World War II: A Glance Through Photographs.

Although thousands, even millions, of photographs were taken during World War II, only a handful ever became popular. But sometimes it’s the little-known photographs that reveal to us the cruelty and uncertainty the war brought upon humanity.

10 The Nazi Muslim Soldiers

Photo via Rare Historical Photos

 

The image above is that of German Nazi-era Muslim soldiers in prayer. They are from the German 13th Waffen-Gebirgs-Division der SS Handschar, a full Muslim division of the German army. The unit, which mostly consisted of Bosnian Muslims, was formed in March 1943 after Germany conquered Croatia, which included Bosnia-Herzegovina. The Bosnian Muslims were accepted into the Nazi ranks because of Heinrich Himmler’s belief that the people of Croatia were of Aryan descent, not Slavic. The Nazis also believed that the new division would help them win the support of most Muslims around the world. In time, the division also included Croatian Roman Catholics, who formed 10 percent of its ranks.

The unit was Grand Mufti Hajj Amin al Husseni’s initiative. Hajj Amin al Husseni had led a failed coup in Iraq and had been exiled to Italy and then Berlin, Germany, where he encouraged Bosnian Muslims to join the ranks of the German army. Husseni encouraged the killings of Jews in North Africa and Palestine. He also wanted the Luftwaffe to bomb Tel Aviv. After the war, Husseni fled to France, where he was arrested. He later escaped and fled to Egypt, where the Allies were discouraged from re-arresting him because of his status in the Arab world.

 

 9 Shaving The Hair Of French Women 

 

Photo via Rare Historical Photos

 

After France was liberated toward the end of World War II, French citizens who had supported the invading German troops in any form were tracked down and had their heads forcefully shaved as a badge of dishonor. The photograph shown above is that of a woman whose head was being shaved in Montelimer, France, on August 29, 1944. As many as 20,000 French citizens had their heads shaved in public, the majority of which were women. The punishment was often carried out by locals or members of the French Resistance and was done everywhere from the homes of the victims to public squares in the presence of a cheering crowd.
During the same period, Germany also decreed that women who had sexual relations with non-Aryans or prisoners of war should have their heads shaved. Shaving the hair of women seen as fugitives didn’t get its start during World War II—it’s also recorded to have been done in Europe during the Middle Ages, when it was used as punishment for adulterous women.

 8 Raising A Flag Over The Reichstag

Photo credit: Yevgeny Khaldei

 

Raising a flag over the Reichstag would have been the Russian equivalent of Raising the Flag on Iwo Jima except that it was staged, a fact which its photographer, Yevgeny Khaldei, confirmed. The photograph shows a young Russian soldier raising the Soviet flag over Berlin after the defeat of the German army.

Yevgeny Khaldei was in Moscow when the Soviet army overran Berlin, but he quickly left for Berlin on the orders of top Soviet officials, possibly Joseph Stalin himself. His orders were to produce images that depicted the Soviet victory in Germany. Yevgeny got to Berlin and inspected several locations, including Tempelhof Airport and the Brandenburg Gate, before settling for the Reichstag building. Yevgeny took 36 different shots of the scene, which was to be used for Soviet propaganda. Interestingly, a Soviet army unit had initially hoisted its flag on the building not long after the town was captured, but that scenario had gone unrecorded.

 7 The Weeping Woman Of Sudetenland

Photo via Picturia Historia

 

This photo of a weeping Sudeten woman is one of the most controversial photographs of World War II. It was also a propaganda tool used by both the Allies and the Nazis. The photograph was taken in Sudetenland, Czechoslovakia, in October 1938 after the city was captured and annexed by Germany just before World War II officially began. The photograph shows a weeping Sudeten woman raising one of her arms to salute the invading German troops while the other hand holds a handkerchief over one of her tear-filled eyes.
The photograph appeared in different newspapers in different countries with different captions. It was first published by a German newspaper, Volkischer Beobachter, which said that the Sudeten woman was so overjoyed by the advancing German soldiers that she could not hide her feelings. In the United States, one newspaper said that the women could not hide her misery as she “dutifully” saluted Hitler.

