Wittenberg University Journals

Rodgers, Clint

English

Family Ties to Anarchy: King Stephen  and Empress Matilda

Kay, Laura

Staging Religion: Liturgical Drama in the Central Middle Ages

Matthews, Adam

Framing Kingship: Directed Conceptions of Kingship in  Twelfth-Century England and France

Nair, Jacquelyn

To Achieve Heaven: Gendered Depictions of Mary Magdalene in the Gospels of Thomas and Mary

Hartenstein, Stu

The Decadent Olympics of 1896

Bogner, Molly

The Amarna Period in Egypt

Van Wormer, Rex

Vol. XXXV, Spring 2006 ° t
Kokoro no Kizu (Scars of the Heart)
The Story of Michiko Yamaoka,
Rex Van Wormer
Sometime around 8:00a.m. August 6, 1945, fifteen year old Michiko Yamaoka said
"see you later" to her mother and headed [or the door. As she was about to leave her
mother called out to her, "watch out, the B-29s might come back again."2 Ms. Yamaoka
assured her mother that she was just paranoid and started her journey to work without
giving it much thought? Several minutes after leaving her house she noticed a group
of students pulling down houses at a point about eight hundred meters away from the
hypocenter (ground zero) to form a fire break. It was at that moment she heard the faint
sound of planes passing over Hiroshima. "The planes were tricky. Sometimes they only
pretended to leave. I could still hear the very faint sound of planes."4 Her life would be
changed forever within the next few seconds. Looldng up into the clear summer sky
she remembered her mother's worries. Just as she was about to shield her eyes from the
bright sun she wimessed a "beautiful blue-yellow flash" and feli unconscious.
She regained consciousness in a sea of darkness and heard the voices of others
calling out for help. She soon heard her mother's voice and began to call out to her.
The fire could be heard cracking all around her as her mother eventually found her and
dug her out of the burning debris just in the nick of time. Thanks to her mother, Ms.
Yamaoka miraculously escaped death twice within in a matter of several minutes. Only
after being reunited with her mother did she realize the macabre scene around her. The
image of sldn hanging loosely and peeling off both her and her mother's arms was burnt
into her memory forever. Her mother gestured for her to leave and so she headed for
Hiyajima (an area that was not affected much by the initial blast)? As she made her way
through the "hell on earth" she heard a voice call out to her, "Michiko, is that you?" It
was her friend from school, Keko. Michil o was frightened by her friend's appearance
but was 'happy to have her company. They eventually came to a river filled with
countless bodies. Keko insisted on jumping into the river and was never seen again.
Fortunately, Ms. Yamaoka did not follow her friend and thus, escaped death a third time.
Ms. Yamaoka eventually made it to Hiyajima, which was also a nightmare.
Soidiers came to help and dispose of dead bodies but regrettably, had no medication
to give to the incalculable amount of victims. She still clearly recalls the horrors that
surrounded her. "'The worst part," she declares, "was that ff you stopped yelling, if you
stopped screaming, the soldiers considered you dead, and threw you on top of the pile
of corpsesJ" She, like many others, could do nothing but wait. Just when she was
about to lose all hope, her mother found her. Ms. Yamaoka was so badly injured that
her own mother could only identify her from the sound of her voice.
Ms. Yamaoka would never completely heal from her wounds. Directly after
the blast, she had burns throughout much of her body. Also, her fingers were melted
2 • The Wittenberg History Jouma!
together and she gradually lost her hair. About ten years after the end of the war, she
was invited to the United States by an independent organization, Friends, in order to
receive eatment that was not available in Japan at the time.7 She would stay in New
York for a year and a half, spending most of her time in a hospital where she underwent
twenty-seven operations. Even though the operations greatly improved her appearance,
she later would suffer from cancer and numerous other problems. The largest scar, she
says, is "the scars of her heart"8
Ms. Yamoka's testimony is a chilling reminder of the death and destruction
humans are capable of. The now seventy-five year oid hibakusha9 has long since
dedicated her life to peace education and is still traveling to share her story and speak
out against war everywhere. "Nuclear weapons," she asserts, 
"are 
such an inhumane
way to kill people. I don't want anyone to have to go through what I did." Remarkably,
she still has faith in humanity and is certain that peace is possible. She asserts, 
"Never
believe that we are powerless. Peace will come through the accumulation of individual
efforts. My heart's deepest desire is the abolition of nuclear weapons and genuine peace
on Earth."1° Hopefully everyone who hears her story will do their part to ensure that
Ms. Yamaoka's vision becomes a reality, for it is the only way to fully heal the scars of
her heart.
End Notes
Ms. Yamaoka's lecture at the Hiroshima Peace Museum was the main basis for this work.
A few online sources, however, were used in order to create a more complete narrative.
2 Michiko Yamaoka, Hiroshima Peace Memorial Museum, Hiroshima, Japan, October, 2004.
3 In order to support the war effort, Ms. Yamaoka, like many young women at the time,
was encouraged to find employment prior to finishing school. She worked as a
switchboard operator.
4 "Hiroshima: Survivors," Hiroshima International School,
http://www.hiroshima-is.ac.jp/Hiroshima/survivors.htm#Michiko % 20Yamaoka
Ibid.
Ibid.
7 "Michiko Yamaoka," IDEA Center for the Voices of Human!ty, 26, June 2003,
http://www.idealepro sydignity.org/Voices ODIumanity/Awards . tm
Michiko Yamaoka
9 Atomic bomb survivor
0 "Michiko Yamaoka," IDEA Center for the Voices of Humanity.


