Sagara Sōzō

Sagara Sōzō (相楽 総三 1839 – March 26, 1868), real name Kojima Shirō (小島 四郎),[1] was the leader of the 1st Unit of the Sekihōtai, a group of Japanese political extremists formed in 1868 during the Boshin War.

After the Battle of Toba–Fushimi in 1868, the Sekihōtai, in which Sagara was the leader of the 1st Unit, constituted of a civilian squad made principally of farmers and merchants, was formed on February 1, 1868, at Kongōrin-ji temple in Matsuoji, Ōmi Province with the support of Saigō Takamori and Iwakura Tomomi.

[2] His wife Teru, upon hearing the news, entrusted her son Kawajirō to Sagara's elder sister (married into Kimura family), and committed suicide soon afterwards.

While on display, Sagara's head was later stolen by his close friend and a kokugaku scholar Iida Takesato and was secretly buried.

After their original burial ground at the temple was no longer being kept up, their graves were reburied at Aoyama Cemetery, Akasaka, Tokyo, Japan by the Kimura family.

Sagara's family, taken five or six years after his death; from left: his sister, his niece, his son, and his father
The Sagara-zuka monument, 2017