, real name , was the commanding officer of the Sekihōtai

Sekihotai

The was a group of Japanese political extremists in the Bakumatsu, the Japanese civil war in the 1860s. The term also refers to the 1980s group. A reporter, Tomohiro Kojiri, was killed and another was injured when a gunman used a shotgun and fired at the Hanshin Bureau of the Asahi Shimbun in...

. After the battle of Toba and Fushimi, in 1868, it constitutes a civilian squad made principally of farmers and merchants.
The group promised a reduction in taxes to the people who supported it; when Sagara was asked to return to the headquarters by the Meiji forces, Sagara decided not to because he believed it would be too soon. As a result the Meiji forces turned on the group, and Sagara, along with seven more leaders, was executed.

Sagara is portrayed in the manga

Manga

Manga is the Japanese word for "comics" and consists of comics and print cartoons . In the West, the term "manga" has been appropriated to refer specifically to comics created in Japan, or by Japanese authors, in the Japanese language and conforming to the style developed in Japan in the late 19th...

 and anime

Anime

is the Japanese abbreviated pronunciation of "animation". The definition sometimes changes depending on the context. In English-speaking countries, the term most commonly refers to Japanese animated cartoons....

 series Rurouni Kenshin

Rurouni Kenshin

, also known as Rurouni Kenshin and Samurai X, is a Japanese manga series written and illustrated by Nobuhiro Watsuki. The fictional setting takes place during the early Meiji period in Japan. The story is about a fictional assassin named Himura Kenshin, from the Bakumatsu who becomes a wanderer to...

, where he is the mentor of Sagara Sanosuke

Sagara Sanosuke

is a fictional character from the Rurouni Kenshin manga and anime series created by Nobuhiro Watsuki. He is known as Sanosuke Sagara in the English adaptation of the anime and is nicknamed Sano...

, a fictional character.