Miyanaga Ryozo (宮永良蔵)
Ryozo MIYANAGA (1833 - January 16, 1868) was a Dutch Studies scholar from Fukumitsu-mura, Tonami County, Ecchu Province (present-day Fukumitsu, Nanto City, Toyama Prefecture). He was a son of Tosaku, the fifth son of Masayoshi MIYANAGA, the Yamamawari-yaku (a forestry official) of Shimokawasaki-mura (present-day Shimokawasaki, Oyabe City, Toyama Prefecture). He was a great grandson of agriculturist Shoun MIYANAGA. His childhood name was Ryunosuke. His popular name was Ryozo.
His father, Tosaku, was adopted by Tokai ARISAWA, who was a physician in Fukumitsu-mura at the time, and Tosaku had taken over as a physician in Fukumitsubashi Kitazume. However, he passed away when Ryozo was 14 years old. At the time, his father's family, the Miyanaga family in Shimokawasaki-mura, was upon bad times, so he and his mother were taken in and cared for by her relative Kihei ISHISAKI, the Kimoiri-yaku (the headman of a village) in Fukumitsu-mura village, and he was raised there.
In 1850, at the age of 18, he aspired to study medicine, studied Western learning in Nagasaki, and he became a disciple of a reputable doctor, Tsunoyama, in Kyoto. He studied vaccination, which was the front line of research at the time, and he forged a friendship with Koan OGATA, a Dutch studies scholar at Osaka Tekijuku. He opened his medical office at Kamidachiu-sagaru, Chion-in, Kyoto. Through a connection via an aunt on his mother's side, he used to visit Minister Kinito TOKUDAIJI as his attending physician, and because Minister Kinito TOKUDAIJI was a pro-Imperialist kuge (court noble), Ryozo began to lean toward Sonno Joi (reverence for the Emperor and the expulsion of foreigners). At the Kinmon Incident in July of 1864, he rendered his service to the Choshu clan by communicating information. Furthermore, he joined the conspiracy when he heard that Buddhist monk Gyokuei, an uncle on Ryozo's mother's side and a monk in charge of a subsidiary temple of Hongan-ji Temple in Buzen Province, was in Kyoto and was involved in the movement to revere the Emperor.
In December of 1867, on his way to a patient's house, he was arrested by Shinsengumi on suspicion of participating in the scheme to overthrow the shogunate, and he was confined to Rokkaku prison house at Nishihongan-ji Temple, which the Shinsengumi used as its headquarters. Even though he was tortured he never spoke, and he was released few days later. However, his body had weakened because of the severe torturing, and he died on December 22, at the age of 35. His grave is located in Ryozen cemetery in Higashiyama Ward, Kyoto City.
He was given the rank of Jugoi (Junior Fifth Rank) by Emperor Meiji's special imperial order. In November 1918, a memorial was erected in Shimokawasaki-mura in order to pass down Ryozo MIYAGAWA's achievement to posterity.
The words on the memorial read 'Monument Commemorating the Awarding of Jugoi to Miyanaga Ryozo, Inscribed by Shonii Kunsanto (third class Senior Second Rank) Viscount Mimurodo Masamitsu.'
Ryozo's farewell poem was, 'I dedicate my life to my great master from the day I serve him.'