Matsumoto Jun 松本順 |
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Portrait of Matsumoto Jun
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Born |
Edo, Japan |
July 13, 1832
Died | March 12, 1907 Oiso, Kanagawa, Japan |
(aged 74)
Nationality | Japanese |
Matsumoto Jun (松本 順?) (also known as Matsumoto Ryōjun 松本 良順) (July 13, 1832 – March 12, 1907) was a Japanese physician who served as the personal physician to the last Shogun, Tokugawa Yoshinobu. He also studied photography with J. L. C. Pompe van Meerdervoort (1829–1908), though he was somewhat unimpressed with his instructor's skills, once describing the result of one of Pompe van Meerdervoort's photographic experiments as "a meagre black shadow". Foreign Minister Hayashi Tadasu was his brother.
Matsumoto was born as the son of the domain physician of Sakura Domain, at the clan's Azabu residence in Edo. He was sent to Nagasaki in 1857 to study rangaku, during which time he studied both western medicine and photography. When Swiss photographer Pierre Rossier arrived in Japan in 1859, Matsumoto ordered Maeda Genzō to assist Rossier. Maeda subsequently became a pioneering Japanese photographer. Another link between Matsumoto and photography dates from some point between 1857 and 1859 when he adopted the 13-year-old future photographer Uchida Kuichi.
Matsumoto helped the Aizu Domain modernize its medical practices, and in 1868 moved to Kyoto to assist Aizu daimyo Matsudaira Katamori during the latter's tenure as Kyoto Shugoshoku. The situation in Kyoto was very unsettled, and Matsumoto befriended Shinsengumi leader Kondo Isami and rendered medical assistance to them. During the Second Chōshū expedition of 1866, he served as personal physician to the 14th Shogun, Tokugawa Iemochi.