Last Letter of Ensign Isao Yui to His Parents
At 1206 on April 16, 1945, Ensign Isao Yui took off from Kanoya Air Base and
died in a special (suicide) attack southeast of Kikaijima at the age of 24. He
was a member of the 3rd Tsukuba Special Attack Squadron. He flew a Zero fighter
carrying a bomb. He was from Nagano Prefecture and attended Nagano
Teachers College. He was a member of the 12th Class of the Navy's Flight Reserve
Students.
He wrote the following final letter to his parents:
Dear Parents,
Please take comfort that I arrived safely at my destination. I will use
some spare time to write to you from this forward base. In this place plum
blossoms have already fallen. Japanese yellow roses (yamabuki) and
other flowers are
now in full bloom and remind me of my hometown full of simple beauty.
Adding to that, with emotion filling my heart, I remember the touching
scene from the other day at the time of my departure when Father came to see
me off. I am seized with an impulse that I want to cry manly tears, but with
an effort I hold them back and will go resolutely.
Now I am waiting only for the order to come. Please have everyone in the
neighborhood pray to God for my success. Please look up to the southern
skies where vast white clouds rise high in the blue sky and imagine that I
will be smiling there always.
Grandmother, Father and Mother, and younger brothers and sisters [1],
I hope that you will be well. I will go with great vigor.
Farewell.
Isao Yui
Letter translated by Bill Gordon
January 2018
The letter and biographical information on this page come from Kanoya Kōkū Kichi Shiryōkan Renraku Kyōgikai
(2003, 53).
Note
1. The word in Japanese (teimai) means that
he had at least one younger brother and at least one younger sister, but he does
not indicate in his letter the number of each.
Source Cited
Kanoya Kōkū Kichi Shiryōkan Renraku Kyōgikai (Kanoya Naval
Air Base Museum Coordinating Committee). 2003. Kokoro no sakebi (Cries
of the heart). Kanoya, Kagoshima Prefecture: Kanoya Kōkū Kichi Shiryōkan
Renraku Kyōgikai.
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