Recently discovered eyewitness account of Hiroshima atom bomb published, detailing horror and desperation of survivors

At 8:15 a.m.on August 6, 1945, the course of World War II and the history of Japan changed when the US military dropped the atomic bomb on Hiroshima.Now, on the 81st anniversary of the bombing, an extraordinary eyewitness account written in English is being published for the first time, written by Kiyoshi Tanimoto a Methodist minister who survived.Tanimoto, then 36, had studied theology at Emory University in Atlanta and described “a sharp flash of light” and a “strong blast of wind” accompanied by a “tremendous explosion” in the long-lost memoir “Hiroshima, 8:15: The Lost Memoir,” out Thursday.In the memoir, Tanimoto describes how he was on the outskirts of the city helping to move his church’s piano.

Back at home, his wife and eight-month-old infant daughter were partially buried under rubble from the bomb.His daughter’s crying roused his wife, Chisa Tanimoto, who began to dig furiously through debris to save them both.Now 81, Kondo has spent most of her life as a peace activist, warning about the perils of nuclear weapons.The 400-page manuscript had been sent to Pulitzer Prize-winning reporter John Hersey, who was the first American to chronicle the devastation of the bomb on residents of Hiroshima.

However, it was only recently discovered by his grandson, Cannon Hersey, and Japanese filmmaker Taku Nishimae, when they were going through his files.It’s unclear whether John Hersey, who had interviewed Tanimoto in 1946, ever read the pastor’s manuscript.“People seemed to be buried in the ground,” Tanimoto writes in the book, saying he stepped over the dead and dying as he rushed to find his family.“Nothing whatsoever could be done, with the strength of only one person, to help the people beneath those houses.Yet there were people buried here and there – everywhere.”Miraculously Tanimoto, who describes undergoing severe bouts of diarrhea and fever, emerged from the ruins of his city largely unscathed.

More than 140,000 residents w...