Humble beginnings, Japan’s First Two War Medals

[Nick Komiya]

I’ve just written about Japan’s last medals of the war, so let’s change the scenery and take you back to the origins, a short piece about the first two war medals in Japan’s history.
It was the normal practice to launch a new war medal or commemorative medal as an order, so each medal has a corresponding order establishing it, such as the Greater East Asia War Medal Order, etc. However, the first war medal was established as a “me too” item, like a pack of chewing gum you pick up incidentally at the super market cashier on your way out. The main business of that day was to launch the various grades of the Rising Sun Order and the war medal was stuck on the end unceremoniously, simply with the heading, “war medal”. The original document that launched the war medal was done as an elaborate full color wood block print, so reproducing the original drawing of the medal here would only show a solid black disc. Luckily the army also made a line drawing of it, as they couldn’t use such extravagant means to announce the medal internally. Here it is.

[Nick Komiya]

The obverse has Kanji saying “war medal” and the rear shows where the year of the campaign would be shown. It was not specifically designed for the Taiwan campaign, but all war medals hence forth were to be identical in design. Japan had prepared a detailed study of the British Army and Navy’s traditions for decorations and it appears they simply borrowed the idea without much thinking. The 1874 War Medal that followed this formula came in a wooden case without even a recess to hold the medal in place and the ribbon was without the eyelet and hook provision that all later medals had that facilitated wear as medal bars. While the artisan Hikoshiro Hirata hand crafted all the early Rising Sun Orders as pieces of art, cutting each out with a chisel, the 1874 War Medal was an unpretentious trinket rattling in a box. It was still early days and the Japanese didn’t know yet how to add those fancy water patterns to the ribbons until in 1881 a Seikichi Sugimura finally succeeded in copying the European process. The unwatered ribbons furthermore had a linen core and were stiff to the touch.

[Nick Komiya]

Of the roughly 3700 people who comprised the strike force against Taiwan a total of 2638 individuals received the medal, 2352 for army personnel and 286 for the navy. Among them were three Americans who were hired by the Japanese government as advisors. From the US Navy a Lt. Commander Douglas Kassel was there, who almost died of a fever he contracted in Taiwan. Despite the temporary recovery, the disease did catch up with him again after his return to the USA and he died in Pennsylvania on June 15th 1875. Another American was a James Earl Watson a major who had been working for the foreign office at that time. A fairly detailed CV of the three is filed in the national archives, because the Japanese government considered awarding them with orders. Douglas Kassel was passed over, due to his early death, but Watson was recommended for a Rising Sun 4th class, and although the records do not specifically mention it, he would have received the Taiwan Campaign Medal as well.
Anyway after launching Japan’s first war medal in this somewhat casual manner, Japan had 20 years till the next victory in the Sino-Japanese War to reflect upon the significance of campaign medals and when it was time to establish the 1894-1895 War Medal, the army couldn’t help making their own suggestions to the Awards Bureau. It is fortunate that the army didn’t have too much of a say in the actual design, as their design ideas lack elegance. Despite not having the artistic touch to execute it as an appealing design, one can see that they had put some serious thought into the basic 3 principles of the symbolism behind the medal designs, which did seem to make a lot of sense to the Awards Bureau as well as they made it into the final design.
The 3 principles as the army saw it were,
1. “Material should be iron recycled from captured enemy equipment. Though the Taiwan campaign medal was in silver a symbol of having served in a campaign ought to be bold and Spartan, avoiding delicate and elaborate designs. We therefore wish to borrow a feather from the German practice in the 1870 Franco-Prussian War” The German Iron Cross had been the inspiration.
2. Though the Taiwan Medal had dates and a fair amount of writing on them, only two kanji characters should adorn the medal reading “Seishin” (Subjugation of the Shin Dynasty)
3. The ribbon design to be carried over from the Taiwan medal. However, dimensions should be adjusted to suit the design and the suspension ring should resemble that of the orders. Initially when the army prototyped some of their designs they considered various ribbon colors to match the design, but having remembered that a good array of colors already were employed in the ribbons of orders, they saw an advantage in sticking to the same ribbon design for all campaign medals, so they can be recognized as war medals at a glance.
Of the above 3 points point 2 was not accepted by the Awards Bureau, but the other 2 points were pretty much respected in the final design. Ribbon colors were carried over another further generation, the Boxer Rebellion Medal until they dropped the idea in the Russo-Japanese War Medal design.
Here is the final design that was realized.

[Nick Komiya]

Finally, here are the designs that the army had proposed.
Option 1: Uses the regimental flag as motif. The white parts to be raised and black to be recessed
Option 2: Cherry blossom as a base with the army star and navy anchor

[Nick Komiya]

Option 3: Inspired by the Rising Sun
Option 4: Inspired by the Cherry Blossom and Sun

[Nick Komiya]

Option 5: Inspired by the Rising Sun whose rays form the chrysanthemum
Option 6: Inspired by the 2nd Class Rising Sun Order

[Nick Komiya]

Option 7: Stylized form of the kanji for Sun, the second alternative combines this with option 6
Option 8: “Proposal for the suspension borrowed from the order designs. The design employed in the Taiwan medal was too busy. This part should have a consistent design regardless of the medal”

[Nick Komiya]

The archives is littered with material like this and when you make these discoveries one after the other it becomes the unstoppable bag of potato chips I mentioned. Incidentally I found out that the gold version of the constitution medal made for members of the royal family only had a production run of 10 medals and I can therefore write it off my wants list as a Mission Impossible, but that's another story.
Hopefully you made some discoveries today that gives you insight that is not available elsewhere. With that said my writing spree has now run its full course and I can resume regular programming, Good Night from the Iron Cross plantation.

[JapanX]

Cool info Nick!
Special thanks for prototypes.
Boxed Formoza! IMPRESSIVE!

So the medals with ribbons supplied with eyelet and hook - are they late replacement ribbons or upgraded original ones? What do you think?

I think they actually used (slightly modified it first) option 3 design for unofficial medal/order for 1895 war.

Could you please post better pictures of obverse, reverse and bar of the medal.

Thanks again. It was a real pleasure.

P.S.

Good Night from the Iron Cross plantation.

Still very poetic

[JapanX]

Incidentally I found out that the gold version of the constitution medal made for members of the royal family only had a production run of 10 medals and I can therefore write it off my wants list as a Mission Impossible, but that's another story.

10

Easy does it Nick

Keep yourself alive for long enough and one day in 3011 AD...

That will be the day!

P.S. According to my information only princes of royal blood were eligible for gold medals...
So 10 is a crowd

[Rommel1933]

Another great post! Thank you for the extremely well done informative email! Thank you, scott

[Paul G]

Thanks again Nick for another great thread

PG-

[Papa Nambu]

Very interesting reading. I've been collecting Japanese items since the 80s but I've only just recently gotten into medals.

[Nick Komiya]

I got some homework as expected, so I'll get that off my desk. Here the extra photos requested

[Nick Komiya]

The Taiwan Bar