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| MURAKAMI Shigetaro（MURAKAMI Shigetaro） |
| Gender |
Male |
Age at time of bombing |
19 |
| Recorded on |
2003.10.6 |
Age at time of recording |
77 |
| Location at time of bombing |
Hiroshima(Exposed upon entering city) |
| Location when exposed to the bombing |
|
| Status at time of bombing |
Armed Forces member or military personnel |
| Occupational status at time of bombing |
Second Independent Railway Battalion (13352nd Sen Unit), Railway Headquarters, Hiroshima District, Homeland Railway Headquarters, Army Department, Imperial Headquarters |
| Hall site |
Hiroshima National Peace Memorial Hall for the Atomic Bomb Victims |
Dubbed in English/
With English subtitles |
Dubbed in English |
1. In the afternoon of August 6th, Shigetaro Murakami came into the city to engage in rescue efforts. He was 19. Today, he still suffers from A-bomb disease and needs occasional hospitalization.
2. [before the bomb]
3. In those days, conscription examinations were held when a man turned 20. Well I had mine a year early, when I was 19.
4. I was in the military, you see. And I entered the city immediately after the bomb fell.
5. After all, I was raised on a farm. I was physically fit from childhood.
6. [the moment of the bomb]
7. I was on a train. You see, I was enlisted in a Chiba regiment. I left Chiba in the morning on August 5th.
8. Being the 40's trains were slow. We just sat in one chugging toward the west, with no idea where we were headed. We went where we were taken.
9. In the evening of that day, I think it was around six, we arrived in Kyoto. Then when the sun was rising, we were in Himeji. The train had stood still because of air raids.
10. At dawn, the train slowly started moving. I think we got to Okayama at around noon. And we headed on to Hiroshima.
11. [entering Hiroshima immediately after the bomb]
12. Do you know Kaita-ichi, the station just before Hiroshima? That's where we got off. The train couldn't go any further.
13. I mean, the tracks, the rails were all like candy. And you know, it was right after. I think we had arrived at Kaitaichi at 2 pm.
14. From there, we walked to Oshiba. To be honest, I couldn't tell you on this map which way we walked, but I think we passed through the city center as well.
15. In Oshiba, an elementary school had been taken over and used as army barracks. Now these barracks had been struck by the atomic bomb and nearby homes had been flattened.
16. The army made sure there were no fires, but soldiers were trapped under the buildings when I arrived. So I immediately started doing whatever I could to help.
17. We walked there. I don't think it took two hours. I don't know though. It was those days, you know.
18. Then right away, I don't remember which river it was, but there must have been different barracks there because we crossed the river to go and help them. They were injured.
19. When we first arrived, at Kaitaichi that is, I couldn't help thinking ""What is going on?"" It was crowded with injured people. 4 or 5 rows, leading up to the station.
20. I was saying: ""What in the world is this?"" ""What on earth has happened?"" as I followed the lead.
21. In those days if you were in the military you had leather shoes. But there were no leather shoes available so when we came from Chiba, we wore hot fuming split-toed canvas shoes that had rubber soles.
22. So then for as far as I could see, houses were crushed and burnt down. I'd say most of the houses were burned.
23. On the way, well being only 19, I had never seen a dead body in my life. Until then, that is. So I was sickened by the sight. At first.
24. There were dead bodies lying everywhere. It was tragic. I mean it looked like the city had been attacked by hundreds of fighter planes.
25. When I asked a resident, he said there was only one. One plane couldn't do this. How were we expected to believe that?
26. [post A-bomb devastation]
27. I have to say it was a mass of dead bodies. Houses were flattened and the city was burnt down for as far as you could see. The only things left standing were the metal frames of concrete houses.
28. Those houses too, were burnt black on the inside. I just couldn't believe it. I asked about it and was told that it was one airplane.
29. Not only that, there was an air raid warning that had been called off. And as soon as it was called off, bang!
30. [rescue efforts in the immediate aftermath]
31. I don't know much about what happened then, like where the hypocenter was. I just crossed rivers to rescue people. I think I went south of Yokogawa station.
32. I walked all around. The next day, civilians were just left alone. If a woman had fallen face down, the army left her there and went for military men first.
33. In other words,other civilians might come later searching for her.I believe that is why the nilitary did that.
34. [tragic scene]
35. I went to help the injured. I know I crossed a river. The tide was out, so river was easy to cross, on the way out that is.
36. After crossing the river, I gathered sticks and things from the fields, made stretchers and carried the injured back to the barracks in Oshiba.