Kokoro no Kizu (Scars of the Heart) The Story of Michiko Yamaoka

Rey, Eric

The Resignation of Clarendon: The Power of Personal Relationships in Politics in Early Modern England

Strong, Tyler

Intellectual Biography - Japan

Wilson, Bradley

Vol. XVI, Spring 2012 © 7 
Hartje Paper: 
The Personal History of Sgt. Robert E. Wilson: 
Narrative of a WWII Infantryman 
Bradley S. Wilson 
Caught off guard in his foxhole, staring down 
the barrel of a deadly German submachine gun, Set. 
Robert E. Wilson must choose either being killed 
or becoming a prisoner of war. “It was an easy 
choice... | became a prisoner of war,” said Wilson.! 
The 87 year old retired Army infantryman swirls the 
ice in his drink and stares off into the distance as he 
remembers the past. 
Only three years before becoming a POW 
Wilson had been in high school. He had envisioned 
his senior year being spent in the high school halls; 
instead he spent it on the frontlines of Europe during 
World War IIL. “I was a soldier at 18, saw my first 
combat at 19, and became a POW at 20” said the 
retired soldier? Wilson was drafted into the Amny 
in July of 1943, a time when the tide of the war was 
turning back against the Allied Forces. Instead of 
training for the usual 21 weeks in basic training, he 
only trained for 17 weeks before he was thrust into 
battle. 
Wilson landed at Anzio Beach, in Southern 
Italy, in early 1944. “February 24, 1944— it was 
my birthday, I was 19 and it was my first time in 
cormbat,” comments Wilson.? He was sure that 
they were all going to be killed on that first day, 
with bullets raining down from the mountains and 
artillery shells exploding yards away. One of the 
giant artillery pieces that the Germans unleashed 
was nicknamed the “Anzio Express,” which could 
shoot a projectile as large as a 500 pound bomb. “I 
can still hear that shell coming, even though it has 
been over 50 years ago” remembers Wilson.‘ 
During his experience as the first scout, he 
was the first U.S. soldier to enter a town in southern 
France and see the people rejoice at the Americans’ 
arrival. The town had been occupied by Germans 
for years. It appeared to be abandoned upon first 
inspection. He described an old man coming out 
of his house and into the deserted street. When he 
saw Wilson, he asked him if he was American. “I 
kiss first American I see,” said the old man in broken 
English.5 He threw his arms around Wilson and 
kissed him on both cheeks, weeping like a baby. 
He will never forget the touching reaction of the 
liberated people. “I was a little embarrassed to have 
been kissed by that old man,” states Wilson, “but 
also proud to have been the first American soldier 
these people had seen.”® 
The most difficult memory to deal with is the 
day his sergeant was killed. After receiving his third 
Purple Heart the sergeant had retumed once again to 
action. While delivering rations between foxholes, 
the sergeant was killed by a direct hit from an 
artillery shell. Nothing was ever found of him. “This 
was a loss that even today brings tears to my eyes,” 
said Wilson, “they never even found his dog tags or 
his shoes, there was literally nothing left.” ” 
When he later found himself staring down 
the barrel of that German machine gun, Wilson felt 
