NewsWeek, By Jack Beresford, Mar 03, 2024
Haunting photos have emerged of Hiroshima just a few weeks after it was decimated by an atomic bomb on August 6, 1945.
Estimates vary on the number of people killed by the nuclear blast, with the Bulletin of the Atomic Scientists putting the number of casualties at between 110,000 and 210,000. What's perhaps less well known, however, is what life was like for those left behind in the ruins of Hiroshima after the attack.
Now, a series of pictures has surfaced online offering a glimpse of the devastation left behind. They are images that have been familiar to Ben Green ever since his great uncle Dr. Bernie Greenwald showed them to him as a child.
"My great uncle Bernie was a doctor on the USS Pickett that pulled into Tokyo Bay on August 28th for the surrender ceremony," Green told Newsweek. "They'd been ordered to stay put, but when he heard about the atom bomb, he and his friend 'commandeered' a jeep and drove to Hiroshima, knowing they'd just be hanging out in the Bay for a bit anyway."
Greenwald was an avid amateur photographer who took pictures throughout the war and long after. His collection includes pictures of scuttled Japanese battleships, while Green still has the piece of a propeller from a kamikaze pilot that his great uncle found after it struck the USS Dorsey..................................................................................................
Green said during his uncle's time there, he ended up assisting a Japanese doctor and they became friends who remained in touch for several years after, even though they never met again.
Greenwald died, aged 97, in 2017, but his photographs and the stories he told Green have stayed with him. "His story about the people being kind to him when they could still taste the ashes of Hiroshima in the air really hit me and I think it stayed with him too," he said. "Something about the juxtaposition of the most devastating weapon ever used on people with the people's kindness to 'the other' encompasses such a range of humanity."
Green said he's always wanted to see his uncle's pictures go to a museum or somewhere they can serve as part of the record of what happened in Hiroshima............................. more https://www.newsweek.com/chilling-pictures-hiroshima-weeks-after-atomic-bomb-dropped-1875169
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