Sugihara Chiune: His Handwritten Memoir

Fig. First page of handwritten memoir of Sugihara

This is a schematic picture. The interested reader can visit and see the real image at Tokyo Shinbun:

https://www.tokyo-np.co.jp/article_photo/list?article_id=260349&pid=1065094

Sugihara Chiune was a Japanese diplomat who risked his carrier to save thousands of Jewish refugees in WWII.

Fig. Sugihara Chiune

This is a schematic picture. The interested reader can click the following site for real image:

https://www.timesofisrael.com/japans-schindler-a-genuine-hero-tangled-in-a-web-of-myth/

At age 83, he wrote a memoir consisting of 49 pages each with 200 letters. Document [2] is compiled from his hand writings. With his deed belatedly started being recognized by the public, he must have felt accurate account of what happened should be retained and passed onto the generations to come. My conviction is that Sugihara finally started thinking about the importance of his deeds and their role in the human history.

He must have had many complaints, however, I find none in his memoir. He simply describes various important events as they happened. On the final page he writes “end”, however, the word is double crossed out. [2] He must have more things to say. At this time, he was already weak and some of his writings are not clear.

To those people studying the Japanese language I would recommend to read [2].

[1] Youtube site: https://www.youtube.com/results?search_query=Chiune+Sugihara+Doc.+1

(translation by the author)

[2] Watanabe, K., and Sugihara, Y. “Ketsudan”, Taisho Shuppan, Tokyo, 2002