A popular account of the beginnings of the Meiji Period (1868-1912) has it that the incompetent Tokugawa government was overthrown and the system of administration reorganized through the efforts of several forward-looking clan leaders. These were, notably, those of Satsuma (Kagoshima), Choshu (Yamaguchi), Tosa (Kochi) and Hizen (Saga). Despite later quarrels among themselves, it was these disaffiliated daimyo who put the country on the road to prosperity.
Popular though this account remains, it is but one of many. Indeed, in general, there is rarely a true history of anything. At the most there are a number of histories, from among which the historian may choose. An alternative interpretation of the beginnings of Meiji may be seen in the fall of the Aizu domain.
The destruction of this northern province was observed by a child, son of a ranking Aizu samurai, who many years later, despairing of the ways of political history, decided to record what he had himself witnessed. This was Shiba Goro (1859-1945), later to make a name for himself during the Boxer Rebellion.