Tokugawa Iesato was born to the Tayasu branch of the Tokugawa clan, under the name Kamenosuke, he became its 16th head, following the resignation of the last Shogun, Tokugawa Yoshinobu. His brothers were Tokugawa Satotaka and Tokugawa Takachiyo, who also held the Tayasu headship at different times. Iesato was also briefly the daimyō of the short-lived Shizuoka Domain, before the abolition of the han system in the early 1870s. Though he was Yoshinobu's adopted son, his guardian at the time was Matsudaira Naritami, the former lord of the Tsuyama Domain.he was a adopted son of fourteenth shogun,Tokugawa Iemochi and his wife,kazu no Miya or Seikan'in no Miya