As he was born when the country was still under rule by the Tokugawa Bakufu, he was sent into the Buddhist priesthood, and assigned to serve at the monzeki temple of Ninna-ji in Kyoto, where he adopted the title Ninnaji-no-miya Yoshiaki (仁和寺宮嘉彰).

He returned to secular life in 1867 during the Meiji Restoration, and led imperial forces to Osaka, Yamato, Shikoku and Aizu during the Boshin War to overthrow the Tokugawa shogunate.

The emperor granted him the rank of lieutenant general in the newly created Imperial Japanese Army and awarded him the Order of the Rising Sun (1st class).

In June 1902, Prince Komatsu Akihito returned to the United Kingdom to represent Emperor Meiji at the coronation ceremonies for King Edward VII,[1] and also visited France, Spain, Belgium, Germany and Russia.

[2] In his latter years, Prince Komatsu was a patron of the Japanese Red Cross Society and the Dai Nippon Butoku Kai, along with other charity institutions.