 6 The Weeping Frenchman

Photo credit: Office of War Information

 

In the summer of 1940, German soldiers rolled into Paris, marking the defeat of France and the beginning of “Les Annee Noires” also known as “The Dark Years.” By the time the German soldiers began moving in, the French government had already abandoned the city and fled to Bordeaux in southern France, which was their last stronghold. The exact date the picture was taken is disputed. While it originally appeared in 1941, it is believed to have been taken in 1940. The man in the picture is believed to be Monsieur Jerome Barrett, who was crying as the flags of France made their way through Marseilles on their way to Africa.

The defeat of France during World War II was shocking as well as disappointing. Prior to the war, it was believed that France had the best army in the whole of Europe. After France fell to Germany, Adolf Hitler insisted that the documents to acknowledge the surrender of France must be signed in the Compiegne Forest, inside the same railroad car Germany had signed the documents of its own surrender in at the end of World War I. The railroad car was already in a museum, but it was removed and taken to the forest so the documents could be signed.

 5 The Gadget

Photo credit: US Government

 

The atomic bombs that went off over Hiroshima and Nagasaki are sometimes said to be the first nuclear weapons. Actually, the two bombs weren’t the first—they were just the first nuclear weapons deployed to kill and destroy. The first atomic bomb ever made was the Gadget (photograph above). It was completed and tested weeks before two other atomic bombs went off over Hiroshima and Nagasaki. The test, called Trinity, was carried out at the Alamogordo Bombing and Gunnery Range, known today as White Sands Missile Range, in New Mexico.

The bomb was placed on a forest service watchtower 30 meters (100 ft) tall. Three bunkers were constructed 9,000 meters (29,000 ft) away from the tower so that the impending explosion could be observed. In the early hours of July 16, 1945, the Gadget went off. The resulting explosion sent shock waves through the desert, vaporizing the tower and producing a gigantic mushroom cloud 12,000 meters (40,000 ft) high. It produced a flash brighter than 10 Suns. The flash was so bright that it was seen in all of New Mexico and parts of Arizona, Texas, and Mexico. The heat produced was so severe that observers 16 kilometers (10 mi) away compared it to standing in front of a “roaring” fireplace.

 4 The Warsaw Ghetto Boy

Photo via Wikimedia

 

We’ve already talked about the Warsaw Ghetto Uprising, when Jews in Warsaw, Poland, launched a 10-day revolt against German soldiers. The Jews knew quite well that they would be defeated, but they didn’t want to give up without a fight. “The Warsaw ghetto boy” is the name given to a young Jewish boy, not more than 10 years old, who was arrested by German soldiers in the ghetto after the uprising had been crushed. The unidentified boy’s hands were raised in the air while a German soldier pointed a machine gun at him. Although the photograph is one of the most circulated images of the Holocaust, no one knows who the boy is or what happened to him.

Some sources say he was gassed to death at Treblinka camp, while others say he survived. In 1999, a man named Avrahim Zeilinwarger contacted an Israeli museum saying that the boy was his son, Levi Zeilinwarger, who was gassed to death in a concentration camp in 1943. In 1978, an unnamed man contacted the Jewish Chronicle saying that the boy was his son. In 1977, a woman named Jadwiga Piesecka claimed that the boy was Artur Dab Siemiatek, who was born in 1935. In 1982, a New York ear, nose, and throat specialist claimed that he could be the boy, although he himself doubted it. While he was arrested in Warsaw, he had never been to the ghetto. Besides, he was arrested on July 13, 1943, months after the picture is said to have been taken.

 3 The Prisoner Of War Olympics

Photo via Mental Floss

 

Because of the ongoing war, the Olympic Games of 1940 and 1944, slated for Tokyo and London, could not be held. However, several POW camps in Poland went ahead with their own Olympics, both in 1940 and 1944. While many of the events were held in secret, the 1944 Woldenberg Olympics, held at the camp in Woldenberg, and another held at the camp in Gross Born (both in Poland), were held on a much larger scale.
About 369 out of the 7,000 prisoners at the Woldenberg camp participated in several games, including handball, basketball, and boxing. Fencing, archery, pole vaulting, and javelin were not allowed. The flags for the games were made with excess bedsheets which even the German guards saluted. Winners of sporting events were given medals made out of cardboard. The 1944 Olympics was held because the Polish soldiers wanted to remain fit and, at the same time, honor Janusz Kusocinski, a Polish athlete who won the 10,000-meter race in the 1932 Olympics.

