With what this poor woman had been through the sight of her crying tore at my heartstrings. What if something should happen to her; who would care for her little baby? To conceal the fear and terror in my heart I left her, trying to put up a cheerful front. But no one could conceal from her the ominous import of the dark spots that had appeared on her chest.
The Doctor of Hiroshima is the extraordinary true story of Dr Michihiko Hachiya, whose hospital was less than a mile from the centre of the atomic bomb that hit on that warm August day. In immense shock and pain, he and his wife Yaeko dragged themselves to the devastated hospital building and what colleagues they could find.
In time, they begin to heal, and start to treat the impossible numbers of patients – a small girl covered in burns, an elderly man with pneumonia, a young boy and his little sister looking for their parents. They also began to investigate the strange unexplainable symptoms afflicting his patients – things he never dreamed he would see…
Told simply and poignantly in Dr Hachiya’s own words, The Doctor of Hiroshima is a unique and deeply moving human story of survival about a small, committed band of hospital staff in the face of unthinkable destruction and loss.
Author Bio
Dr. Michihiko Hachiya was Director of the Hiroshima Communications Hospital when the world’s first atomic bomb was dropped on the city. After the bomb, he continued as Director there for several years before taking on a teaching role at Okayama University Medical School. He retired in Okayama and passed away in the 1980s.
My thoughts
Having been a student and learning about the bombing that happened at Nagasaki and Hiroshima I was always scared of what happened and wanted to know about the people who were victims of this attack.
It isn’t common but it seemed to be a soft target and I wanted to know about the average person. In this book we see a very real and very scary story of what happened to those who lived in Hiroshima on n the fateful day of the atomic bomb.
I enjoyed the book a lot as it showed the human aspect that many forget about the Japanese people during the years of world war ii. It brings it back that the culture and the people of Japan were not all to blame and weren’t supposed to suffer.
The story is very powerful and moving. The format is that of a diary which can make it difficult to read at times since it is more about the thoughts and feelings than about what happened fully.
The clinic that the doctor was part of was so close to were the atomic bomb went off which shows a harrowing time that noone should have to go through.
Reading about the doctor I will say that it brought a very humanistic nature as well to the people of Japan. I think he showed remarkable character and showed us all that it doesn’t matter the nation we swear to it’s the person inside that really counts.
The details can be a bit much for people who aren’t used to the aftermath of wars or who haven’t read many
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