Tachikawa Was Once in Kanagawa: A History Walk to the 1893 Transfer

Sunagawa for, Tachikawa’s headman against: two documents from February 1893

On receiving the two governors’ petitions, the government submitted a bill changing the prefectural boundaries to the 4th Imperial Diet. According to the Archives’ report, once the bill was introduced, the people of Tama split into supporters and opponents and campaigned fiercely.

Tachikawa Monogatari found the names of Tachikawa’s two villages in that campaign.

On 23 February 1893 (Meiji 26), a statement supporting the transfer was submitted. On it were the names of 21 “representatives of the volunteers of the three districts,” speaking for 1,600 people of the Three Tama. At the head of the list was Sunagawa Gen’emon of Sunagawa village, a former head of Kitatama District. The newsletter writes that many villages in Kitatama came out in favour because the Kobu Railway had deepened their transport and trade ties with Tokyo.

The next day, 24 February, a petition opposing the transfer was submitted. A fierce opposition movement arose, centred on the Minamitama Liberal Party, and the petition was signed by every town and village headman in Minamitama and Nishitama districts, plus five headmen from Kitatama. Among those five from Kitatama was the headman of Tachikawa village, Inoue Zenjiro.

Two documents, a day apart, saying opposite things. At the head of the “yes” list, a man from Sunagawa village. Among the “no” signatures, the headman of Tachikawa village.

When I read that line, I could not take my eyes off the page for a while. Today’s Tachikawa City was formed in 1963 (Showa 38), when Tachikawa City and the town of Sunagawa merged. So in February 1893, the two villages that would one day become one city stood, quite literally, on opposite sides of the question of going to Tokyo or staying in Kanagawa. The merger came seventy years later. Seventy years is long enough for most quarrels to pass their statute of limitations.

Why did Tachikawa’s headman oppose it? The newsletter does not record each headman’s individual reasons. He was one of just five who wrote their names on the “no” side while most of Kitatama came out in favour. What lay behind that, I still do not know.

What is certain is that opposition was stronger to the west and south of Kitatama. The Archives’ exhibition presents an official document secretly reporting on the activities of the opposition in Nishitama just before the transfer, under the title “Report and notice on the disquieting situation in Nishitama District, Kanagawa Prefecture.” A disquieting situation. Quite an ominous title. The encyclopedia’s Tama entry writes that the core of the opposition at the time of the transfer was the Santama Soshidan, the young activist corps known as the Liberal Party’s action squad.

Traces of that heat survive on the Tachikawa side too. Tachikawa Monogatari shows a photograph of a document from the Nakajima family, who served as headmen of Shibasaki village: material for a public speech meeting titled “The Three Tama Districts Boundary Change Incident.” People of the time called a change of prefecture an “incident.” The government papers say “boundary change”; the speech-meeting flyer says “incident.” The same event, called by quite different names depending on where you stand.

After ten days of debate, the bill passed by a majority. On 1 April 1893, the three Tama districts, West, South and North, became part of Tokyo Prefecture. The Archives’ report writes that in Tama, which had been so torn over the question, confusion continued for some time after the transfer.

Kanagawa’s Tachikawa in numbers

• 21 — Years (and about four months) that Tachikawa was in Kanagawa. Long enough for a baby born then to reach Japan’s coming-of-age ceremony.
• 7 — Tenths: the share of the Tamagawa Aqueduct channel, from Hamura to Yotsuya Okido, that ran through Kanagawa. The source of Tokyo’s taps was mostly in another prefecture.
• 2 — Years, roughly, that boats floated on the Tamagawa Aqueduct. Started in 1870, stopped in 1872 at Tokyo’s request. Sunagawa people ran boats too.
• 1 — Year and seven months: how long Tokyo Governor Tomita Tetsunosuke had earlier lasted as Governor of the Bank of Japan. His stubbornness was the genuine article.
• 10 — Days the 4th Imperial Diet spent debating the transfer bill. Twenty-one years of belonging, settled in ten days.
• 1,920 — Tachikawa village’s population in 1889, the year the station opened. In front of today’s station, that’s about one change of the traffic lights.

