Kimura Yoshikiyo (木村吉清)
Yoshikiyo KIMURA (year of birth unknown - 1598) was a busho (Japanese military commander) in the Sengoku and Azuchi-Momoyama Periods. Ise no kami (Governor of Ise Province). Kosei.
Brief Personal History
A vassal of Mitsuhide AKECHI. He first served Murashige ARAKI but somewhere along the line he became a vassal of Mitsuhide. He was picked up by Hideyoshi TOYOTOMI after the Battle of Yamasaki. A theory says that Omandokoro (Mother of the chief Adviser to the Emperor) liked him and took him up because he handled the situation very well at the time of the receipt of Kameyama-jo Castle. His Kokudaka (a system for determining land value for tribute purposes in the Edo period) was 5,000 koku. Since he was a great bugyo (magistrate) of Taiko kenchi (Hideyoshi Toyotomi's nationwide land survey) and his son Kiyohisa KIMURA acted as a close aide to Hideyoshi, he is often regarded as a civil officer. However, he defeated the enemy army at the battles in Nabuchi and other places during Oshu-shioki (repression of the Oshu District) in 1590, and successfully took the head of Daisho (Major Captain). Due to this distinguished war service, he was rewarded about 300,000 koku in the 12 districts of former territories of the Osaki clan and Kasai clan (present northern part of Miyagi Prefecture and southern part of Iwate Prefecture). However, an uprising occurred in the territory due to such reasons as severe collection of nengu (land tax) by implementing land survey, failing to use jizamurai (local samurai) of former Osaki and Kasai clan as vassals, adopted Sword Hunt against those jizamurai, and Yoshikiyo's vassals who were originally ronin (masterless samurai), ashigaru (common foot soldier) or chugen (a rank below common soldier) repeatedly acted violence and assault to the people of the domain (the Kasai-Osaki-ikki (the revolt of the former retainers of the Kasai clan and the Osaki clan). Yoshikiyo was forced to leave his residence, the Teraike-jo Castle, by the people joining the ikki and barricaded himself into the Sanuma-jo Castle. Other castles in the territory also fell due to the forces of the ikki, which led Yoshikiyo being locked up in the Sanuma-jo Castle along with his son Kiyohisa KIMURA. Soon Ujisato GAMO and Masamune DATE came to support them and made the force of ikki withdraw, then finally Yoshikiyo and his son could get out of the hole. However, his territory was confiscated to take his responsibility for the uprising.
Later Yoshikiyo became a guest shogun of Ujisato GAMO and was granted 50,000 koku in Shinobu-gun (present Fukushima City) in 1592.
Yoshikiyo moved his resident castle from Omori-jo Castle to Fukushima-jo Castle, and renamed Suginome to 'Fukushima.'
This means that Yoshikiyo named the present Fukushima Prefecture. In 1598 when the Gamo clan was transferred to Utsunomiya domain, Yoshikiyo parted ways with the Gamo clan and was newly granted 15,000 koku in Bungo Province and became daimyo (Japanese feudal lord) again; however, he died in the same year.