Satsuma Rebellion

February 11, 1877

Samurai in southern Japan, angry at the loss of their privileges and rice stipends, rose under Saigo Takamori, one of the architects of the Meiji Restoration. The new conscript army crushed them after eight months of brutal fighting. Saigo, wounded, had a retainer cut off his head. The samurai era ended on a hillside outside Kagoshima.