In the latter half of the nineteenth century the Japanese army medical bureau struggled to prevent beriberi in its ranks. In Japan, traditional medicine effectively treated beriberi, a nutritional deficiency illness, with food therapies. The army medical bureau, in line with western medical practice, viewed the disease as microbial in origin. Army leadership was driven, in part, by a desire to be seen as advanced and civilized by western nations, and demonstrating sound western medical protocols served this purpose. By the mid -1880s unit level medical officers adopted a mixed staple of rice and barley, which was a common food practice in rural households. This modification provided the necessary vitamin B1 in the soldiers' daily diet to prevent the onset of beriberi. The leadership of the army medical bureau allowed this dietary change on an ad hoc basis, but during times of war reinstated the official white rice staple. During wartime the army repeatedly suffered high rates of beriberi.
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In May of 1884 medical officer third class Shigeji Masami cared for 70 beriberi patients from the Osaka garrison military hospital at a rural treatment center in Hyōgo prefecture. The Japanese army medical bureau assumed beriberi to be an infectious disease, so it was common practice to send beriberi patients to the countryside to recuperate and separate them from other patients. Horiuchi Toshikuni (1844–1895), the director of the Osaka garrison military hospital, visited the center to check on the treatment and progress of the patients. He asked Shigeji how he was caring for the men and Shigeji replied that he simply treated his patients’ symptoms. Shigeji then took the opportunity to impart some personal wisdom, he told Horiuchi that some years ago while stationed at the Kumamoto garrison he contracted beriberi, and since then he had eaten barley and rice daily and not suffered a reoccurrence of the illness. According to Shigeji, “Horiuchi listened to my personal experiment and laughed derisively saying mugimeshi (rice and barley) is Toda’s (Toda Chōan (1819-1889), a prominent practitioner of kanpo in the late Edo and early Meiji periods) method of treating beriberi … . We are now a part of the civilized world and we do not use such treatments (ima ya kaimei no yo no naka ni konna ryōhō wo saiyōsuru mono wa nai)” (Shigeji Citation1901: 611).Footnote1 Horiuchi ended his harangue by telling those within earshot that Shigeji was a disciple of Toda Chōan’s (Toda no deshi). This last quip associated Shigeji’s personal findings with kanpō, a system of traditional medicine that most of the leadership of the army medical bureau perceived to be unscientific and irrational.Footnote2
