Biographical Study of Odagiri Masunosuke: From Childhood to becoming a Diplomat

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  • 小田切万寿之助の伝記的研究：幼年時代から外交官になるまで
  • オダギリ マスノスケ ノ デンキテキ ケンキュウ ヨウネン ジダイ カラ

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This paper is chiefly a biographical study of Odagiri Masunosuke (小田切万寿之助) aiming to clarify his date and place of birth, and his childhood environment.So far, research on Odagiri has been neglected, especially of his early life which remains a mystery, and different versions of conjectures have been passed around. This paper is result of some first-hand study of data preserved in the Archives of the Ministry of Foreign Affairs (外交史料館) and by the Yonezawa clan (藩). All the data are carefully scrutinized and past conjectures are corrected in this paper. A special contribution of this study is its detailed record of Odagiri’s early life as well as the life of his father, Seitoku. This paper is divided into three major sections. The first section deals with the date and place of birth, while the second section is devoted to the life of Odagiri’s father. Lastly, the third section concerns Odagiri’s childhood and his educational background.Since the lunar calendar was used during early Meiji period, different versions of his birth date exists. In this paper, the author concludes that the correct date should be 25 January, 1868. Similarly, different versions of birth place, such as Niigata, Mie, Yonezawa and Tokyo have been mentioned. As for this argument, Yonezawa is proved to be the correct place. Furthermore, the author also refutes the common belief that his father was a Confucius scholar (儒者), but analyzes that his was actually a Yoita (与板), a middle class Bushi of the Yonezawa clan.Odagiri’s educational background is as follows: he entered the Foreign Language School of Tokyo (東京外國語學校) in May 1882, went on to Peking in September 1884 to further his studies, but due to his father’s sudden death in November 1885, he returned home to inherit his family business. In order to support his family, upon passing the examination of the Ministry of Foreign Affairs, Odagiri entered the foreign service. On 2 March, 1886, he was sent to Tientsin, China on assignment.In this paper, the author suspects that Odagiri’s knowledge of the “Four Books and Five Classics” came under his father’s tutelage. But this will be a research theme of another paper at a later date.

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