lucky to survive even as a prisoner. “He could have 
cut me in half,” remembers Wilson, “but he held his 
fire.® The first POW camp was used to separate the 
Americans from the other nationalities. Wilson’s 
final destination of the war was the Mooseberg 
Camp, near Munich. Wilson was forced to do hard 
labor and he constantly struggled to get food and to 
avoid the bombs of Allied air strikes. Working on 
the railroad tracks in Munich was dangerous because 
of constant bombing by the Americans during the 
day and the British during the night. The prisoners 
had to manually pump air into the German air raid 
shelters deep beneath Munich. 
One day while working on the railroad tracks 
in Munich, Wilson saw prisoners with the Star of 
David on their thinly striped uniforms. They were 
in very poor health and the Americans tried to share 
bread with them. The German guards refused, 
saying that they were political prisoners. Wilson 
later leamed that the Dachau concentration camp 
was near them, outside Munich. “All those men
2 © The Wittenberg History Journal 
were probably on their way to the gas chamber,” 
said Wilson? 
By April 1945 the German guards had become 
friendly because they knew the war was winding 
down. They stopped making the prisoners work, 
placed them in a bomb shelter, and said they would 
supply them with rifles if the dreaded German 5.5. 
Troops came to kill the Americans. On April 30, 
1945 a vehicle approached and it was a jeep witha 
lone American driver. The Americans, laughing and 
crying, poured out of the bomb shelter that had been 
their most recent quarters. Wilson said this was the 
happiest day of his life. He had been a POW for 
seven months and 18 days. 
When Wilson reflects upon his war experience 
he feels blessed to have survived but bewildered by 
the fact that he got to come home. “] often wonder 
how anyone who served in the Infantry could have 
lived to talk about it,” said Wilson reflectively, “it 
must be plain good luck.”!° When he sleeps he 
still dreams of the war. “It’s like another life,” said 
Wilson. “It’s like watching a movie you’ve seen 
many times before.”!! 
Bibliography 
Wilson, Robert B. “My World War Il Journal: A Diary of 
an Infantryman.” Pickaway Quarterly (Spring 1996): 
4-10. 
Wilson, Robert E. “My World War II Journal: A Diary of 
an Infantryman.” Pickaway Quarterly (Summer 1996): 
4-8. 
Wilson, Robert E. “Oral interviews with Sgt. Robert E. 
Wilson.” Interviews by Bradley S. Wilson, Circleville, 
OH, 1995-2012. 
Endnotes 
1 Robert E. Wilson, “My World War II Journal: A Diary 
of an Infantryman,” Pickaway Quarterly (Spring 1996): 10. 
2 Robert E. Wilson, Interview by Bradley S. Wilson, 
Circleville, OH. 3/18/2011 
8 Wilson, “My World War II Journal,” 4. 
4 Wilson, Interview, 3/18/2011 
5 Wilson, Interview, 3/18/2011 
§ Wilson, “My World War Il Journal,” 7. 
7 Wilson, “My World War II Journal,” 6. 
§ Wilson, Interview, 3/18/2011 
? Robert E. Wilson, “My World War Ii Journal: A Diary 
of an Infantryman,” Pickaway Quarterly (Summer 1996): 6. 
10 Wilson, “My World War {I Journal,” (Summer 1996) 5. 
11 Wilson, Interview. 3/18/2011.


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Family Ties to Anarchy: King Stephen and Empress Matilda