, served as a gensui or admiral of the fleet in the Imperial Japanese Navy and became one of Japan's greatest naval heroes. As Commander-in-Chief of the Combined Fleet during the Russo-Japanese War of 1904âÂÂ1905, he successfully confined the Russian Pacific naval forces to Port Arthur before winning a decisive victory over a relieving fleet at Tsushima in May 1905. Western journalists called Tà Âgà  "the Nelson of the East". He remains deeply revered as a national hero in Japan, with shrines and streets named in his honour.
Tà Âgà  was born as Tà Âgà  Nakagorà  (仲äºÂéÂÂ) on 27 January 1848 in the Kajiya-chà  () district of the city of Kagoshima in Satsuma domain (modern-day Kagoshima Prefecture), the third of four sons of Togo Kichizaemon, a samurai serving the Shimazu daimyà  as controller of the revenue, master of the wardrobe, and district governor, and Hori Masuko (1812âÂÂ1901), a noblewoman from the same clan as her husband.
Kajiya-chà  was one of Kagoshima's samurai housing-districts, in which many other influential figures of the Meiji period were born, such as Saigà  Takamori and à Âkubo Toshimichi. They rose to prominent positions under the Meiji Emperor partly because the Shimazu clan had been a decisive military and political factor in the Boshin War against the Tokugawa shogunate during the Meiji Restoration.
As a youth, Tà Âgà  was educated to become a samurai warrior. He changed his name to Heihachirà  (meaning "peaceful son") in a religious and patriotic ceremony held when he turned 13, in which samurai tradition called for youth to adopt a change in name (genpuku).
Tà Âgà Â's first experience at war was during the Bombardment of Kagoshima in August 1863, in which Kagoshima was shelled by the Royal Navy to punish the Satsuma daimyà  for the death of Charles Lennox Richardson on the Tà Âkaidà  highway the previous year (the Namamugi Incident), and the Japanese refusal to pay an indemnity in compensation. Tà Âgà Â, who was aged 15 at the time, was part of a gun crew manning one of the cannons defending the port.
The following year, Satsuma established a navy, in which Tà Âgà  enlisted in 1866 at age 17. Two of his brothers also enlisted. In January 1868, during the Boshin War, Tà Âgà  was assigned to the paddle-wheel steam warship , which participated in the Battle of Awa, near Osaka, against the navy of the Tokugawa Bakufu, the first Japanese naval battle between two modern fleets.
As the conflict spread to northern Japan, Tà Âgà  participated as a third-class officer aboard the Kasuga in the last battles against the remnants of the Bakufu forces, the Battle of Miyako Bay and the Battle of Hakodate in 1869.
After the civil war ended in the autumn 1869, Tà Âgà Â, on the instructions of the Satsuma clan, first travelled to the treaty port of Yokohama to study English. He resided in Yokohama with Daisuke Shibata, a government official reputedly proficient in English and received additional pronunciation coaching from Charles Wagman, Japan correspondent of The Illustrated London News. Tà Âgà  made rapid progress in his studies and in 1870 secured a place at the newly established Imperial Japanese Navy Training School at Tsukiji, Tokyo. On 11 December 1870 he was formally appointed a cadet on the Japanese ironclad flagship , then at anchor in Yokohama harbour.
In February 1871, Tà Âgà  and eleven other Japanese officer cadets were selected to travel to Britain to further their naval studies. Between extensive practical sea training and an extended voyage to Australia, Tà Âgà  lived and studied in Britain for a period of seven years. Arriving at the port of Southampton in April 1871 after a journey of 80 days, Tà Âgà  first traveled to London, at that time the most populous city in the world. According to contemporary accounts of the cadet's first days in England, many things were strange to Japanese eyes at that time; the domed buildings made out of stone, the "number and massiveness of the buildings", "the furnishings of a commonplace European room", and "the displays in the butchers' shop windows: it took them several days to become accustomed to such an abundance of meat."
The Japanese group was separated and sent to English boarding houses for individual instruction in English language, customs and manners. Tà Âgà  was initially sent for some weeks to a boarding house in the major naval port of Plymouth, to gain some understanding of the British Royal Navy. Subsequently, he studied history, mathematics and engineering at a naval preparatory school in Portsmouth under the direction of a tutor and local clergyman in order to prepare for admission to the training establishment Britannia at Dartmouth, Devon.