 2 The Sinking Of HMAS Armidale

Photo via Wikimedia

 

The HMAS Armidale was a corvette (although it was originally built to be a minesweeper) in service of the Australian navy during World War II. It was commissioned on June 11, 1942, only to be sunk in November that same year. While on a mission to evacuate soldiers and civilians from Betano Bay, Timor, the HMAS Armidale was spotted by Japanese airplanes, which proceeded to attack it along with its sister ship, HMAS Castlemaine. Armidale was soon destroyed by the attacking Japanese airplanes, forcing its crewmen to abandon ship. Twenty-one crewmen, including the captain, climbed onto a small, damaged motorboat, where they awaited rescue. When the rescue never came, they began rowing toward Australian waters.
Two days later, another 29 survivors began a similar journey on a badly damaged whaler that wouldn’t stop taking water. The survivors clung to a floating raft (shown in the photograph above) while awaiting rescue. 
After several days out at sea, the men on the motorboat were rescued along with those on the whaler. But the men hanging on the raft were never found.

The photograph shown above was taken by the pilot of a Hudson reconnaissance airplane, who even dropped a message for them saying that their rescuers were on the way.

 1 Yakov Dzhugashvili

Photo via Rare Historical Photos

 

The man with his hands in his pocket in the photograph above is Yakov Dzhugashvili, the first son of Josef Stalin. The picture was taken after Yakov was captured by German troops during World War II. Yakov and Stalin were not on good terms long before the war began. Stalin often insulted him and even disowned him. He also barred Yakov from changing his surname to Stalin after he changed his.

When the Germans realized that Yakov was Stalin’s son, they took his photograph for propaganda purposes. On the back of the propaganda photographs was a short note urging Soviet soldiers to surrender just like Stalin’s son. When the Germans asked to swap Yakov with a captured German field marshal, Stalin told them off, saying that he did not swap lieutenants with field marshals. Even with his hatred and public lashing of his son, Stalin actually attempted to rescue him twice.

Yakov died at the Sachsenhausen concentration camp in April 1943 under mysterious circumstances. While declassified archives reveal that he was shot for failing to follow orders, others say he committed suicide by walking into an electrified fence. Another report said that he was killed in action in 1945.

World War II: A Glance through Diary Pages

The terror and devastation faced by millions during World War II is essentially unimaginable. Perhaps the closest we can come is through the eyewitness accounts of the ordinary people caught up in history’s deadliest conflict. Here are 10 heartbreaking World War II diary entries written by everyday people.
 
10. Michihiko Hachiya, Hiroshima Resident, August 6, 1945

Photo credit: US Navy

We started out, but after 20 or 30 steps I had to stop. My breath became short, my heart pounded, and my legs gave way under me. An overpowering thirst seized me and I begged Yaeko-san to find me some water. But there was no water to be found. After a little my strength somewhat returned and we were able to go on. 

I was still naked, and although I did not feel the least bit of shame, I was disturbed to realize that modesty had deserted me... Our progress towards the hospital was interminably slow, until finally, my legs, stiff from drying blood, refused to carry me farther. The strength, even the will, to go on deserted me, so I told my wife, who was almost as badly hurt as I, to go on alone. This she objected to, but there was no choice. She had to go ahead and try to find someone to come back for me.

On August 6, 1945, an atomic bomb detonated directly over central Hiroshima, immediately killing around a quarter of the city’s population and exposing the remainder to dangerous levels of radiation. When the bomb hit, a hospital worker named Michihiko Hachiya was lying down in his home, around 1.5 kilometers (1 mi) from the center of the explosion. His incredible diary, published in 1955, recounts his experiences that day. The above passage describes Michihiko’s short journey to the hospital just minutes after the detonation. The sheer force of the blast had ripped the clothes from his body and his entire right side was badly cut and burned. The “overpowering thirst” that Michihiko describes is a direct effect of losing body fluid from severe burns.