The documents for and against were submitted, the bill passed, and Tachikawa became Tachikawa village, Kitatama District, Tokyo Prefecture. But the story does not end there. Once it was part of Tokyo, Tama entered an era in which it might be cut away from Tokyo again.

After becoming Tokyo: water at Yodobashi, and the plan for a “Tama Prefecture”

On 1 December 1898 (Meiji 31), five years after the transfer, Tokyo’s modern waterworks came to life: the Yodobashi Water Purification Plant in Shinjuku began supplying water. According to an encyclopedia, its raw water was drawn from the Tamagawa Aqueduct. Water taken in at Hamura and carried across the plateau north of Tachikawa was filtered at Yodobashi and distributed through iron pipes to the streets of Tokyo. That day was later designated “Tokyo Waterworks Day.”

From source to purification plant, everything now lay within a single prefecture. What Tokyo had been asking for since 1873 had finally taken shape.

But that did not make the bond between Tama and Tokyo secure. According to the Archives’ report, during the fifty years from the transfer to the creation of Tokyo Metropolis in 1943 (Showa 18), various plans were drawn up for how the capital should be governed. And those plans often proposed separating the Tama area from Tokyo.

The encyclopedia’s Tama entry writes that in 1895 (Meiji 28), the Home Ministry put forward a “Bill for a Tokyo Metropolitan System and the Establishment of Tama Prefecture.” The idea was to split Tama off from Tokyo Prefecture and make a prefecture of the three Tama districts alone, with its prefectural office expected to be in Hachioji. The bill did not pass, in the face of opposition from the Imperial Diet and the citizens of Tokyo City. Separately, there was also a plan to create a “Musashi Prefecture” from the rural districts of Tokyo Prefecture outside Tokyo City’s 15 wards. The Archives’ exhibition displayed a “Draft Bill for the Establishment of Musashi Prefecture,” held by the National Archives of Japan.

If Tama Prefecture had come about, I can’t help thinking, Tachikawa would have become “Tachikawa town, Kitatama District, Tama Prefecture,” and might have had to deliver its paperwork to the prefectural capital in Hachioji. Considering the relationship between Tachikawa and Hachioji today, it is a rather delicious thought.

In the end, in July 1943 (Showa 18), the Tokyo Metropolitan system came into force, Tokyo Prefecture and Tokyo City were abolished, and Tokyo Metropolis was born. Tachikawa town had already become Tachikawa City in December 1940 (Showa 15), so at this point Tachikawa became “Tachikawa City, Tokyo Metropolis.” Counting from Shibasaki village, Kitatama District, Kanagawa Prefecture, how many titles had it changed? Counting Nirayama Prefecture too, its allegiance changed three times: Nirayama, Kanagawa, Tokyo.

The titles changed. So did those twenty-one years in Kanagawa leave nothing behind in today’s Tachikawa?

Thin threads to Kanagawa in today’s daily life

To be honest, it is hard to point to anything in the streets that the 1893 transfer directly left behind. There is no boundary stone standing anywhere. Still, a few thin threads continue to connect this town and Kanagawa.

One is the railway. The JR Nambu Line, which starts at Tachikawa Station, links Kawasaki Station in Kawasaki, Kanagawa, with Tachikawa Station in Tachikawa, Tokyo. The Nambu Railway reached Tachikawa in 1929 (Showa 4), 36 years after the transfer, so it has nothing to do with the Meiji boundary. But board a train at Tachikawa that crosses the Tama River heading south, and you enter land that was once in the same prefecture, now as “out of prefecture.”

The second is the telephone. Many areas in Tama use the area code “042,” and according to an encyclopedia, most of Sagamihara City in Kanagawa is in 042 too. This is a matter of telephone zoning from the Heisei era, not a relic of the Meiji boundary. Still, it is a small pleasure that a call from a Tachikawa home to Sagamihara starts with the same 042.

The third is anniversaries. In 1993 (Heisei 5), to mark the 100th anniversary of Tama’s transfer to Tokyo, “TAMA Life 21,” organised by citizens, universities and companies together with the municipalities and Tokyo Metropolis, ran from 25 April to 7 November. And in 2023 (Reiwa 5), for the 130th anniversary, the Administration Department of the Tokyo Metropolitan Government’s Bureau of General Affairs held an event called “Cho Tamaran Haku.” The venue was Tachikawa. Two days, 28 and 29 October. The Tokyo Metropolitan Archives reports that it brought a panel display and a jigsaw puzzle in which you assemble the changing administrative boundaries of Tama.

