Aoyama Yukiyoshi

Aoyama Yukiyoshi was the eldest son of the 6th daimyō of Gujō Domain, Aoyama Yukishige. He became daimyō in 1863 on the death of his father.^[1] The following year, the shogunate ordered the domain to reply troops against the Mito Rebellion, but by the time the order reached the domain, the rebel forces had already passed. In the Bakumatsu period, as with most domains, the samurai were divided between a pro-shogunate faction and a pro-sonnō jōi faction whose goal was to restore political power to the throne. Aoyama Yukiyoshi refused to support either side, and many of the pro-Tokugawa samurai rallied around the son of his chief retainer and formed a type of freikorps which joined the defenders at the Battle of Aizu in the Boshin War. The new Meiji government awarded Aoyama for his inactivity, and appointed him imperial governor of Gujō-Hachiman in 1868. With the abolition of the han system in 1871 he relocated to Tokyo. With the establishment of kazoku peerage on 8 July 1884, he was made a viscount (shishaku).^[2] He later served as president of Nippon Printing Company, and as a director on the Iwakura Railway School. He was appointed to the House of Peers in 1890.

Aoyama was married three times. His first wife, Setsuko, was the daughter of the kuge, Tadaaya Hirohata. His second wife, Machiko, was the daughter of the famed Ii Naosuke. His third wife, Fumiko, was the daughter of Todo Tadakuni of Hisai Domain. Aoyama Yukiyoshi died on 6 February 1930. He is 75 years old. His grave is at the temple of Baiso-in in Minami-Aoyama, Tokyo.