Iemochi Dies during the Second Chōshū Expedition

The second expedition against Chōshū developed into fighting across four approaches in 1866. Iemochi remained at Osaka Castle, the shogunate’s headquarters in the region, as forces from participating domains struggled against Chōshū’s reorganized army.

The shogun became ill and died on the twentieth day of the seventh month of the Japanese calendar. His death interrupted command during a campaign that had already failed to force Chōshū’s submission. His body was returned to Edo and buried at Zōjōji, where Kazunomiya was later also buried.

Yoshinobu first accepted succession to the Tokugawa house. The expedition was halted, and a ceasefire was negotiated at Miyajima. His appointment as shogun followed in the twelfth month of the Japanese calendar; house succession and appointment to imperial office were separate steps. Iemochi’s death thus joined a wartime leadership loss to an unresolved political transition. The campaign’s battlefield reverses preceded it, and the succession did not restore the domain coalition’s earlier military position.