“Cho Tamaran Haku.” A pun: tamaran means something like “irresistible, too good to bear,” and it contains “Tama”; haku means expo. So, roughly, “the Super-Irresistible Tama Expo.” This name is printed, with a perfectly straight face, in a government report. I don’t dislike it at all. An event people called an “incident” 130 years ago is now celebrated with a pun-titled expo. Time has, it seems, moved on.

The Archives’ themed exhibition the same year, “Tama and Tokyo as Seen in Tokyo Prefecture Documents,” drew about 1,700 visitors, roughly 80 percent of whom lived in the Tama area. Among the written comments, one said the account of how the Three Tama were moved from Kanagawa to Tokyo was easy to understand. The people of Tama themselves were coming to learn, all over again, that their land had once been Kanagawa.

There is one more thread, on a map. Tachikawa Monogatari introduces a sketch map, drawn in 1896 (Meiji 29), of the “Miyao Railway,” a line planned to link Omiya and Hachioji that never came to be. Its promoters included Sunagawa Gen’emon of Sunagawa village and Nakajima Jirobei of Tachikawa village. The man who headed the statement in favour of the transfer and a man from the family of Shibasaki’s village headmen were, three years after the transfer, dreaming of the same railway. On the map, the pre-transfer prefectural boundary survives as a black dashed line. And the newsletter notes that the map also shows how “Tachikaha” Station (written in the old spelling), where the railways converge, sat at the point linking the West, North and South Tama districts with Tokyo.

The station born as a Kanagawa village’s station became, after it moved to Tokyo, the knot that tied the three parts of Tama together. Having come this far, I finally felt I could answer the question I started with.

Water pulled toward Tokyo, and the railway pushed

Why did Tachikawa move from Kanagawa to Tokyo?

From Tokyo Prefecture’s point of view, the answer was water. The source of the capital’s drinking water lay in another prefecture. Boats floated on it, filth got in, cholera spread, and the forests that were supposed to be protected were cut down. Turned down in 1873 and again in 1886, Tokyo kept asking, and the felling of the forest in 1891 gave it the final push.

From Kanagawa’s point of view, the answer may have been politics. Hand a formidable opponent, the Liberal Party of Minamitama, over to the neighbours along with the water business. That is not written in any official document; it survives in the form of “it is said.”

And from Tachikawa’s point of view, the answer was the railway. Many villages in Kitatama came out in favour because the Kobu Railway had deepened their ties with Tokyo, the city-history newsletter writes. A village that had a station was no longer facing the port to the south; it was beginning to face the capital to the east. Even so, Tachikawa’s headman wrote his name on the side of opposition. The land may change the way it faces, but people’s feelings do not change in a day.

Water pulled toward Tokyo, and the railway pushed toward Tokyo. Between those two forces, Sunagawa said yes and Tachikawa’s headman said no.

Stand on the deck at Tachikawa Station today and you see tracks running south across the Tama River toward Kanagawa, the Chuo Line running east to central Tokyo, and lines heading west and north toward Ome and Hachioji, with the monorail gliding off to northern Tama. The knot that the Meiji newsletter wrote as “Tachikaha” is still a knot.

Tachikawa was in Kanagawa. And with the station born in those Kanagawa years as its axis, it became the centre of Tokyo’s west. Probably not many Tachikawa people know things happened in that order. Which is exactly why you’ll want to tell them.

Quiz answer

The answer is B. According to vol. 16 of the city-history newsletter Tachikawa Monogatari, the village was renamed from Shibasaki “to avoid confusion with Shibasaki village (today’s Chofu City) in the same Kitatama District.” Two villages with the same name in the same district would have been a headache for the district office and the post. The reason for dropping a name centuries old turned out to be surprisingly practical.