After the British Admiralty decided in 1872 that no places were to be made available at Dartmouth for the Japanese cadets, Tà Âgà  was able to gain admission as a cadet on , the training ship of the Thames Nautical Training College, moored at Greenhithe. Tà Âgà  found his cadet rations "inadequate": "I swallowed my small rations in a moment. I formed the habit of dipping my bread in my tea and eating a great deal of it, to the surprise of my English comrades." Tà Âgà Â's comrades called him "Johnny Chinaman", being unfamiliar with the "Orient" and not knowing the difference between Asiatic peoples. "The young samurai did not like that, and on more than one occasion he would threaten to put an end to it by blows." Gunnery training for the college was held aboard , at the time moored in Portsmouth harbour. Tà Âgà  is recorded to have attended Trafalgar Day observances on the deck of the ship in 1873. After two years of training, Tà Âgà  was to graduate second in his class.
During 1875, Tà Âgà  circumnavigated the world as an ordinary seaman on the British training ship Hampshire, leaving in February and staying seventy days at sea without a port call until reaching Melbourne. Tà Âgà  "observed the strange animals on the Southern continent". Rounding Cape Horn on his return voyage, Tà Âgà  had sailed thirty thousand miles before returning to England in September 1875. During the autumn and winter of 1875âÂÂ1876, Tà Âgà  spent five months in Cambridge studying mathematics and English under the direction of the Rev. Arthur Douglas Capel. The Rev. Capel was at the time of Tà Âgà Â's visit, both a mathematics tutor and curate at the Anglican church of Little St Mary's, Cambridge. Tà Âgà  is recorded to have attended services at the church during his stay.
In 1875 Tà Âgà  suffered a bout of illness which severely threatened his eyesight: "the patient asked his medical advisers to 'try everything', and some of their experiments were extremely painful." Capel commented later, "If I had not seen with my own eyes what a Japanese can suffer without complaint, I should often have been disinclined to believe ... But, having observed Tà Âgà Â, I believe all of them." Harley Street ophthalmologists were able to save his eyesight. Upon recovery Tà Âgà  travelled to Portsmouth to continue his training before being assigned the role of inspector for the construction of , one of three new warships ordered by the Imperial Japanese Navy. Residing in proximity to the Royal Naval College, Greenwich, Tà Âgà  made use of the opportunity to apply his training, observing the construction of the ship at the Samuda Brothers shipyard on the Isle of Dogs.
Tà Âgà  was absent from Japan during the Satsuma Rebellion of 1877. His three brothers all fought in the rebellion: two were killed in battle, and the third died shortly after the rebellion's end. Later, Tà Âgà  would often express regret for the fate of his benefactor, Saigà  Takamori, who was also killed in that rebellion.
Tà Âgà Â, newly promoted to lieutenant, finally returned to Japan on 22 May 1878 aboard one of the newly purchased British-built ships, . That same year, he was promoted to the rank of first lieutenant of the Japanese built paddle-steamer warship , later to be transferred to the corvette . In 1882, Tà Âgà  led his ship's company in landing troops at Seoul in the wake of the Imo Incident.
In 1883, Tà Âgà  was given command of his first ship, and interacted with the British, American, and German fleets during this time.
On his return to Japan Tà Âgà  received several commands, first as captain of Daini Teibà Â, and then Amagi. During the Sino-French War (1884âÂÂ1885), Tà Âgà Â, onboard Amagi, closely followed the actions of the French fleet under Admiral Courbet.
Tà Âgà  also observed the ground combat of the French forces against the Chinese in Formosa (Taiwan), under the guidance of Joseph Joffre, future Commander-in-Chief of French forces during World War I.
Although first promoted to the rank of captain in 1886, Tà Âgà  suffered from a bout of acute rheumatism during the late 1880s that confined him to bed rest for nearly three years. He used this period of enforced absence from front line naval duties to study aspects of international and maritime law.
In 1891, Tà Âgà Â's health had sufficiently recovered that he was appointed to the command of the cruiser . In 1894, at the beginning of the First Sino-Japanese War, Tà Âgà Â, as a captain of Naniwa, sank the transport ship, Kowshing, which was chartered by the Chinese Beiyang Fleet to convey troops, during the Battle of Pungdo. A report of the incident was sent by Suematsu Kenchà  to Mutsu Munemitsu. The ship, which was under the command of captain T.R. Galsworthy, who incidentally had been one of Tà Âgà Â's instructors as a young cadet on HMS Worcester, had been ferrying more than a thousand Chinese soldiers towards Korea, and these soldiers had refused to be taken prisoner or interned on the appearance and under threat from the Japanese warships.
