Mizuno Tadawake
水野忠分
Mizuno Clan
Bushō
Owari Province
Lifespan: Tenbun 6 (1537) to 12/8 of Tenshō 6 (1579)
Other Names: Tōjirō
Rank: bushō
Clan: Mizuno
Lord: Oda Nobunaga
Father: Mizuno Tadamasa
Siblings: Chikamori, Nobumoto, Nobuchika, Tadamori, Chikanobu, Tadakatsu, Tōsuke, Tadawake, Tadashige, sister (wife of Matsudaira Iehiro), Odai-no-kata (formal wife of Matsudaira Hirotada), sister (wife of Ishikawa Kiyokane), sister (wife of Mizuno Toyonobu), sister (wife of Nakayama Katsutoki), sister (wife of Mizuno Tadamori)
Wife: Younger sister of Saji Nobukata
Children: Wakenaga, Shigenaka, Yoshitada, Matsudaira Katsumasa, daughter (wife of Matsudaira Ietada)
Mizuno Tadawake served as a bushō during the Sengoku and Azuchi-Momoyama periods.
In 1537, Tadawake was born as the eighth son of Mizuno Tadamasa.
During the Tenbun era (1532 to 1555), he is deemed to have built and served as the lord of Futto Castle in Owari Province, but the details are uncertain.
He served under the command of Oda Nobunaga in battles against the Imagawa clan in Owari including the Siege of Muraki Fortress in 1554 and the Battle of Ishigasegawa in 1558.
Other than the fact that he continued to follow Nobunaga, his subsequent movements are unknown except that he did keep a residence below Yamazaki Castle – the base of Sakuma Nobumori. It can also be surmised that, after the murder of his older brother, Mizuno Nobumoto, Tadawake had a residence below Ogawa Castle.
In 1579, Tadawake was killed in action in battle against Araki Murashige, a rebellious retainer of Nobunaga, in an event known as the Siege of Arioka Castle. He was forty-two years old. His grave is at the Kenkon Temple in the town of Higashiura in Aichi Prefecture.
