was a Japan

Japan

Japan is an island nation in East Asia. Located in the Pacific Ocean, it lies to the east of the Sea of Japan, China, North Korea, South Korea and Russia, stretching from the Sea of Okhotsk in the north to the East China Sea and Taiwan in the south...

ese samurai

Samurai

is the term for the military nobility of pre-industrial Japan. According to translator William Scott Wilson: "In Chinese, the character 侍 was originally a verb meaning to wait upon or accompany a person in the upper ranks of society, and this is also true of the original term in Japanese, saburau...

 of the Azuchi-Momoyama period

Azuchi-Momoyama period

The came at the end of the Warring States Period in Japan, when the political unification that preceded the establishment of the Tokugawa shogunate took place. It spans the years from approximately 1573 to 1603, during which time Oda Nobunaga and his successor, Toyotomi Hideyoshi, imposed order...

, who served the Oda clan

Oda clan

The was a family of Japanese daimyo who were to become an important political force in the unification of Japan in the mid-16th century. Though they had the climax of their fame under Oda Nobunaga and fell from the spotlight soon after, several branches of the family would continue on as daimyo...

. He ruled Kaganoi Castle. During the Battle of Komaki and Nagakute

Battle of Komaki and Nagakute

The consisted of two battles in 1584 between the forces of Hashiba Hideyoshi and the forces of Oda Nobukatsu and Tokugawa Ieyasu. Hideyoshi and Ieyasu had both served Oda Nobunaga and had not previously come into conflict; this would in fact be their only period of enmity...

, Shigemochi fought under his father Shigemune, who was attached to the forces of Oda Nobukatsu

Oda Nobukatsu

was a Japanese samurai of the Azuchi-Momoyama period. He was the second son of Oda Nobunaga. He survived the decline of the Oda clan from political prominence, becoming a daimyo in the early Edo period.-Kitabatake clan:...

. Soon after, Kaganoi Castle was surrounded by the forces of Toyotomi Hideyoshi

Toyotomi Hideyoshi

was a daimyo warrior, general and politician of the Sengoku period. He unified the political factions of Japan. He succeeded his former liege lord, Oda Nobunaga, and brought an end to the Sengoku period. The period of his rule is often called the Momoyama period, named after Hideyoshi's castle...

; Shigemune surrendered, and Shigemochi was employed by Hideyoshi as a messenger, receiving a stipend of 10,000 koku

Koku

The is a Japanese unit of volume, equal to ten cubic shaku. In this definition, 3.5937 koku equal one cubic metre, i.e. 1 koku is approximately 278.3 litres. The koku was originally defined as a quantity of rice, historically defined as enough rice to feed one person for one year...

. He also possessed a blade made by Muramasa

Muramasa

Muramasa Sengo was a famous swordsmith who founded the Muramasa school and lived during the Muromachi period in Japan...

, which Hideyoshi bestowed on him in 1598.

In the late summer of 1600, Shigemochi was at a drinking party with Mizuno Tadashige

Mizuno Tadashige

was a retainer of the Japanese clan of Tokugawa following the later years of the Azuchi-Momoyama period of the 16th century. Tadashige was the son of Mizuno Tadamasa and the brother of Mizuno Nobumoto....

 and Horio Yoshiharu

Horio Yoshiharu

Horio Yoshiharu was a daimyo in Azuchi-Momoyama period and Edo period.He was appointed to one of three chu-rō by Toyotomi Hideyoshi and the first leader of the Matsue clan.He was also known as Horio Mosuke ....

. Shigemochi killed Tadashige in a drunken rage, and was himself promptly killed by Yoshiharu. This worked to Tokugawa Ieyasu

Tokugawa Ieyasu

 was the founder and first shogun of the Tokugawa shogunate of Japan , which ruled from the Battle of Sekigahara  in 1600 until the Meiji Restoration in 1868. Ieyasu seized power in 1600, received appointment as shogun in 1603, abdicated from office in 1605, but...

's favor, as Shigemochi (whose territory was in the path of Ieyasu's planned march) was close to Ishida Mitsunari. With Shigemochi's death, the Kaganoi family line became extinct.