A contemporary account from a German survivor, Major von Hannecken, stated that the Chinese survivors had been fired upon, sinking two lifeboats. "...By this time only the Kowshings masts were visible. The water was however covered with Chinese, and there were two lifeboats from the Kowshing crowded with soldiers. The Japanese officer informed me that he had been ordered by signal from the Naniwa to sink these boats. I remonstrated, but he fired two volleys from the cutter, turned back, and steamed for the Naniwa. No attempt was made to rescue the Chinese. The Naniwa steamed about until eight o'clock in the evening, but did not pick up any other Europeans ..."
Tà Âgà  later took part in the Battle of the Yalu River on 17 September 1894, with Naniwa as the last ship in the line of battle under the overall command of Admiral Tsuboi Kà Âzà Â. Naniwa assisted in sinking the Chinese cruisers and .
Tà Âgà  was promoted to rear admiral at the end of the war, in 1895.
In May 1896, Tà Âgà  was appointed commandant of the Naval War College in Tokyo. He reformed the curriculum, and was promoted to vice admiral during this time. In 1899, he was appointed commander of the Sasebo Naval College, and he also served as Commander of the Standing Fleet.
With the advent of the Boxer Rebellion in China in 1899, Tà Âgà  was appointed Admiral of the Fleet and recalled to active sea duty on 20 May 1900. During the rebellion, he was responsible for patrolling the Chinese coast. As the Boxer Rebellion was crushed in 1902, Tà Âgà  was relieved of his command, and was decorated for his service to the Emperor. He was subsequently posted to supervise the construction of and become the first commander of the naval base at Maizuru.
In 1903, the Navy Minister Yamamoto Gonnohyà Âe appointed Tà Âgà  Commander-in-Chief of the Combined Fleet of the Imperial Japanese Navy. This astonished many people, including Emperor Meiji, who asked Yamamoto why Tà Âgà  was appointed. Yamamoto replied to the emperor, "Because Tà Âgà  is a man of good fortune".
During the Russo-Japanese War, Tà Âgà  engaged the Russian navy at Port Arthur and the Yellow Sea in 1904, and to widespread international acclaim commanded the Japanese naval forces at the destruction of the Imperial Russian Navy's Baltic Fleet at the Battle of Tsushima in May 1905.
The Battle of Tsushima was considered a daring naval victory pitting a small but rapidly militarising emerging Asian nation against a major European adversary. Russia was at the time the world's third-largest naval power. While the Japanese fleet at Tsushima lost only three torpedo boats under Tà Âgà Â's command, of the 36 Russian warships that went into action, 22 were sunk (including seven battleships), six were captured, six were interned in neutral ports and only three escaped to the safety of Vladivostok.
Tsushima broke Russian naval dominance in East Asia, and is said to have been a contributing factor in subsequent uprisings in the Russian Navy (1905 uprisings in Vladivostok and the battleship Potemkin uprising), contributing to the Russian Revolution of 1905. Post-war investigations were held into Russian naval leaders during those battles in which Tà Âgà  had prevailed, seeking the reasons behind their utter defeat. The Russian commander of the destroyed Baltic fleet, Admiral Zinovy Rozhestvensky (who was badly wounded in the battle) attempted to take full responsibility for the disaster, and the authorities (and rulers of Russia) acquitted him at his trial. However, they made Admiral Nikolai Nebogatov, who had tried to blame the Russian government, a scapegoat. Nebogatov was found guilty and sentenced to ten years' imprisonment in a fortress, but was released by the tsar after serving only two years.
Tà Âgà  kept his journals in English, and wrote, "I am firmly convinced that I am the re-incarnation of Horatio Nelson." In 1906, he was made a Member of the British Order of Merit by King Edward VII.
Tà Âgà  was Chief of the Naval General Staff and was given the title of hakushaku (Count) under the kazoku peerage system. He also served as a member of the Supreme War Council. In 1911, Tà Âgà  returned to England for the first time in over 30 years to attend the coronation of King George V, the Coronation Fleet Review at Portsmouth, to attend naval alumni dinners and visit dockyards on the Clyde and in Newcastle.
In 1913, Admiral Tà Âgà  received the honorific title of Marshal-Admiral, which is roughly equivalent to the rank of Grand Admiral or Admiral of the Fleet in other navies. From 1914 to 1924, Gensui Tà Âgà  was put in charge of the education of Crown Prince Hirohito, the future Shà Âwa Emperor.
Tà Âgà  publicly expressed a dislike and lack of interest for involvement in politics; however, he did make strong statements against the London Naval Treaty.
Tà Âgà  was awarded the Collar of the Supreme Order of the Chrysanthemum in 1926, an honour that was held only by Emperor Hirohito and Prince Kan'in Kotohito at the time; the award made him Japan's most decorated naval officer ever. He added the award to his existing Order of the Golden Kite (1st class) and already existing Order of the Chrysanthemum. His peerage was raised to that of kà Âshaku (marquis) in 1934, a day before his death.
