6-1-1-2Hiroshima and the Sino-Japanese War

"The Hiroshima Provisional Diet Building," a woodblock print depicting the Meiji Emperor’s arrival in Hiroshima during the war　
1894 Courtesy of Hiroshima Central City Library

Hiroshima’s Ujina Port played an important role in the Sino-Japanese War that began in 1894, dispatching soldiers and materials to battlefields in Korea and China. The Imperial Headquarters, the top of the wartime command hierarchy, moved from Tokyo to Hiroshima, as did the Meiji Emperor. A Hiroshima Provisional Diet Building was constructed for the Provisional Imperial Diet that deliberated the cost of the war. Hiroshima took on the appearance of a temporary capital of Japan.