Documenting Hiroshima of 1945: Around August 10–11, “Don’t take photos of us,” said exhausted family, including girl with bandaged face
Aug. 11, 2024
by Minami Yamashita, Staff Writer, and Kyosuke Mizukawa, Senior Staff Writer
The photograph shows a father pushing a handcart on which an injured mother and daughter are riding. The mother’s expression is one of exhaustion. The daughter’s face is barely visible due to the bandages covering it. Hajime Miyatake, a member of the photography department at the Asahi Shimbun’s Osaka head office who died in 1985 at the age of 71, took the photo in Hiroshima’s Minami-machi area (in the city’s present-day Minami Ward) sometime during the period August 10–11, 1945.
Of the three family members, Emiko Yoshida, six at the time, is still alive at the age of 85. Due to poor health, she lives in a facility for the elderly in Hiroshima. Her second daughter, Keiko Yoshida, 50, who lives in Hiroshima’s Higashi Ward, spoke to the newspaper about what her mother described she had experienced in the atomic bombing. “My mother told me, ‘I cried from the pain when they changed the bandages on my face.’ Apparently, her skin had stuck to the bandages,” said Ms. Yoshida.
Emiko is the oldest daughter of her father, Sentaro Aizaki, and Hatsuyo, the couple in the photo. On August 6, Emiko had been taken by her mother to the place where building-demolition work was being carried out to create firebreaks in the area of Senda-machi (in Hiroshima’s present-day Naka Ward). While playing on a pile of rubble, Emiko was exposed to the atomic bombing’s thermal rays. That spot was around two kilometers from the hypocenter. She suffered severe burns to her face and left arm.
On way to relief station
The photo was taken as the family was on its way to a relief station at the Hiroshima District Monopoly Bureau in the area of Minami-machi (in Hiroshima’s Minami Ward) to have her bandages changed. A video remains of Emiko looking back and speaking about that day. Her testimony was recorded by students of the broadcasting club at Hijiyama Girls’ High School, which is located in the city’s Minami Ward, resulting in a documentary film of around five minutes in length titled “Photographs connect.”
In the video, Ms. Yoshida said, “[Mr. Miyatake] suddenly appeared from behind us and pointed his camera diagonally to the left side in front of me. At that moment, my mother [Hatsuyo] said, ‘Don’t take photos of us.’” The family did not want that photo to be taken. “My face was bandaged to that extent, and it was so hot. Even if I had an itch somewhere on my face, I wasn’t able to scratch it.”
Iconic photo
After the war, the burn on Emiko’s left arm remained as a keloid, and she wore long sleeves even in the summer to hide the scar. The image of her on the handcart became an iconic A-bombing photo, conveying the tragedy of the bombing to people in Japan and overseas. In the recording made by the high school students, she paid a visit to the grave of her parents together with the students and put her hands together in prayer. “I told my parents, ‘The photo is being put to good use’,” explained Ms. Yoshida.
Around this time 79 years ago, children who escaped direct experience in the atomic bombing at sites where they had been evacuated were just learning the news about the deaths of family members, with widespread sorrow ensuing.
Yutaka Amatsu, eight at the time, who died in 2013 at the age of 76, kept an illustrated journal in which he wrote about his grandmother, Chiyono, whose whereabouts after the bombing were unknown. Mr. Amatsu had been evacuated from Hiroshima and was staying with relatives in the village of Kameyama (in Hiroshima’s present-day Asakita Ward).
His journal entry dated August 10, 1945, indicated, “My grandmother’s ashes returned home today. My mother and sister had been looking for her but were not able to find her. I was sad.”
In an entry dated August 11, he wrote, “We got the first grapes from the fields of the Tsue family (last name of relatives to where he had been evacuated). Since it was the first time, we gave them to my grandmother as an offering.”
Chiyono’s remains were ultimately found in the ruins of her home in the area of Sakan-cho (in Hiroshima’s present-day Naka Ward). In his August 11 journal entry, Yutaka drew an image of the grapes they had given as an offering to his kind-hearted grandmother.
