[1] Born as the third son to a bankrupt samurai in the Matsuyama Domain, Iyo Province (modern Ehime Prefecture), Akiyama worked as a fire stoker and janitor in a local public bathhouse as a child.

Akiyama was often mistaken for a European student by many foreign instructors such as Jakob Meckel while at the Japanese Army Academy.

Akiyama died of complications from diabetes at the Army Medical School Hospital in Tokyo in 1930, and his grave is in the city of Matsuyama.

Akiyama is one of the main characters of Saka no Ue no Kumo ("Clouds Over the Slope"), a novel by Ryōtarō Shiba, adapted as a historical drama on the Japanese television network NHK from 2009 to 2011.

When series author, Hajime Isayama, stated this inspiration he received death threats and criticism regarding the general's actions in the military, primarily regarding Akiyama and his division's involvement in the Port Arthur Massacre.