Events of 30 January
The retreating Shogunal troops were progressively streaming into Osaka Castle.
At Osaka Castle, Tokugawa Yoshinobu gathered his advisors and military leaders to plan strategy and, to boost morale, advised that he would personally take to the field as commander of bakufu forces. That evening however, he slipped away from Osaka Castle accompanied by the daimyō of Aizu and Kuwana to escape back to Edo on the shogunate warship Kaiyō maru.
As Kaiyō maru had not arrived, he took refuge for the night on an American warship, USS Iroquois, anchored in Osaka Bay. The Kaiyō maru arrived the following day.
When the remnants of his forces learned that the Shogun had abandoned them, they departed Osaka Castle, which was later surrendered to Imperial forces without resistance. Yoshinobu later claimed that he had been disturbed by the Imperial approval given to the actions of Satsuma and Chōshū, and, once the brocade banner had appeared, he had lost all will to fight.
French advisors Jules Brunet and Cazeneuve, who were present at the battle, left Osaka and returned to Edo on 12 January, together with Enomoto Takeaki on board the Fujisan. Enomoto brought with him various documents and a treasure of 180,000 ryō. They arrived in Edo on 14 January.
Read more about this topic: Battle Of Toba-Fushimi
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