Hiroshima Bombing Accounts
HIROSHIMA_WITNESS_No.1-1
The first atomic bomb actually used in war time was dropped
on Hiroshima on August 6, 1945 killing 130,000 to 150,000 people
by the end of the year. Those who survived the bombing are
rapidly aging now at struggling for many years. The Hiroshima
Peace and Culture Foundation has decided the new video tape, the
testimony of 108 bomb victims to commemorate the International
Peace Year 1986 to record the precious experiences of these
survivors to be handed down to the future generations.
Mr. Hiroshi Sawachika was 28 years old when the bomb was
dropped. He was an army doctor stationed at the army
headquarters in Ujina. When he was exposed, he was inside the
building at the headquarters, 4.1 km from the hypocenter. Being
rather far from the hypocenter, he was not seriously injured.
Afterwards, he was very busy getting medical treatment to the
survivors.
MR. SAWACHIKA : I was in my office. I had just entered the room
and said "Good morning." to colleagues and I was about to
approach my desk when outside it suddenly turned bright red. I
felt very hot on my cheeks. Being the chief of the room, I
shouted to the young men and women in the room that they should
evacuate. As soon as I cried, I felt weightless as if I were an
astronaut. I was then unconscious for 20 or 30 seconds. When I
came to, I realized that everybody including myself was lying at
one side of the room. Nobody was standing. The desks and chairs
had also blown off to one side. At the windows, there was no
window glass and the window frames had been blown out as well. I
went to the windows to find out where the bombing had taken
place. And I saw the mushroom cloud over the gas company. The
sound and shock somehow suggested that the bomb had been dropped
right over the gas company. I still had no idea what had
happened. And I kept looking towards the gas company. After a
while, I realized that my white shirt was red all over. I
thought it was funny because I was not injured at all. I looked
around and then realized that the girl lying near by was heavily
injured, with lots of broken glass stuck all over her body. Her
blood had splashed and made stains on my shirt. In a few
minutes, I heard my name called. I was told to go to the
headquarters where there were lots of injured persons waiting. I
went there and I started to give treatment with the help of
nurses and medical course men. We first treated the office
personnel for their injuries. Most of them had broken glass and
pieces of wood stuck into them. We treated them one after
another. Afterwards, we heard the strange noise. It sounded as
if a large flock of mosquitoes were coming from a distance. We
looked out of the window to find out what was happening. We saw
that citizens from the town were marching towards us. They
looked unusual. We understood that the injured citizens were
coming towards us for treatment. But while, we thought that
there should be Red Cross Hospitals and another big hospitals in
the center of the town. So why should they come here, I
wondered, instead of going there. At that time, I did not know
that the center of the town had been so heavily damaged. After a
while, with the guide of the hospital personnel, the injured
persons reached our headquarters. With lots of injured people
arriving, we realized just how serious the matter was. We
decided that we should treat them also. Soon afterwards, we
learned that many of them had badly burned. As they came to us,
they held their hands aloft. They looked like they were ghosts.
We made the tincture for that treatment by mixing edible peanut
oil and something. We had to work in a mechanical manner in
order to treat so many patients. We provided one room for the
heavily injured and another for the slightly injured. A
treatment was limited to the first aid because there were no
facilities for the patients to be hospitalized. Later on, when I
felt that I could leave the work to other staff for a moment, I
walked out of the treatment room and went into the another room
to see what had happened. When I stepped inside, I found the
room filled with the smell that was quite similar to the smell of
dried squid when it has been grilled. The smell was quite
strong. It's a sad reality that the smell human beings produce
when they are burned is the same as that of the dried squid when
it is grilled. The squid - we like so much to eat. It was a
strange feeling, a feeling that I had never had before. I can
still remember that smell quite clearly. Afterwards, I came back
to the treatment room and walked through the roads of people who
were either seriously injured or waiting to be treated. When I
felt someone touch my leg, it was a pregnant woman. She said
that she was about to die in a few hours. She said, "I know that
I am going to die. But I can feel that my baby is moving inside.
It wants to get out of the room. I don't mind if I had died.
But if the baby is delivered now, it does not have to die with
me. Please help my baby live." There were no obstetricians
there. There was no delivery room. There was no time to take
care of her baby. All I could do was to tell her that I would
come back later when everything was ready for her and her baby.
Thus I cheered her up and she looks so happy. But I have to
return to the treatment work. So I resumed to work taking care
of the injured one by one. There were so many patients. I felt
as if I was fighting against the limited time. It was late in
the afternoon towards the evening. And image of that pregnant
woman never left my mind. Later, I went to the place where I had
found her before, she was still there lying in the same place. I
patted her on the shoulder, but she said nothing. The person
lying next to her said that a short while ago, she had become
silent. I still recalled this incident partly because I was not
able to fulfill the last wish of this dying young woman. I also
remember her because I had a chance to talk with her however
short it was.
INTERVIEWER : How many patients did you treat on August 6?
