best known. However, there are few primary sources that reliably establish the provenance of any sword Serizawa personally carried, and much of what is handed down owes more to embellished accounts in later novels and period dramas. The Yagi residence still preserves some of the sword scars from that time. These scars speak to the ferocity with which the assassins wielded their swords in the darkness, and they are known as one of the few material pieces of evidence that convey the grisliness of the incident to the present day.

Various Theories Regarding the Discrepancies in the Sources and the Background

Broadly speaking, two views have come down to us regarding the background of this incident. One holds that Aizu domain, exasperated by Serizawa's repeated outrages, privately ordered his removal. The other holds that it was a purely internal power struggle, planned by the Kondō-Hijikata faction to take full control of the Shinsengumi's leadership. The two are not mutually exclusive, and a compromise understanding is also widely accepted: that Kondō and Hijikata carried out the act while taking Aizu domain's wishes into account. In any case, most of the extant sources rely on memoirs and hearsay records compiled after the incident. The scarcity of contemporaneous primary sources is one reason why various theories about the perpetrators and motives coexist.

Historical Significance and Later Influence

The assassination of Serizawa Kamo is positioned as the decisive turning point at which the Shinsengumi transformed from a mixed gathering of rōnin brought from Edo into a disciplined armed organization under Kondō and Hijikata. Beginning with this purge, the Shinsengumi is said to have strengthened its tendency to strictly enforce the Kyokuchū Hatto and to purge, one after another, members who violated internal discipline. Some researchers point out that this precedent from the Serizawa purge also influenced later events, including the escape and seppuku of Sannan Keisuke, and the Aburanokōji Incident of Keiō 3 (1867), an attack on Itō Kashitarō and the Goryō Eishi. The Yagi residence is preserved today in Mibu, Nakagyō Ward, Kyoto. Along with its sword scars from that time, it is open to the public as a historic site associated with the Shinsengumi. In the study of bakumatsu history and the Shinsengumi, the assassination of Serizawa Kamo is repeatedly cited as the origin of purges within the organization. The establishment of the Kondō-Hijikata system is also said to have provided the organizational foundation for the Shinsengumi's later activities, including the Ikedaya Incident. The fact that this purge was its starting point is remembered as an indispensable episode in the history of public order maintenance in late-Edo Kyoto.