Written Monument

Written Monument –Testimony of the A-bombed Elderly People – (first issue published on July 20, 1981) is a collection of the A-bomb victims’ stories, which was compiled to mark the 10th anniversary of the foundation of the “Mutsumien”, Hiroshima A-bomb Nursing Home and the 35th of the A-bombing.

Twenty-eight stories were selected out of 72 pieces, either from the notes written by the residents themselves or the ones orally given and taken notes by the staff in the Home.

It is not overstating that the “Written Monument”is a monument by words which the A-bomb surviving generation can pass on to the younger generation of how they, the A-bomb witnesses, survived through the post war years and came to choose the nursing home, Mutsumien, as their home in their final years.

“Hiroshima Speaks Out!” has decided to make these notes into CD-R and distribute widely, attaching a factual record of the A-bombing, survivors’ drawings as well as the A-bomb-related homepage links, since we wish many people would read them.

Taking the “Written Monument” deep in our heart as “reviving testimonies of the A-bomb survivors“ (Yoshiaki Nakamura writes in the epilogue), we’d like to look to a peaceful century free from nuclear disasters, by sharing the acknowledgement of “nuclear” threat focused on human misery with the people in the world.

The age given is the survivor’s age at the time the note was written, and we used assumed names due to the privacy reasons.
To all those concerned who gave us permission when we make the Written Monument into CD-ROM in Japanese as well as English, we’d like to express our sincere appreciation. Also, we are very grateful to the World Friendship Center Translators’group for the English translation, Hiroshima Peace Memorial Museum and Hiroshima Council of the A-bomb Counter-disaster Measures for the pictures and other materials, and the late photographer, Mr. Yoshito Matsushige for his cooperation.