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Fugaku-tai no jūhachinin
(Eighteen men of Fugaku Squadron)
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Last Letter of Corporal Shigeo Maruyama to His Parents
On December 16, 1944, Corporal Shigeo Maruyama took off from Marcot
Airfield in the Philippines in a Type 4 Heavy Bomber (Allied code name of Peggy)
and died south of Mindoro Island in a special (suicide) attack at the age of
23 [1]. He was a member of the Fugaku [2] Squadron.
On October 24, 1944, this special attack squadron was formed at Hamamatsu Air
Base in Shizuoka Prefecture, and on October 26 it officially was named the
Fugaku Squadron in a ceremony [3]. After
his death in a special attack, he received a promotion to Second Lieutenant. He
was from Aichi Prefecture and was a non-commissioned officer who
entered the Army in 1941.
He wrote the following final letter to his parents in the evening before the
day of his final sortie:
I very warmly thank you for your kindness in raising me for over twenty
years without wanting for anything.
If I look back, I have not yet done a single thing to repay your
kindness. At this time please forgive my lack of filial piety for leaving
you behind in your old age.
Nevertheless, please be glad. No, please praise me. I, an inexperienced
person, recently was selected to be a member of the Special Attack Corps. I
obtained this honor to carry out an important mission.
Now when I will depart, what I pray for is only success. I certainly want
to display an end that will not bring shame to a Japanese man. The one last
thing that I request is that for my grave you use a smaller stone than the
one for Older Brother Genji.
I pray that you always will have good health.
Translated by Bill Gordon
May 2025
The letter come from Kawachiyama (2000, 228). The biographical information
on this page comes from Kawachiyama (2000, 241), Osuo (2005, 190), and Tokkōtai
Senbotsusha (1990, 254).
Notes
1. Tokkōtai Senbotsusha (1990, 254) indicates
that he was born in 1921, so he could have been either 22 or 23 at the date of
his death on December 16, 1944.
Kawachiyama (2000, 241) gives his age at death as
24.
2. Fugaku means Mount Fuji.
3. Kawachiyama (2000, 175-177, 179-180), Osuo
(2005, 10).
Sources Cited
Kawachiyama, Yuzuru. 2000. Fugaku-tai no jūhachinin:
Tokkō taichō Nishio Tsunesaburō no shōgai (Eighteen men of Fugaku
Squadron: Life of special attack squadron leader Tsunesaburō Nishio). Tōkyō:
Kōjinsha.
Osuo, Kazuhiko. 2005. Tokubetsu kōgekitai no kiroku (rikugun hen)
(Record of special attack corps (Army)). Tōkyō: Kōjinsha.
Tokkōtai Senbotsusha Irei
Heiwa Kinen Kyōkai (Tokkōtai Commemoration Peace Memorial Association). 1990.
Tokubetsu Kōgekitai (Special Attack Corps). Tōkyō: Tokkōtai Senbotsusha
Irei Heiwa Kinen Kyōkai.
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