The stories in this article are from Dr. Arata Osada\u2019s Children of Hiroshima<\/em>, which was published in Japan in 1951 and later translated into English. Osada interviewed children affected by the bombing.<\/p>\n You can find this book in e-book format on Barnes & Noble<\/a> and Amazon<\/a> under the title Children of the A-Bomb: Testament of the Boys and Girls of Hiroshima<\/em>.<\/p>\n Toshihiko Tanabe was in second grade (seven or eight years old) when the bomb was dropped. His parents had sent him to stay with his grandmother in the countryside to protect him from Allied bombs.<\/p>\n A few days after the bombing, he and his grandmother went looking for his parents. Their house was empty, and they couldn\u2019t find them. Toshihiko said:<\/p>\n Were my father and mother dead? I felt very sad just thinking that. My father was so good and strong. I thought he wouldn\u2019t be killed by a bomb like that, not Dad. And I kept telling myself that my mother was alive, too.[i]<\/a><\/p>\n Six days later:<\/p>\n [A] soldier, dirty and bloody, leaning on a stick, hardly able to walk, lurched in the door. It was no other than my dear, unforgettable father. I was so happy! I rushed to him and hugged him. I was right, my father was strong and wonderful.[ii]<\/a><\/p>\n Sadly, his joy was short-lived. His father was sick with radiation poisoning and passed away ten days after the bombing while Toshihiko \u201cjust clung to him tightly and cried and cried.\u201d[iii]<\/a><\/p>\n He never saw his mother again and doesn\u2019t know where she was when she died. She was one of the many missing; her body never found, presumably obliterated by the explosion.<\/p>\n Takako Okimoto was also in second grade. She lost her entire family. She told Osaka, \u201c[P]arents, brothers, and sisters, relatives, and friends. All of them died, one after another.\u201d[iv]<\/a><\/p>\n Her big brother, like Toshihiko\u2019s mother, was never found. Her other brother was horribly burned and died a day after the bombing. After he died, she, her parents, and her two sisters went to the countryside, but they were unable to find medical care in the small village. Her mother went back to Hiroshima to be treated for her injuries.<\/p>\n A day later, her uncle sent them a message saying his mother was much worse. Takako and her surviving family members hurried to the city. Takako said, \u201cThere was a nasty smell everywhere in the city, and the scene was most horrible.\u201d[v]<\/a><\/p>\n Another Hiroshima orphan, Yuriko Sakurai, whose story I shared in a previous article<\/a>, described the scene when she spoke about going to Hiroshima two days after the bombing: \u201cBloated bodies were floating in its seven once beautiful rivers. The air \u2026 was thick with the stench of burned bodies.\u201d[vi]<\/a><\/p>\n Takako arrived too late. Her mother had already died. She said, \u201cI cried and cried. We cremated her body on the dry riverbed. People were cremating corpses here and there.\u201d[vii]<\/a><\/p>\n Soon after returning to the countryside, Takako\u2019s older sister died from radiation poisoning, and her father and little sister got very sick.<\/p>\n Even though Takako was only seven or eight, she tried to take care of them as best she could. She said, \u201cThough I was too young to know what to do, I did everything I could to help my father and little sister.\u201d[viii]<\/a><\/p>\n But Takako\u2019s little sister died a day after her big sister\u2019s funeral. Her father went to the first sister\u2019s funeral but was too weak and sick to attend the second\u2019s.<\/p>\n Despite losing four of his children and suffering from the horrible effects of radiation poisoning, Takako\u2019s father kept up a positive attitude with her:<\/p>\n Father must have felt very sad and lonely to see his sons and daughters die before him, one after another, but whenever I said, \u2018How do you feel this morning?\u2019 he would said, \u2018I feel a little better this morning, my dear.\u2019 He didn\u2019t want me to worry, but he was just getting weaker and weaker.[ix]<\/a><\/p>\n Her father wanted to live:<\/p>\n [H]e often said, \u201cI hope I don\u2019t die. Now that our house and possessions have been lost in the fire, I want to stay here in the country and do farming, dressed in rags but leading a quiet life with you.\u201d\u2026<\/p>\n On the morning of September 10, he departed this life, with the thought of leaving me alone weighing on his mind.[x]<\/a><\/p>\n Despite losing her entire family to the Americans, Takako wasn\u2019t hateful or consumed with thoughts of revenge. Instead, she only wanted peace. She said, \u201cI think that if we are to build a peaceful country, we should be more thoughtful toward each other.\u201d[xi]<\/a><\/p>\n Junya Kojima was five when the atomic bomb was dropped. He\u2019d lost his mother as an infant. He was staying in the countryside with relatives.<\/p>\n Junya\u2019s father survived the bombing, but, like Takako\u2019s sisters and father, was exposed to a lethal dose of radiation. Takako said, \u201cWhen he came to the country, he had a lot of colored spots all over, and he soon died.\u201d[xii]<\/a><\/p>\n Radiation poisoning affects the blood, reducing platelets and white blood cells and damaging red blood cells. The victim dies from massive internal bleeding.[xiii]<\/a> Often, the first sign of this bleeding is petechiae. They are the \u201ccolored spots\u201d Junya described.