In 1944, as World War II entered its final stages, Itaru Maruo was a promising student at an elite university, dreaming of a career in art. Then the Imperial Japanese Army called him up. Deployed to China under the wartime student mobilization program, Maruo fell ill and was hospitalized time and again.
He is believed to have been caught up in the Soviet invasion and died at an army hospital in Manchuria, in what is now northeastern China, on Aug. 30, 1945, about two weeks after Japan’s surrender. His remains have never been returned to Japan. In late July this year, a relative donated some 200 items that once belonged to Maruo, including his memoirs, to the Wadatsumi no Koe (Voices of Fallen Student Conscripts) memorial museum in Tokyo’s Bunkyo Ward, a short walk from the University of Tokyo’s Hongo Campus.
Extract — continue reading at the source.
