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Hiroshima : 70 Years After the A-bombing

Hiroshima: 70 Years After the A-bombing: Donated Items 4

Disaster certificates recall hardships endured by mother and children

Hideo Kimura, 78, a resident of Asaminami Ward, Hiroshima, has kept two disaster certificates his mother received in the aftermath of the atomic bombing. One of them was issued by the chief of the West Police Station on August 9, 1945; the other was from the president of a neighborhood association in Nakahiro-machi on August 24.

The certificate issued by the chief of the West Police Station states: “This provides proof that Sakuyo Kimura and five others are sufferers of the war disaster of August 6.” The second daughter of the family, Harue, then 16, was missing. She had been working at the Chugoku Shikoku Public Works Office of the Internal Affairs Agency, which was located in the Hiroshima Prefectural Industrial Promotion Hall, later dubbed the Atomic Bomb Dome. Her remains were never found.

Hideo’s father, Yoshitaro, had already died in the war. As their home in Nakahiro-machi (part of today’s Nishi Ward) burned down in the bombing, Sakuyo and her children fled to the hills of Mitaki (in Nishi Ward) and found shelter at Honkawa National School, which was still standing among the ruins. They walked around the devastated city to obtain rations such as dumplings that were made from a mixture of seaweed and other ingredients. When they showed their disaster certificates, they were able to receive rations and go ahead of others when taking trains.

After Sakuyo died six years later at the age of 53, her second son, Toshio, now 88, who had lived with her, kept the disaster certificates. When her third son, Hideo, published their experience of the atomic bombing last fall, Toshio gave the certificates to Hideo. “I think Mother wanted to keep the certificates so that she wouldn’t forget how her family lived through those hardships together,” he said.

(Originally published on July 8, 2014)