Both Michihiko and his wife were lucky to survive. The area of the city they inhabited saw a fatality rate of 27 percent. Just 0.8 kilometers (0.5 mi) closer to the center of the explosion the fatality rate was 86 percent. While most historians agree that the atomic bombings of Japan were necessary to accelerate the Japanese surrender, eyewitness accounts like Michihiko’s give a clear image as to why nuclear weapons have never been used again.


9. Zygmunt Klukowski, Polish Doctor, October 21, 1942

Photo credit: USHMM

From early morning until late at night we witnessed indescribable events. Armed SS soldiers, gendarmes, and “blue police” ran through the city looking for Jews. Jews were assembled in the marketplace. The Jews were taken from their houses, barns, cellars, attics, and other hiding places. Pistol and gun shots were heard throughout the entire day. Sometimes hand grenades were thrown into the cellars. Jews were beaten and kicked; it made no difference whether they were men, women, or small children. 

All Jews will be shot. Between 400 and 500 have been killed. Poles were forced to begin digging graves in the Jewish cemetery. From information I received approximately 2,000 people are in hiding. The arrested Jews were loaded into a train at the railroad station to be moved to an unknown location. 

It was a terrifying day, I cannot describe everything that took place. You cannot imagine the barbarism of the Germans. I am completely broken and cannot seem to find myself.

On January 20, 1942, 15 senior Nazi officials held a conference to discuss the implementation of a “Final Solution” to obliterate the Jewish people. It took another nine months for the genocide to reach the sleepy town of Szczebrzeszyn in southeast Poland. The above diary entry was written by Zygmunt Klukowski, the chief physician of Szczebrzeszyn’s small hospital. Klukowski was an enthusiastic diarist and noted everything that occurred in his village during the Nazi occupation. He took a great risk in doing so, knowing that the discovery of his chronicle would have marked him for death.

This particularly harrowing entry documents the speed and ferocity with which Jews were rounded up in thousands of villages and towns throughout Eastern Europe. The following day, Klukowski noted that the German SS had already left the village, leaving the Polish military police in charge of locating any remaining Jews. Klukowski, who was devastated by his inability to do anything to help the injured, expressed disgust at how many of his fellow townsfolk took part in the violence against the Jews.


8. Lena Mukhina, Leningrad Resident, January 3, 1942

Photo credit: RIA Novosti Archive

We are dying like flies here because of the hunger, but yesterday Stalin gave another dinner in Moscow in honor of [the British Foreign Secretary, Anthony] Eden. This is outrageous. They fill their bellies there, while we don’t even get a piece of bread. They play host at all sorts of brilliant receptions, while we live like cavemen, like blind moles.

To say that the Russian people had it rough during World War II would be a monumental understatement. Depending on the source, it’s estimated that between 7–20 million Russian civilians died as a direct result of the conflict. In Leningrad alone, as many as 750,000 civilians starved to death as the Germans placed the city under siege for over two years, from September 1941 to January 1944. The above diary entry was written by 17-year-old resident Lena Mukhina just a few months into the siege.

As the blockade wore on, residents were reduced to eating rats, cats, earth, and glue. There were widespread reports of cannibalism. At the time the entry above was written, Lena was living with her aunt, who tragically died from hunger a month later. Lena managed to survive by concealing the death from the authorities, allowing her to continue using her aunt’s food card. In later entries, she begins to plot an escape to Moscow. Her diary ends suddenly on May 25, 1942, when she made a dangerous journey to safety across Lake Ladoga. Lena died in 1991, a few short months before the Soviet Union finally collapsed.


7. Felix Landau, SS Officer, July 12, 1941

Photo via: Wikipedia

At 6:00 in the morning I was suddenly awoken from a deep sleep. Report for an execution. Fine, so I’ll just play executioner and then gravedigger, why not. Isn’t it strange, you love battle and then have to shoot defenseless people. Twenty-three had to be shot, amongst them the two above-mentioned women. They are unbelievable. They even refused to accept a glass of water from us. 

