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Takashi and Akiko Fukushima with records of trail
followed by Second Lieutenant Masaya Abe
(October 6, 2014, Shinagawa Ward, Tōkyō Prefecture)
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Puzzle Left for Couple: Journey of Seven Years to Search for Date of Death (Takusareta
nazo:
Meinichi saguri fūfu no tabi 7nen)
Researched and written by Shūji Fukano and Fusako Kadota
Pages 35-37 of Tokkō kono chi yori: Kagoshima shutsugeki no kiroku
(Special attacks from this land: Record of Kagoshima sorties)
Minaminippon Shinbunsha, 2016
At the end of summer in 2004, a package arrived without any prior notice at
the home of Takashi and Akiko Fukushima who live in Tōkyō Prefecture.
Inside were old notes, diary entries, letters, and photos. These were items
left by Masaya Abe, cousin of Akiko's father. Akiko had heard that he had died
in battle in a special (suicide) attack.
The sender was Masaya's older sister who was 84 years old. Akiko says,
"My father also died in battle in New Guinea. Since I was a child whose parent
was lost in the war, it seems that she thought that I would understand the
importance of these items that used to belong to Masaya."
Newspaper articles also were enclosed. There was a special collection from the
August 1977 anniversary of the war's end.
Second Lieutenant Masaya Abe, who was from Fukuoka Prefecture and 21 years old at
the time, was assigned to the 24th Shinbu Squadron. He made a sortie from Chiran
on April 29, 1945. That is his date of death in battle that was officially
reported, but actually he made a forced landing at the small island of Kuroshima
(now part of Mishima Village) due to engine trouble.
First he made a forced landing, and there was a squadron member there who had
suffered serious burns. Second Lieutenant Abe returned to the mainland in a
small boat rowed by an islander for more than 30 hours, and he again
departed for Okinawa. Along the way in the skies above the island, he dropped
burn medicine for his comrade. However, a newspaper reported, "Even now it is
not known when he again made a sortie and his true date of death."
Takashi was shocked "as if an electric current ran through me." For the first
time he realized the fact that the day he thought was Abe's date of death was
actually the date he survived.
Masaya's older sister passed away a half year after receipt of the package.
It was sudden. "She may have left to us a request that she wanted us to search
for the correct date of death." The Fukushima couple began their journey to
search for the "true date of death."
Absolutely nothing remained in Army records about another sortie.
We went several times to Chiran and Kuroshima. We listened to stories from the
islander who rowed the small boat and the islanders who received medicine
from the sky. We could only link together their memories and imagine what
happened.
The journey extended to seven years. The couple finally concluded that the
date when he again made a sortie was May 5.
They wanted to know not only how Second Lieutenant Abe died but also how he
lived, so they met with his school friends. They said, "He was a stylish
man who liked to be flamboyant."
They found out that he had an offer to work at the Bank of Japan, but
in the fall of 1943 he graduated early from
Meiji University and
joined the Army in the 1st Class of the Army Special Cadet Officer Pilot
Training Program.
A diary, which was among the items that he left, was written at Tachiarai
Army Flight School over the period of one year starting in December 1943. They
came to understand how this patriotic youth was filled with determination by
reading his diary. "What is the country requesting? Young men like ourselves
must as soon as possible take up weapons, advance forward bravely, and hasten to
bring stability to East Asia." "I will lay down my life for the country." On
December 5, 1944, the day after he was named a Special Attack Corps member, he
wrote, "I believe in certain victory. I believe that there are others who will
follow afterward."
"I carried out 'training to die' with my comrades in the 24th Shinbu Squadron. The
belief that we must continue was strong." Takashi imagines that he had such a
feeling when he again made a sortie.
Translated by Bill Gordon
May 2025
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