37. Sleeves on the military shirts were wide then. The short sleeved shirts. But this person's arms were so swollen from burns that the shirt was too tight,
38. especially around the neck. And his bright red skin was turned inside out.
39. He was barely alive and unbearable to look at. But being from the outside, we were the only ones in good enough condition to help people like this. So we carried them back to Oshiba.
40. On the way back though, the tide would be forcing its way back in. And then all along the banks were civilians. Citizens who had fallen into the river and died.
41. And these bodies would come floating along and well, we were only 19 or 20 and had never seen dead bodies. We were horrified.
42. So I was carrying a stretcher in water up to my chest, like this, and dead bodies would come crashing into me. It was disgusting. I felt like I was no longer alive.
43. Oh and those few days, the weather was really good. It was so hot, it must have been 34 or 5 Celcius.
44. A lady had fallen completely face down. I moved her just a bit and liquid came flowing out of her rotten body.
45. Those memories are the clearest. When four or five days had passed, flies were everywhere. It was truly a living hell.
46. [finding out that it was an A-bomb]
47. Of course I could not believe that it was a simple explosion from one air craft. But in those days we had no knowledge that it was an atomic bomb. Not us.
48. It wasn't until I had returned to Kagawa after the military was disbanded. Then I slowly found out that this was the type of bomb that it was. At the time, I knew nothing.
49. [symptoms immediately after the bomb]
50. There were. First of all, I had diarrhea. The food wasn't any good either. When we entered the city, there were no dishes. No food. Only balls of kaoliang mixed with soy beans.
51. The night after we arrived, there was of course no drinking water or tea, so all you could do was fetch water from where there used to be a faucet. One drink gave me diarrhea.
52. That diarrhea lasted until after the War ended and did not heal for another month and a half after I returned home.
53. [present health conditions]
54. The doctor's diagnosis from March 18th this year shows I have diabetes, high blood pressure, peripheral nerve disorder, pulmonary apex disorder and cervical spondylosis. My spinal cord is shot.
55. My lumbar spine is deformed and my legs are weak. I look well, but am far from it. I can no longer stand up quickly. This is the way I am. Just like the doctor's certificate says.
56. But the doctor will not certify the correlation between my exposure to radiation and these illnesses being a result of that.
57. When I say that my health is this way because I was exposed to the bomb, he will not listen to me. The correlation has not been clarified.
58. [employment after the bomb]
59. I was a farmer, until was it 1961. That's when I decided that farming doesn't earn a living. A lot happened during that time.
60. We could raise crops, but farming alone wasn't getting us very far. Luckily, a paper-company came to town and they had work in three shifts so I kept the farm and started working there, as well.
61. Then in 1976, or was it 77? The company folded. But there was a food company in town, a food service company rather, and I worked there for just over 10 years.
62. Then well you see there's a big dam, the Ouchi Dam over yonder and I was invited to work there, supervising the dam. I worked there for just over 10 years again, until I was 71 or 2.
63. [as a hibakusha]
64. Sure I worried about what the media was saying about effects on 2nd generation hibakusha and some people criticized me for getting treatment, saying: ""You only stayed there for a month or two.""
65. So I kept quiet about my experiences or about being a hibakusha to the best of my ability.
66. Also, there was a man from this neighborhood, 2 years older than me, who died in the atomic bomb. He wasn't a soldier but just happened to be in Hiroshima.
67. When I talked to his parents, they cried. Then they said: ""Our son would never have come home alive.""
68. [relaying the experience to family members]
69. I told them that Grandpa went to a place called Hiroshima and this is what it was like. Then, I guess it was about four or five days ago.
70. While I was talking to my grandson, he said: ""I tell you what, Grandpa. Why don't you tell everybody what you think, just the same way you told me."" His keenness made me cry.
71. This grandchild has a great memory and is adorable. Thinking of what he said brings a tear to my eye.
72. [passing the story down to younger generations]
73. Younger generations need to see what it was like and that atomic bombs are not acceptable and that the United States has used them and is still testing them. Over and over again.
74. I read in a recent paper about a subcritical nuclear experiment. They keep conducting them. They continually put North Korea down but look at what the US is doing? I absolutely cannot forgive this.
75. Isn't it written at the end of this, something to the effect that if another atomic bomb is used, the human race will be destroyed?
76. Really. The bomb is different now from the atomic bomb that was used then. If one is used somewhere on earth, we are doomed. I truly believe that.
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*Many more memoirs can be viewed at both the Hiroshima and Nagasaki Peace Memorial Halls.
*These contents are updated periodically.
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