I was detailed as marksman and had to shoot any runaways. We drove one kilometer along the road out of town and then turned right into a wood. There were only six of us at that point and we had to find a suitable spot to shoot and bury them. After a few minutes we found a place. The death candidates assembled with shovels to dig their own graves. Two of them were weeping. 

The others certainly have incredible courage. What on earth is running through their minds during these moments? I think that each of them harbors a small hope that somehow he won’t be shot. The death candidates are organized into three shifts as there are not many shovels. 

Strange, I am completely unmoved. No pity, nothing. That’s the way it is and then it’s all over. My heart beats just a little faster when involuntarily I recall the feelings and thoughts I had when I was in a similar situation.

Felix Landau was a member of the feared German SS. For much of the war he belonged to an Einsatzkommando, a mobile death squad charged with exterminating Jews, Romani gypsies, Polish intellectuals, and a number of other groups within Nazi-occupied territory. Landau operated throughout Poland and Ukraine, slaughtering his way from town to town.

His remarkable diary details his appalling crimes, often in graphic detail. This entry, from July 1941, records his actions in the city of Drohobych in western Ukraine. The lack of emotion he feels during the killings is typical of SS officers who took part in mass executions. Landau was documented as being particularly brazen in his ill-treatment of Jews, randomly shooting at them from his window as they walked down the street. Following the war, Landau managed to evade capture until 1959, when he was put on trial and sentenced to life imprisonment. He was released for “good behavior” in 1971 and died in 1983.


6. Leslie Skinner, British Army Chaplain, August 4, 1944

Photo via: the Telegraph

On foot located brewed up tanks. Only ash and burnt metal in Birkett’s tank. Searched ash and found remains pelvic bones. At other tanks three bodies still inside. Unable to remove bodies after long struggle—nasty business—sick.

The diary of Captain Leslie Skinner documents his experiences of the brutal conflict immediately following the D-Day landings. Skinner was not a combat soldier, but a priest, assigned as an army chaplain to the Sherwood Rangers Yeomanry tank regiment. The first chaplain to land on D-Day, he was badly wounded by a mortar shell but quickly returned to the front and stayed with the regiment throughout its campaign in northwest Europe. Known as “Padre Skinner,” his job was to provide spiritual comfort and perform last rites. A more harrowing part of the job involved recovering the bodies of the dead to give them a proper burial:

Fearful job picking up bits and pieces and reassembling for identification and putting in blankets for burial. No infantry to help. Squadron Leader offered to lend me some men to help. Refused. Less men who live and fight in tanks have to do with this side of things the better. My job. This was more than normally sick making. Really ill—vomiting.

Padre Skinner donated his diary to the Imperial War Museum in 1991. He died 10 years later at the age of 89.


5. David Koker, Concentration Camp Prisoner, February 4, 1944

Photo credit: Bundesarchiv

A slight, insignificant-looking little man, with a rather good-humored face. High peaked cap, mustache, and small spectacles. I think: If you wanted to trace back all the misery and horror to just one person, it would have to be him. Around him a lot of fellows with weary faces. Very big, heavily dressed men, they swerve along whichever way he turns, like a swarm of flies, changing places among themselves (they don’t stand still for a moment) and moving like a single whole. It makes a fatally alarming impression. They look everywhere without finding anything to focus on.

While Holocaust survivors have written a number of memoirs, only a few diaries have been recovered from the concentration camps. One was written by David Koker, a Dutch student of Jewish descent who was sent to Camp Vught in southern Holland in February 1943. David’s story has strong similarities with that of Anne Frank. He had lived in Amsterdam with his parents and younger brother until he was captured. Unlike Anne, however, David began his diary after he was captured.

While most concentration camp prisoners would have been prevented from keeping a diary, David had befriended the camp clerk and his wife at Vught, meaning he was allowed extra privileges. The above entry is quite remarkable—it is a description of Heinrich Himmler, the leader of the SS and one of the main architects of the Holocaust. Himmler visited Vught in February 1944, giving Koker an eyewitness view of the man responsible for persecuting his people.