Admiral Tà Âgà  died at 6:35 am on 30 May 1934, of throat cancer at the age of 86. He was accorded a state funeral. The navies of the United Kingdom, United States, Netherlands, France, Italy and China all sent representatives and ships to a naval parade in his honour in Tokyo Bay.
In 1940, Tà Âgà  Jinja was built in Harajuku, Tokyo, as the naval rival to the Nogi Shrine erected in the honour of Imperial Japanese Army General Nogi Maresuke. The idea of elevating him to a Shinto kami had been discussed before his death, and he had been vehemently opposed to the idea. There is another Tà Âgà  shrine at Tsuyazaki, Fukuoka. The statues to him in Japan include one at Ontaku Shrine, in Agano, Saitama and one in front of the memorial battleship Mikasa in Yokosuka.
Tà Âgà Â's son and grandson also served in the Imperial Japanese Navy. His grandson died in combat during the Pacific War on the heavy cruiser at the Battle of Leyte Gulf.
In 1958, Fleet Admiral Chester Nimitz, an admirer of Tà Âgà Â, helped to finance the restoration of the Mikasa, Admiral Tà Âgà Â's flagship during the Russo-Japanese war. In exchange, Japanese craftsmen created the Japanese Garden of Peace, a replica of Marshal-Admiral Tà Âgà Â's garden, at the National Museum of the Pacific War (formerly known as The Nimitz Museum) in Fredericksburg, Texas.
Incorporates information from the corresponding Japanese Wikipedia article
The village of Togo, Saskatchewan, Canada was named in his honor. Until 1992, Pyynikin Brewery in Tampere, Finland produced the Amiraali beer brand, which is popular with the local population and is still available in Japan with a label with the image of Tà Âgà  Heihachirà Â.
Tà Âgà Â's wife was Kaieda Tetsu (1861âÂÂ1934). The couple had two sons; the elder son, Hyà  (1885âÂÂ1969), succeeded his father as the second Marquis Tà Âgà  in 1934 and held the title until the kazoku was abolished in 1947. The younger, Rear-Admiral Tà Âgà  Minoru (1890âÂÂ1962) followed his father into the navy, rising to the rank of rear-admiral and ending his career in 1943 as commander of the naval district in Fukuoka. His elder son Ryà Âichi, who became a naval lieutenant, was killed in action during the Second World War aboard the heavy cruiser Maya. Neither Tà Âgà  Minoru nor Tà Âgà  Ryà Âichi had the same naval 'inclinations' as their famous ancestor; Tà Âgà  Minoru placed 142nd out of 144 cadets in the Naval Academy's 40th Class, while Tà Âgà  Ryà Âichi graduated dead-last (625th out of 625 cadets) in the Naval Academy's 72nd Class.
Tà Âgà  Hyà  married Ohara Haruko (1899âÂÂ1985); the couple had one son, Kazuo (1919âÂÂ1991) and two daughters, Ryà Âko (1917âÂÂ1972) and Momoko (1925âÂÂ). Kazuo married Amano Tamiko and had three daughters, Kikuko (1948âÂÂ), Shoko (1952âÂÂ) and Muneko (1956âÂÂ). As Kazuo and his wife never had sons, to perpetuate the Tà Âgà  name they adopted their son-in-law, Maruyama Yoshio (1942âÂÂ), the husband of Kikuko. Kikuko and Yoshio have two sons; the elder, Yoshihisa (1971âÂÂ), married Niimi Miyuki and has two sons, Ryà «ta (1991âÂÂ) and Masahei (1993âÂÂ).
Minoru married Akazaki Yae, and had three sons and a daughter, Ryà Âichi, Chà «zà Â, Kenzà  and Hisako. Kenzà Â's son, Hiroshige Tà Âgà  is a retired captain (ä¸ÂçÂÂæµ·ä½Â) of JMSDF.
Tà Âgà Â's success in the Russo-Japanese War was seen as a source of inspiration for some Turks. Halide Edip Adñvar, a Turkish journalist and nationalist who was among the founders of modern Turkey, named one of her children Togo.
Tà Âgà  was portrayed by Toshiro Mifune in the 1969 Japanese film The Battle of the Japan Sea (æÂ¥æ¬海大海æ¦), directed by Seiji Maruyama.
In the miniseries Reilly, Ace of Spies, Tà Âgà  is portrayed by Robert Ya Fu Lee.
In the game Civilization VI Togo Heihachiro is portrayed as a great admiral that can be earned and used in naval warfare.
Russo-Japanese War
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