ANSWER : Well, at least 2 or 3 thousands on that very day if you
include those patients whom I gave all directions to. I felt
that as if once that day started, it never ended. I had to keep
on and on treating the patients forever. It was the longest day
of my life. Later on, when I had time to reflect on that day, I
came to realize that we, doctors learned a lot through the
experience, through the suffering of all those people. It's true
that the lack of medical knowledge, medical facilities,
integrated organization and so on prevented us from giving
sufficient medical treatment. Still there was a lot for us,
medical doctors to learn on that day. I learned that the nuclear
weapons which gnaw the minds and bodies of human beings should
never be used. Even the slightest idea using nuclear arms should
be completely exterminated the minds of human beings. Otherwise,
we will repeat the same tragedy. And we will never stop being
ashamed of ourselves.
--
Gary S. Trujillo gst@gnosys.svle.ma.us
Somerville, Massachusetts
90/07/30 10:39:26 SYSOP HIROSHIMA_WITNESS_No.2-1
Mr. Akira Onogi was 16 years old when the bomb was dropped.
He was at home 1.2 km away from center of explosion. The house
was under the shade of the warehouse, which protected him from
the first blast. All five members of the Onogi family
miraculously survived in immediate fire at their house.
MR. ONOGI : I was in the second year of junior high school and
was mobilized work with my classmates at the Eba Plant,
Mitsubishi shipbuilding. On the day when A-bomb was dropped, I
happened to be taking the day off and I was staying at home. I
was reading lying on the floor with a friend of mine. Under the
eaves I saw blue flash of light just like a spark made by a train
or some short circuit. Next, a stemlike blast came.
INTERVIEWER : From which direction?
ANSWER : Well, I'm not sure, anyway, when the blast came, my
friend and I were blown into another room. I was unconscious for
a while, and when I came to, I found myself in the dark.
Thinking my house was directly hit by a bomb, I removed red soil
and roof tiles covering me by hand and for the first time I saw
the sky. I managed to go out to open space and I looked around
wondering what my family were doing. I found that all the houses
around there had collapsed for as far as I could see.
INTERVIEWER : All the houses?
ANSWER : Yes, well, I couldn't see anyone around me but I heard
somebody shouting "Help! Help!" from somewhere. The cries were
actually from underground as I was walking on. Since no choose
were available, I'd just dug out red soil and roof tiles by hand
to help my family; my mother, my three sisters and a child of one
of my sisters. Then, I looked next door and I saw the father of
neighboring family standing almost naked. His skin was peeling
off all over his body and was hanging from finger tips. I talked
to him but he was too exhausted to give me a reply. He was
looking for his family desperately. The person in this picture
was a neighbor of us. I think the family's name was the
Matsumotos. When we were escaping from the edge of the bridge,
we found this small girl crying and she asked us to help her
mother. Just beside the girl, her mother was trapped by a fallen
beam on top of the lower half of her body. Together with
neighbors, we tried hard to remove the beam, but it was
impossible without any tools. Finally a fire broke out
endangering us. So we had no choice but to leave her. She was
conscious and we deeply bowed to her with clasped hands to
apologize to her and then we left. About one hour later, it
started raining heavily. There were large drops of black rain.
I was wearing a short sleeve shirt and shorts and it was
freezing. Everybody was shivering. We warmed ourselves up
around the burning fire in the middle of the summer.
INTERVIEWER : You mean the fire did not distinguish by the rain?
ANSWER : That's right. The fire didn't subside it at all. What
impressed my very strongly was a 5 or 6 year-old-boy with his
right leg cut at the thigh. He was hopping on his left foot to
cross over the bridge. I can still record this scene very
clearly. The water of the river we looking at now is very clean
and clear, but on the day of bombing, all the houses along this
river were blown by the blast with their pillars, beams and
pieces of furniture blown into the river or hanging off the
bridges. The river was also filled with dead people blown by the
blast and with survivors who came here to seek water. Anyway I
could not see the surface of the water at all. Many injured
people with peeled skin were crying out for help. Obviously they
were looking at us and we could hardly turn our eyes toward the
river.
INTERVIEWER : Wasn't it possible to help them?
ANSWER : No, there were too many people. We took care of the
people around us by using the clothes of dead people as bandages,
especially for those who were terribly wounded. By that time we
somehow became insensible all those awful things. After a while,
the fire reached the river bank and we decided to leave the
river. We crossed over this railway bridge and escaped in the
direction along the railway. The houses on both sides of the
railroad were burning and railway was the hollow in the fire. I
thought I was going to die here. It was such an awful
experience. You know for about 10 years after bombing I always
felt paralyzed we never saw the sparks made by trains or
lightning. Also even at home, I could not sit beside the windows
because I had seen so many people badly wounded by pieces of
glass. So I always sat with the wall behind me for about 10
years. It was some sort of instinct to self-preservation.
--
Gary S. Trujillo gst@gnosys.svle.ma.us
Somerville, Massachusetts