Later that month, a camp employee smuggled Koker’s diary to safety. Koker himself was moved between camps as the Allies retook much of occupied Europe. He died in 1945, while being transported to the notorious Dachau concentration camp.


4. George Orwell, Resident Of London, September 15, 1940

Photo via: the Guardian

This morning, for the first time, saw an aeroplane shot down. It fell slowly out of the clouds, nose foremost, just like a snipe that has been shot high overhead. Terrific jubilation among the people watching, punctuated every now and then by the question, “Are you sure it’s German?” So puzzling are the directions given, and so many the types of aeroplane, that no one even knows which are German planes and which are our own. My only test is that if a bomber is seen over London it must be a German, whereas a fighter is likelier to be ours.

During the war, legendary author George Orwell was among the 8.6 million inhabitants of London. Aside from his literary work, he kept an in-depth diary of his experiences during the war. The diary is mostly taken up with political discussions but occasionally gives an eyewitness account of air strikes.

This entry comes from September 1940, as the RAF wrestled for control of the skies over southern England during the Battle of Britain. It may seem strange to think of people openly celebrating a plane being shot down, but it was widely acknowledged that if the Germans had been victorious in the Battle of Britain, Hitler could have launched an amphibious invasion. Fortunately, Britain emerged the decisive victors, marking the first real defeat of Hitler’s forces during the war.


3. “Ginger,” Resident Of Pearl Harbor, December 7, 1941

Photo credit: National Archives

I was awakened at eight o’clock on the morning by an explosion from Pearl Harbor. I got up thinking something exciting was probably going on over there. Little did I know! When I reached the kitchen the whole family, excluding Pop, was looking over at the Navy Yard. It was being consumed by black smoke and more terrific explosions... Then I became extremely worried, as did we all. 

Mom and I went out on the front porch to get a better look and three planes went zooming over our heads so close we could have touched them. They had red circles on their wings. Then we caught on! About that time bombs started dropping all over Hickam. We stayed at the windows, not knowing what else to do, and watched the fire works. It was just like the newsreels of Europe, only worse. 

We saw a bunch of soldiers come running full tilt towards us from the barracks and just then a whole line of bombs fell behind them knocking them all to the ground. We were deluged in a cloud of dust and had to run around closing all the windows. In the meantime a bunch of soldiers had come into our garage to hide. They were entirely taken by surprise and most of them didn’t even have a gun or anything.

The bombing of Pearl Harbor by Japanese forces in December 1941 effectively turned two existing regional conflicts in Europe and China into a World War. Aimed at the US naval base on the south coast of Hawaii’s Oahu island, the surprise attack left 2,403 Americans dead and was the catalyst for the United States to enter the war. The area surrounding Pearl Harbor was not restricted to servicemen but was inhabited by their families and local islanders. The diary entry above was written by a 17-year-old high school senior known as “Ginger” (her full name was not published along with the diary). Ginger lived at Hickam Field, on the eastern edge of the Pearl Harbor base.

The diary demonstrates the shock the attacks caused. The Japanese had not yet declared war when the first bombs were dropped, which explains why the soldiers in Ginger’s account were so unprepared. The attack lasted only 90 minutes but destroyed a significant area of the base.


2. Wilhelm Hoffman, German Soldier, July 29, 1942

Photo credit: Russian State Military Archive

The company commander says the Russian troops are completely broken, and cannot hold out any longer. To reach the Volga and take Stalingrad is not so difficult for us. The Fuhrer knows where the Russians’ weak point is. Victory is not far away.

The most vital and bloodiest battles of World War II were fought on the Eastern Front. A telling statistic reveals that for every German that died on the Western Front, another nine died in the East. And the deadliest battle of the entire war was at Stalingrad, where a five-month bloodbath turned the tide in favor of the Soviet Union.

The above diary entry comes from Wilhelm Hoffman, a soldier in the 94th Infantry Division of the German Sixth Army. Hoffman’s diary is an amazing insight into the attitude of ordinary German soldiers before and during the battle of Stalingrad. The entry was written at the end of July, a month before Stalingrad. Up to then, the German army had seen victory after victory and Hoffman felt confident they could conquer Stalingrad and then the rest of Russia.