(Originally published on August 11, 2024)
The photograph shows a father pushing a handcart on which an injured mother and daughter are riding. The mother’s expression is one of exhaustion. The daughter’s face is barely visible due to the bandages covering it. Hajime Miyatake, a member of the photography department at the Asahi Shimbun’s Osaka head office who died in 1985 at the age of 71, took the photo in Hiroshima’s Minami-machi area (in the city’s present-day Minami Ward) sometime during the period August 10–11, 1945.
Of the three family members, Emiko Yoshida, six at the time, is still alive at the age of 85. Due to poor health, she lives in a facility for the elderly in Hiroshima. Her second daughter, Keiko Yoshida, 50, who lives in Hiroshima’s Higashi Ward, spoke to the newspaper about what her mother described she had experienced in the atomic bombing. “My mother told me, ‘I cried from the pain when they changed the bandages on my face.’ Apparently, her skin had stuck to the bandages,” said Ms. Yoshida.
Emiko is the oldest daughter of her father, Sentaro Aizaki, and Hatsuyo, the couple in the photo. On August 6, Emiko had been taken by her mother to the place where building-demolition work was being carried out to create firebreaks in the area of Senda-machi (in Hiroshima’s present-day Naka Ward). While playing on a pile of rubble, Emiko was exposed to the atomic bombing’s thermal rays. That spot was around two kilometers from the hypocenter. She suffered severe burns to her face and left arm.
On way to relief station
The photo was taken as the family was on its way to a relief station at the Hiroshima District Monopoly Bureau in the area of Minami-machi (in Hiroshima’s Minami Ward) to have her bandages changed. A video remains of Emiko looking back and speaking about that day. Her testimony was recorded by students of the broadcasting club at Hijiyama Girls’ High School, which is located in the city’s Minami Ward, resulting in a documentary film of around five minutes in length titled “Photographs connect.”
In the video, Ms. Yoshida said, “[Mr. Miyatake] suddenly appeared from behind us and pointed his camera diagonally to the left side in front of me. At that moment, my mother [Hatsuyo] said, ‘Don’t take photos of us.’” The family did not want that photo to be taken. “My face was bandaged to that extent, and it was so hot. Even if I had an itch somewhere on my face, I wasn’t able to scratch it.”
Iconic photo
After the war, the burn on Emiko’s left arm remained as a keloid, and she wore long sleeves even in the summer to hide the scar. The image of her on the handcart became an iconic A-bombing photo, conveying the tragedy of the bombing to people in Japan and overseas. In the recording made by the high school students, she paid a visit to the grave of her parents together with the students and put her hands together in prayer. “I told my parents, ‘The photo is being put to good use’,” explained Ms. Yoshida.
Around this time 79 years ago, children who escaped direct experience in the atomic bombing at sites where they had been evacuated were just learning the news about the deaths of family members, with widespread sorrow ensuing.
Yutaka Amatsu, eight at the time, who died in 2013 at the age of 76, kept an illustrated journal in which he wrote about his grandmother, Chiyono, whose whereabouts after the bombing were unknown. Mr. Amatsu had been evacuated from Hiroshima and was staying with relatives in the village of Kameyama (in Hiroshima’s present-day Asakita Ward).
His journal entry dated August 10, 1945, indicated, “My grandmother’s ashes returned home today. My mother and sister had been looking for her but were not able to find her. I was sad.”
In an entry dated August 11, he wrote, “We got the first grapes from the fields of the Tsue family (last name of relatives to where he had been evacuated). Since it was the first time, we gave them to my grandmother as an offering.”
Chiyono’s remains were ultimately found in the ruins of her home in the area of Sakan-cho (in Hiroshima’s present-day Naka Ward). In his August 11 journal entry, Yutaka drew an image of the grapes they had given as an offering to his kind-hearted grandmother.
(Originally published on August 11, 2024)
