Hiroshima Diary
A Hiroshima physician's day-by-day journal from the morning of the bomb, written as he treated the dying while injured himself.
The Verdict
Hiroshima from the ground zero up, recorded as it happened by a doctor who was himself among the wounded. Michihiko Hachiya was a hospital director in the city on the morning of 6 August 1945; his diary, kept day by day through the following weeks, describes treating the dying while injured himself, watching radiation sickness reveal itself before anyone understood it. The voice is clinical, bewildered, deeply humane. As the Japanese companion to Hersey's Hiroshima, it is irreplaceable — the catastrophe from inside it.
Who Should Read It
Read it if you want
- The atomic bombing from a survivor-physician
- The Japanese ground-level view
- A day-by-day contemporaneous record
- The clinical reality of radiation sickness as it emerged
Look elsewhere if you want
- The strategic debate over the bomb
- A broad history of the Pacific war
- A detached overview
Why We Rated It 4.6
Historical Context
Hachiya was director of the Hiroshima Communications Hospital when the atomic bomb was dropped on 6 August 1945. His diary covers the weeks that followed, recording the medical aftermath as he and his colleagues, themselves injured, struggled to treat survivors and to understand the new and mysterious symptoms of radiation sickness. It was published in English in 1955, translated by Warner Wells.
Events Covered
Editions & Reading Notes
Read It Alongside
Collector's Corner
Where to Buy
ISBN: 978-0807845479
Read This Against
The same events seen from a different vantage point. The fullest understanding often lives in the space between accounts that don't agree.
Other Books About the Same Events
Frequently Asked Questions
- Who wrote Hiroshima Diary?
- Dr. Michihiko Hachiya, a hospital director in Hiroshima who survived the atomic bombing and kept a daily journal of the aftermath.
- How does it relate to Hersey's Hiroshima?
- It is the essential Japanese companion — Hersey reports several survivors' stories; Hachiya gives one physician's day-by-day record from within the disaster.