Of course, it didn’t happen that way. Against all odds, the city’s defenders clung on, staging a brutal building-to-building fight while the Red Army prepared its counterattack. By December, it was the Germans who were surrounded. By that point, Hoffman’s diary had become pessimistic about the chance of victory. The entry from December 26, 1942 stands in stark contrast to his attitude during the summer:

The horses have already been eaten. I would eat a cat; they say its meat is also tasty. The soldiers look like corpses or lunatics, looking for something to put in their mouths. They no longer take cover from Russian shells; they haven’t the strength to walk, run away and hide. A curse on this war!

Hoffman would eventually die at Stalingrad, although it is not known precisely how or when this happened.


1. Hayashi Ichizo, Japanese Kamikaze Pilot, March 21, 1945

Photo credit: USHMM

To be honest, I cannot say that the wish to die for the emperor is genuine, coming from my heart. However, it is decided for me that I die for the emperor. I shall not be afraid of the moment of my death. But I am afraid of how the fear of death will perturb my life... 

Even for a short life, there are many memories. For someone who had a good life, it is very difficult to part with it. But I reached a point of no return. I must plunge into an enemy vessel. As the preparation for the takeoff nears, I feel a heavy pressure on me. I don’t think I can stare at death... I tried my best to escape in vain. So, now that I don’t have a choice, I must go valiantly.

In the popular imagination, Japanese kamikaze pilots are fanatical imperialists eager to sacrifice themselves for their country. While this may have been true in some cases, other pilots had a very different story to tell. One such story was that of a Japanese student named Hayashi Ichizo, who was drafted in 1943 at the age of 21. In February 1945, he was assigned to serve as a suicide pilot. Just a month earlier, he had started keeping a diary.

Like many students, Hayashi entered the army untrained and unsure about Japan’s role in the war. Although his family was opposed to the conflict, he had no way to escape the draft. Toward the end of the war, many students were chosen to be “Tokkotai” (suicide) pilots. The vast majority were under the age of 25. The youngest recorded pilot, Yukio Araki (pictured above holding his puppy), was just 17. Officially, all the pilots had volunteered, but many were essentially forced into the role.

Hayashi’s incredible diary features lengthy musings about his situation. He was clearly torn between patriotism and love for his family, whom he knew he would never see again. His suicide mission was completed on April 12, 1945, five months before Japan’s surrender.

(This original article was written by Alex Openshaw, and published on Listverse)

An American Odyssey: Stunning Color Photos of the US from the Late 1800s

Mulberry Street, New York

These rediscovered Photochrom and Photostint postcard images from the private collection of Marc Walter were produced by the Detroit Photographic Company between 1888 and 1924.
Using a photolithographic process that predated the autochrome by nearly 20 years, they offered people the very first color photographs of The United States. Suddenly, the continent's colors were available for all to see. The rich ochres and browns of the Grand Canyon, the dazzle of Atlantic City, became a visual delight not only for eyewitnesses, but for Americans far and wide.

Zuni people, the rain dance, New Mexico

Mount Lowe railway, on the circular bridge, California

 

 

Magnolia-on-the-Ashley, Charleston

Diving for coins, Bahamas

 

Members of the Seminole Tribe in Florida

Clear Creek Canyon, Georgetown loop, Colorado

Mariposa Grove, 'Three Graces', Yosemite national park, California

Grand Canyon, view from O'Neill's Point, Arizona

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Rarely Seen Candid Photos of Charlie Chaplin While Filming on Venice Beach, California, ca. 1914

These rarely seen photographs may be from on-site at the shooting of 1914 silent film Kid Auto Races at Venice (also known as The Pest) on Venice Beach, California. 

This is an Essanay Studios film starring Charlie Chaplin in which his "Little Tramp" character makes his first appearance in a film exhibited before the public.


 



Thank You

India’s Earliest Photographs-Royal collection

A Group of Royal Women, Including Chandrawati Holkar of Indore, her daughter Manorama Raje and Indira Devi of Cooch Behar. Circa 1920.