<\/p>\n Petechiae look like small red marks on the skin, caused by blood leaking from blood vessels. The spots then spread and grow larger until the bleeding becomes uncontrollable and affects internal organs.<\/p>\n At this point in his interview with Osada, Junya seemed to struggle for words. He didn\u2019t know how to express the grief he felt over losing his father and becoming an orphan. He said he couldn\u2019t find words. At the time of the interview, he was still a child, in sixth grade, eleven or twelve years old.<\/p>\n He finally said:<\/p>\n Why did I have to be so unlucky?\u2026[B]efore [the atom bomb] I was happy. My bad luck started after the bomb. But I know that I\u2019m a lot luckier than some kids in Hiroshima. At least I\u2019ve got a place to live.[xiv]<\/a><\/p>\n Indeed, many children in Hiroshima lived in orphanages, and some were on the street.<\/p>\n At the time of the interview, Junya lived with his uncle. His grandmother took care of him for four years after he lost his father, but she died in 1948.<\/p>\n Junya said:<\/p>\n It\u2019s really lonely and sad to live alone without either a father or mother or any brothers or sisters\u2026I wish I could see my father and mother again! But I know it is impossible.[xv]<\/a><\/p>\n Because his mother died only two months after he was born, he had no memory of her.<\/p>\n Takako and Junya watched their family members die. Their deaths weren\u2019t easy ones.<\/p>\n Dr. Michihiko Hachiya, a Hiroshima survivor who treated patients with radiation sickness after the bombing, described some of the symptoms in his memoir.<\/p>\n He and his fellow doctors knew nothing about radiation sickness and didn\u2019t understand why their patients were dying. The symptoms confused them, and they didn\u2019t know how to treat them.<\/p>\n Hachiya wrote:<\/p>\n So many patients died without our understanding the cause of death that we were all in despair\u2026 [Common symptoms] were general malaise, anorexia [loss of appetite], eructation, diarrhea, and vomiting\u2026The critically ill patients had all five\u2026<\/p>\n Among those who died many had a bloody diarrhea similar to that seen in dysentery, and others had bloody urine or sputum. Severe uterine hemorrhage\u2026 was common among the women.<\/p>\n Some, who lingered as long as a week, died with stomatitis [ulcers in the mouth] or gangrenous tonsillitis\u2026 [S]tomatitis appeared and with it petechiae\u2026<\/p>\n [The symptoms] bore no relationship to the type or severity of injury\u2026 [T]hose who appeared to be uninjured and even felt well enough to help in the care of other patients were beginning to show these blood spots beneath the skin\u2026<\/p>\n There was no making heads or tails to this puzzle. But what were we to do?[xvi]<\/a><\/p>\n Death by radiation poisoning is painful, prolonged, and traumatic both to experience and to witness.<\/p>\n Even today, there\u2019s no effective treatment<\/a> for exposure to large doses of radiation such as released by an atomic bomb.[xvii]<\/a> In a nuclear war, millions of people would die this way.<\/p>\n [i]<\/a> Arata Osada, PhD, translated by Yoichi Fukushima, Children of Hiroshima<\/em> (London: Taylor & French Ltd., 1980) 111.<\/p>\n [ii]<\/a> Ibid.<\/p>\n [iii]<\/a> Ibid., 112.<\/p>\n [iv]<\/a> Ibid., 106.<\/p>\n [v]<\/a> Ibid.<\/p>\n [vi]<\/a> Ibid., 40.<\/p>\n [vii]<\/a> Ibid., 106.<\/p>\n [viii]<\/a> Ibid.<\/p>\n [ix]<\/a> Ibid., 107.<\/p>\n [x]<\/a> Ibid.<\/p>\n [xi]<\/a> Ibid.<\/p>\n [xii]<\/a> Ibid., 37<\/p>\n [xiii]<\/a> Michihiko Hachiya, MD, trans. by Warner Wells, MD, Hiroshima Diary: The Journal of a Japanese Physician, August 6\u2013September 30, 1945, <\/em>(Chapel Hill, North Carolina: University of North Carolina Press, 1955) 150, 151,<\/p>\n [xiv]<\/a> Arata Osada, Children of Hiroshima<\/em>, 37.<\/p>\n [xv]<\/a> Ibid., 37-38.<\/p>\n [xvi]<\/a> Michihiko Hachiya, MD, Hiroshima Diary, <\/em>142-143.<\/p>\n [xvii]<\/a> \u201cRadiation Sickness,\u201d Mayo Clinic, accessed August 7, 2026,\u00a0https:\/\/www.mayoclinic.org\/diseases-conditions\/radiation-sickness\/diagnosis-treatment\/drc-20377061<\/a>.<\/p>\n ==========================<\/p>\n This is the second post this year in observance of the anniversaries of the 1945 bombings of Hiroshima and Nagasaki. Last’ week’s was:\u00a0<\/em><\/p>\n Advocating for Peace and Recognition: The Overlooked Korean Victims of the Atomic<\/a><\/p>\n Posts from previous years include:\u00a0<\/em><\/p>\n \u201cOh, the Hateful A-Bomb!\u201d: Survivors\u2019 Stories from Hiroshima and Nagasaki<\/a><\/p>\n \u201cEverybody Else in the World Was Dead\u201d: Hiroshima\u2019s Legacy<\/a><\/p>\n The Danger That Faces Us All: Hiroshima and Nagasaki after 75 Years<\/a><\/p>\n Rejecting Mass Murder: Looking Back on Hiroshima and Nagasaki<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":" by Sarah Terzo On August 6, 1945, the United States military dropped an atomic bomb on Hiroshima, Japan. This one of a series on Hiroshima orphans. The rest of the series can be found on my Substack. The stories in this article are from Dr. Arata Osada\u2019s Children of Hiroshima, which was published in Japan… <\/p>\n![\"\"](\"http:\/\/consistent-life.org\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/08\/1-blog-books.jpg\")
<\/a><\/p>\nToshihiko\u2019s Story<\/strong><\/h3>\n
Takako\u2019s Story<\/strong><\/h3>\n
Junya\u2019s Story<\/strong><\/h3>\n
![\"\"](\"http:\/\/consistent-life.org\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/08\/1-blog-radiation.jpg\")
<\/a><\/p>\nDeath from Radiation Poisoning<\/strong><\/h3>\n