In 1910, the Japanese scholar Yanagi Kakuda heard a shocking news at a bar in Hawaii.
The Japanese who drank next to him said that he had participated in the assassination of Emperor Hyomyō and could not mix in the country before he fled to Hawaii.
At this time, 43 years have passed since the death of Emperor Takashi, and it has always been said in Japan that he died of illness, and anyone who dared to say that he was poisoned was punished with great disrespect.
However, the more inaccurate things are, the more interested people are. Therefore, japanese folk have various sayings. However, the assassin fled overseas, such a drama, Rao is Kakuda Yanagisaku's knowledge, but also for the first time to hear about. Later, he told his students, who wrote about it in his own book, providing another way to study the death of Emperor Xiaoming.
Until now, Emperor Xiaoming was like the Guangxu Emperor, but did they die of disease? Or was it fed arsenic? It's all a mystery.
It is said that there is an arsenic component in Guangxu's hair. But some people also say that this is arsenic in the soil, transferred to the past. In other words, even if the bone breeding of Emperor Xiaoming was tested, it was difficult to confirm whether it was poisoned or a masterpiece in nature.
(Stills of the Guangxu Emperor and Empress Dowager Cixi)
So, why is there so much controversy over the death of Emperor Xiaoming?
Only because he died just right, the moment of Japanese history, when he should have died, just died.
Emperor Takaaki, also known as The Emperor at the end of the Shogunate, ruled at the end of the Tokugawa shogunate. The great powers invaded Japan and signed various treaties. And Xiaoming is an extremely conservative person.
He did not like foreigners, so he became the "co-owner" of the elements who had overthrown the curtain;
He also did not like to overthrow the shogunate, so he became a thorn in the side of the people who destroyed the shogunate.
What he hoped was that the public and military forces would be combined, and the imperial court and the shogunate would form a joint force to drive the Yi people away.
It was 1867, 13 years after the founding of Japan. They were drawn into the world's modernization system, and the shogunate sent delegations to Europe and the United States to find a way to strengthen the country; on the other hand, the shogunate, which was forced to open a country, became the target of the Zunwang Zhiyi movement. In one treaty after another, the prestige is lost.
Emperor Xiaoming was still unmoved in the face of an increasingly turbulent tide of the times.
On the one hand, he rejected everything in the West, including vaccines; on the other hand, he did not agree to the alliance of Choshu and other clans and some courtiers to put the Tokugawa shogunate to death, and to allow the emperor to rule Japan again.
At this time, as the great powers demanded the opening of more ports for trade, the struggle between the two factions had entered a white-hot situation.
Therefore, for the founding fathers, such an emperor, if he continues to live, is obviously an obstacle to continuing to open;
For the Nobles, his presence was the biggest obstacle to their overthrow of the Edo shogunate—after all, they still regarded him as their leading big brother.
(Emperor Xiaoming actually does not want to be the leading big brother)
Just when the shogunate was fighting with the fallen side, Emperor Takamitsu fell ill.
Doctors diagnosed that it was milder smallpox.
His symptoms, which some people in the palace had recorded in their diaries at the time, were beyond any doubt.
What he got was smallpox indeed.
After the diagnosis, he did not allow Yumiya, later The Meiji Emperor Muhito, to go to his room, but when he heard that his son had been vaccinated by Dutch doctors, he was relieved.
It can be seen that his xenophobia is his own insistence, and it does not prevent his son from having a stronger physique.
Seeing that the illness was gone, his health was getting better day by day, and the palace even held a banquet on January 27 to celebrate the emperor's recovery, but three days later, the condition suddenly worsened, purple spots appeared on his face, and nine tricks bled...
Emperor Xiaoming died in extreme pain.
His death makes people unprepared, especially when the illness has improved, suddenly there is such a file, it is no wonder that people have to suspect that someone behind the ghost.
The focus of the suspicion is Iwakura Kushi, who was chased and killed by the Yi faction a few years ago and was removed from his post and retreated.
Although he was reclusive, he had many supporters behind him, and in their view, the indecisive Emperor Xiaoming was a roadblock to the implementation of the reform of the dynasty.
(Left is Iwakura view)
The problem is that any claim that Iwakura was poisoned has been falsified.
First of all, his purpose was to manipulate the emperor. He needs to blackmail the Son of Heaven to order the princes. Killing the emperor did him little good. Therefore, when he heard the news of the emperor's death, his reaction was that I was finished. I intend to continue to live in seclusion and ignore the world.
Secondly, some people say that Iwakura knew that the emperor had a habit of licking the pen when he folded the fold, so he offered two brushes with poison on it. The problem is that after the emperor's illness, it is impossible to approve the fold. If the pen had been sent before he fell ill, Emperor Xiao would have died a long time ago.
Some people say that it was poisoned by Iwakura's niece. In fact, he had only one sister who had been in the palace and had been out of the house a few years earlier.
In any case, Emperor Hyomei died before the shogunate fought with the Fallen Shogunate. He died just right.
In the book "Meiji Emperor 1852-1912", it is written that such a conservative ... Emperor Xiaoming's successor was a fifteen-year-old boy... Some meiji restoration leaders considered him a "treasure jade", a treasure that allowed their great cause to be realized.