Hiroshima atomic bombing survivor Shigeaki Mori, 88, speaks to reporters on the 80th anniversary of the Lonesome Lady B-24 bomber crash in Ikachi, Japan, on July 28, 2025. (Janiqua Robinson/Stars and Stripes)
TOKYO — A Japanese atomic bomb survivor who spent decades researching American prisoners of war killed in the Hiroshima attack has died at age 88.
Shigeaki Mori devoted nearly 50 years to uncovering the stories of 12 Americans who died in the atomic bombing carried out by the U.S. Army Air Forces on Aug. 6, 1945.
Mori gained international attention in 2016 when then-President Barack Obama embraced him at the Hiroshima Peace Memorial. Obama was the first sitting U.S. president to visit the site, which honors about 140,000 people killed in the world’s first atomic bombing.
Masanori Takenaga, owner of the Ikachi Lonesome Lady Peace Memorial Museum, looks at "A Hopeful Sign" at the public library in Yanai city, Japan, July 27, 2022. (Jonathan Snyder/Stars and Stripes)
Mori died Saturday afternoon at a Hiroshima hospital, according to Japanese media reports and the editors of the web-based English translation of Mori’s book, “A Secret History of U.S. Servicemembers Who Died in the Atomic Bomb.”
He was 8 years old and about 1½ miles from the blast’s hypocenter when the atomic bomb, dubbed Little Boy, was dropped from the B-29 Superfortress Enola Gay and detonated over the city.
Mori recalled walking on a bridge, being blown away by the blast and landing in the water without injuries or burns. He later found out that everyone else on the bridge had died.
Mori was amazed at his luck, since he was exposed to a large amount of radiation, fallout in the form of black rain and also drank water contaminated with radiation, he told Stars and Stripes in 2015.
Decades after the war, Mori began investigating the fate of American airmen captured after their aircraft crashed near Hiroshima. He discovered that several were being held at a Japanese military police headquarters in the city when the bomb fell.
Through years of research, Mori reviewed documents and interviewed witnesses to piece together the events leading to their deaths. He later contacted family members, some of whom had not known what had happened to their relatives.
Mori also worked to ensure the Americans were recognized among the bombing’s victims. He built a memorial for them at his own expense, helped secure their inclusion in the registry of atomic bomb victims at the Hiroshima Peace Memorial Museum and arranged for their portraits to be displayed there.
“When I first learned of the American victims, I realized that none of them had been officially recognized as a victim of the atomic bomb. It was shocking to me,” Mori told Stars and Stripes in 2015.
He said he wanted to shed light on those Americans who were killed in the bombing just like the other victims.
“Unless someone speaks for them, their sacrifices would be thrown into darkness,” he said.