Maharajah Sardar Singh of Jodhpur. Circa 1890.

Madura, No. 6. A Passage in the Temple (Kilipputtu Muntapam). 1878.

Maharajah Bhan Pratap Singh of Bijawar. Central India. Circa 1882.

The Golden Temple at Amritsar. 1860s.

Hullabeed: The Great Temple, Southern Door in East Front.

 

A Holy Man Wearing Flower Garlands. Circa 1890s.

A Shaiva Yogi Seated on a Tiger Skin. Circa 1890s.

Maharajah Yeshwantrao Holkar II. Circa 1930.

 

Maharajah Tukoiji Rao Holkar III’s Wedding Procession. Indore. 1913.

Dewas Athletes. Circa 1885.

No. 176 – Caves of Karlie: No.1. The Approach. Western India. 1855-62.

 

The Maharao Raja of Bundi. 1903.

India’s Earliest Photographs- Gate of MJamuasjid Mosque 1860.

Gate of Jamu Masjid Mosque. Lahore, India. 1860.

In “Three Princes With Attendants,” three young Central Indian princes, perhaps from Gwalior, pose with two attendants, with the youth on the very right blurred by the long exposure. According to Ms. Hutton, “The lavishness of the studio setting speaks to the success that Dayal had achieved by that point in time.”

Other images in the exhibition include prints by a handful of photographers and amateurs who worked in India during the late 19th and early 20th centuries, not long after the East India Company replaced the Mughals as the main power in the north and when rule was subsequently given to the queen of England. These men, some of whom were doctors, took quickly to photography, which was rapidly replacing painting as the primary tool for portraiture and documentation, not long after its invention in Europe.

“The majority of South Asia scholars focus on ancient Indian sculpture and painting, but India’s traditions of modern art are becoming new grist for study and are of greater interest to the large collecting and museum-going public,” said Marika Sardar, associate curator of Southern Asian and Islamic art at the San Diego Museum of Art. “In that way, people are looking more at the practice of photography and its importance in the changing world of 19th-century India.”

For one, photographers at the time were encouraged by each other and by the British raj. And not only was there widespread promotion of the new tools of the trade — daguerreotype cameras were advertised in Calcutta a year after their invention in France — but photographic societies in Bombay, Calcutta and Madras were beginning to pop up from the 1850s onward.

And, according to the Bubbar catalog, “With these societies developed communities that organized events, exhibitions and the publication of journals, fostering an active culture of experimentation and exchange.”

The exhibition includes works by members of those societies, like Dr. John Murray, a teacher and principal of the medical school in Agra, who took up photography around 1849 and began participating in the Photographic Society of Bengal in 1856. At that time, the colonial administration began employing photographers to conduct surveys to document and preserve India’s monuments as well as military sites, specifically after the uprising of 1857. It was with this intention, perhaps, that Dr. Murray was asked by Governor-General Lord Canning to photograph myriad locations related to that uprising, as in an 1858 image of cannonballs in front of the Pearl mosque in Agra.

Similarly, in 1863, John and James Nicholas, who together were known as the Nicholas Brothers, Photographers of Madras, established a studio and concentrated on the South Indian landscape. They produced such works as, “Madura, No. 6. A Passage in the Temple” and “Seringapatam. Mausoleum Erected Over Tippoo Sultan and Haider Ali.” The latter, according to the Bubbar catalog, is an example of a site that interested the British.

One gem in the show, Mr. Bubbar said, is the later Man Ray portrait of Yashwant Rao II Holkar Bahadur, maharajah of Indore.

“He was a gifted and highly sensitive Indian prince, not merely one following the latest fashion,” Mr. Bubbar said. “Man Ray photographed him and his wife on numerous occasions. The image marks a high point of exchange, a cultural encounter.”

Mr. Bubbar, who added that he had been working on curating this show “subconsciously for at least five years,” hopes that with his exhibition he can shed light on an important chapter of Indian history and art.

“The show is a survey of the photographic medium in India from 1855 to 1930, highlighting some key moments,” he said. “I am hoping that people walk away with a sense of the medium’s history, its beauty and its relevance.”