| HAND THEM DOWN to the NEXT GENERATION The Testimonies of A-Bomb Victims
The Dome (Prefectural Building) - Honkawa Elementary School |
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Please understand that there is no biased opinion intended on this site. I am fully aware of the many horrific atrocities that occurred on all sides during that particular time. Still many of them that need to be admitted to and dealt with. It is simply as it says "testimonies" and is a chance for the victims to express their feelings in English that hopefully will remain long after they have passed on. The title speaks for itself : Hand them down to the next generation! Are the voices of surviving atomic bomb victims. |
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| I have divided the accounts into three sections: HIROSHIMA - 1 Section - seven accounts NAGASAKI - 2 Sections each with seven accounts
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| I have visited both sites (as in areas). Most frequently the one in Nagasaki. My impression of Hiroshima was the same as one witness states, “After the blast the view stretched out as everything had been destroyed as far as the eye could see”. In effect there was hardly anything left save the remains of the Prefectural building and Honkawa Elementary School (shown above) as the blast was above ground level. The blast at Nagasaki was on a city that sits on a curved hilly area between the sea and the mountains there were areas that were totally and partially destroyed. Sadly the fact that there were remains perhaps gives more impact to the tragedy. I felt it would be remiss of me not setting to work to put these accounts on the Internet for all to read. Another sad thing is perhaps the fact that the blast occurred directly over a Cathedral May it never happen again. Colin (Hyakutake)-Watkin M Ed - Faculty of English - Ryukoku Gakuen. Some of the photographs shown here were returned from the US Armed Forces Institute of Pathology and supplied by the Hiroshima Peace Culture Foundation. These and others can be found on the Hiroshima City site. I have included them here as some peoples accounts relate to the areas shown. Preface: This is a summary in writing of the experiences of the victims of the atoms bombs dropped on Hiroshima and Nagasaki related to the members of FCO-OP. Members of a younger generation who had not experienced W.W.II visited the victims to write their stories. It is now over fifty years since the the atomic bomb attack and the termination of World War 2. We should be concerned that the experiences of the war and the atomic bomb will be forgotten by new generations unless something is done. We must commit ourselves to hand down these stories from generation to generation so that people around the world should know of what happened. As for the FCO-OP it was their first commitment of this kind and they had no archetypes to follow. In continuing their activities and listening to the experiences it was a self learning process for them. First of all it seemed like a simple task to listen to the accounts and write them down. However after getting involved they recognised that it was a very important and responsible task In that they had to be careful not to hurt the feelings of the A-bomb victims. Indeed a very grave and delicate matter. They hope within our hearts that people reading this will create a big wave for a world without atomic weapons.
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