As far as we know, the only time Musashi ever visited Osaka castle was during summer campaign of 1615, when Tokugawa Ieyasu’s eastern forces attacked western forces led by the house of Toyotomi, who were holding up inside the castle.
The attack came On June 3, Being part of an advance guard of lancers under Mizuno Katsunari’s command, Musashi was one of the first to enter the castle’s Sakura mon, the main eastern gate to the castle, north of which water still filled the castle’s moats. And he was with Katsunari and his son when the latter were the first to plant the Mizuno banner over the gate’s imposing entrance.
After that, it seems, Musashi never again visited Osaka castle, thought he does seem to have visited Osaka again in later years. Thus the Bushū denraiki describes how Musashi was at Osaka when, towards the end of July, 1626, word reached him that Honda Tadatoki (1596–1626, the master of his son, Iori, had passed away after a short illness:
武蔵は、そのころ大坂に居て、この事を聞き、「近日中に造酒之助が来るだろう。生涯の別れに、ご馳走してやろう」とのことである。かくて、しばらくして造酒之助がやって来た。武州は悦びに堪えず、盛大に饗応なさった。
Hearing of his lordship’s death, Musashi, who was then at Osaka, thought “Mikinosuke will presently come and visit me. We will have to part in this life. I’ll treat him to a feast.” And surely after some time Mikinosuke came. Musashi was beside himself with joy and treated his adoptive son to a banquet on a grand scale.
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