First Lord of the Yonezawa Domain

Uesugi Kagekatsu

上杉景勝

1556 – 1623

He entered the Uesugi family of Echigo as the adopted son of Uesugi Kenshin, and after Kenshin's death he won the succession struggle known as the Otate no Ran and took over as head of the clan. Together with his chief retainer Naoe Kanetsugu he reunified Echigo, submitted to Toyotomi Hideyoshi, established a domain that included Sado and Shōnai, and was named one of the Five Great Elders before being transferred to a 1.2-million-koku domain at Aizu. After Hideyoshi's death he came into conflict with Tokugawa Ieyasu, an episode that helped trigger the 1600 punitive expedition against Aizu and the Battle of Sekigahara, and fought the Mogami and Date clans in the Battle of Dewa. After the Western army's defeat at Sekigahara he submitted to Ieyasu and was drastically reduced to a 300,000-koku domain at Yonezawa, but kept his retainers together and preserved the Yonezawa domain.

Sources　米沢市「米沢の歴史」／米沢市教育委員会文化財年報／米沢市「上杉鷹山の歴史」