Before you go

• To see Tachikawa’s Kanagawa years in documents: Tachikawa City Museum of History and Folklore (立川市歴史民俗資料館), 3-12-34 Fujimi-cho, Tachikawa, Tokyo. Opened 1 December 1985 (Showa 60). According to the city, it is open 9:00–16:30 and closed on Mondays (or the following day if Monday is a public holiday or substitute holiday) and over the New Year period. Please check the latest on the official page: https://www.city.tachikawa.lg.jp/shisetsu/1008065/1008098.html (Japanese)
• Route: The city’s walking course “Old Villages” starts at the South Exit of JR Tachikawa Station and visits Suwa Shrine, which stood at the centre of old Shibasaki (Tachikawa) village, the gate of the Nakajima family residence, Fusai-ji Temple, the Yamanaka-zaka Jizo Hall and the Museum of History and Folklore. The gate of the Nakajima family, Shibasaki’s village headmen, is on this route: https://www.city.tachikawa.lg.jp/kanko/bunka/1004244/1004848/1004889.html (Japanese). The Nakajima gate stands at the family’s residence (yashiki), so admire it from the road; at the shrine and temple, walk quietly and follow posted rules.
• To learn from the official documents on the transfer: Tokyo Metropolitan Archives, 2-2-21 Izumi-cho, Kokubunji, Tokyo. About 8 minutes’ walk from Nishi-Kokubunji Station on the JR Chuo and Musashino lines, according to the Archives. Check exhibitions and opening days on the official site: https://www.soumu.metro.tokyo.lg.jp/01soumu/archives/
• To combine with: The Tamagawa Aqueduct, the reason for the whole transfer, flows north of Tachikawa along the Itsukaichi Kaido road in Sunagawa (the route walked in this series’ Tamagawa Aqueduct and Sunagawa story). Fusai-ji and Suwa Shrine, the old centre of Shibasaki village, are on the same walking course as the museum.
• To check the timeline: Tachikawa City, “History of Tachikawa (1800s to 1924)”: https://www.city.tachikawa.lg.jp/shisei/gaiyo/1005930/1005948/1005963.html (Japanese)
• Getting there: From Shinjuku, take the JR Chuo Line west to Tachikawa. From Kawasaki, the JR Nambu Line runs all the way to Tachikawa. Carry an IC card such as Suica or PASMO, and check each official site for opening days before you go.

From a Kanagawa station to the North Exit

In Meiji times, Tachikawa Station had an entrance only on the north side. That North Exit, opened as the station of a Kanagawa village, is still Tachikawa’s front door.

A one-minute walk from the North Exit of JR Tachikawa Station, on the 3rd floor of the Etoile Building at 2-14-10 Akebono-cho, Tachikawa, is On the Shore Tachikawa (オンザショア立川店), a lava-stone hot yoga studio where you practise hot yoga in a room laid with lava-stone plates. There is also room-temperature yoga, Pilates, women-only kickboxercise, boxercise, HIIT and personal training, with more than 25 kinds of yoga lessons.

It is open every day, 8:00 to 23:30, with no difference by day of the week. You have plenty of time to pore over old maps at the museum and still come back.

A trial yoga lesson costs ¥1,980 (tax included), with two bath towels, one face towel and a mat rental included, so you can drop in empty-handed on your walk. Pregnant guests cannot join lava-stone hot yoga, but room-temperature maternity yoga is available. Many of our yoga instructors speak English, and the studio’s owner, Naomi Fujita, who holds Japan’s top English qualification (Eiken Grade 1) and a perfect TOEIC score and once worked as a translator and overseas interpreter at Nomura Securities, and who lived in Alaska for three years, often helps guests from the US bases in English herself (visitors from abroad have even left Google reviews about the care they received in English); if you would like an English-friendly lesson, just say so when you book.

• Studio website: https://ontheshore.jp/
• Book a trial lesson: https://site.locaop.jp/C0aVK?_src=hp

More than 130 years since the day the border moved. In the crowds of the North Exit, the only people who know this was once Kanagawa are probably me, today, and you, having read this.

Cover photo: The intake weir at Hamura, where Tama River water is drawn into the Tamagawa Aqueduct (Photo: sewmew / Public domain / Wikimedia Commons)

Information as of October 2026.

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