Nagashino 1575: Melted Coin Bullets and the Three-Volley Myth

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In the early summer of 1575 Takeda Katsuyori, son of the feared Takeda Shingen, besieged Nagashino Castle in Tokugawa Ieyasu's Mikawa province with about 15,000 men against some 500 defenders. Ieyasu called on Oda Nobunaga, who arrived with more than 30,000 men. Nobunaga camped at Shitaragahara in a hollow that hid his numbers, built staggered wooden stockades along the river, and sent a flying column of about 4,000 men on a night march that captured the fort guarding the Takeda rear. With his retreat cut off and the enemy apparently small, Katsuyori had little choice but to attack the fences. By 2 p.m. the Takeda had lost about 10,000 men, two-thirds of their force.

The famous story of 3,000 Oda gunners firing in three rotating ranks comes from the Edo-period Shinchōki of the Confucian scholar Oze Hoan and was made official doctrine by the Imperial Japanese Army General Staff in 1903. The contemporary Shinchō Kōki mentions perhaps 1,000 to 1,500 guns spread among five commanders and no rotating volleys, and the Takeda had a similar number. The difference was supply: through the port of Sakai, Nobunaga controlled Portuguese trade in lead and saltpeter, while the landlocked Takeda were under blockade.

• The samurai Torii Sune'emon slipped out to find the relief army, was captured, and shouted to the garrison that help was coming before he was executed.
• Lead isotope analysis shows Oda bullets came from mines in Thailand, South China and Korea.
• Takeda bullets matched the composition of Chinese copper coins, melted down for want of lead.
• Historian Fujita Tatsuo has framed the battle as an early proxy conflict in which the Portuguese backed Nobunaga.
• Veteran Takeda generals Baba Nobuharu, Yamagata Masakage and Naito Masatoyo died, and the clan was destroyed in 1582.