Travel Reference
In-Depth Information
3
HIMEYURI PEACE MUSEUM AND WAR MEMORIAL
ひめゆり.平和祈念資料館
Roughly 1.75 miles (3 kilometers) east of the Ryukyu Glass Village, and just over a mile (2
kilometers) north of Okinawa Peace Park is the Himeyuri Peace Museum and War Memori-
al (
ひめゆり
.
平和祈念資料館
; Himéyuri heiwakinen shiryōkan). The museum and memorial
were built in honor of the schoolgirls and teachers mobilized as nurse assistants on March
23, 1945. Just before the Battle of Okinawa, a group of 222 girls and 18 teachers from the
Okinawa Women's Normal School and the First Prefectural Girls High School were ordered
by the Japanese Army to join the Haebaru Field Hospital medical unit as nurses. They were
called “Himé-yuri” (Red Lilies). The Japanese soldiers told them that if they were captured,
the Americans would rape and murder them. Rather than surrendering, they hid in caves
and killed themselves. Only five survived. It's reported that many of the schoolgirls plunged
to their deaths by leaping over nearby cliffs rather than face the American invaders, so ter-
rorized were they with propaganda.
The Peace Museum exhibits photographs of the victims, their personal effects, model re-
constructions of the appalling conditions under which they lived and testimonies from sur-
vivors in an appeal against the misery of war. Every passing year, as memories of the Battle
of Okinawa fade further and further, the Himeyuri Peace Museum and War Memorial serve
to remind us of war and its insanity. This memorial is more frequently visited by Japanese
mainland tourists than by Westerners.
