MANCHURIA - JAPANESE ARMY SERGEANT'S DISTURBING PHOTOGRAPH ALBUM].

[Disturbing but Historically Significant Japanese Sergeant's WWII Photograph Album].

c 1940's. Stock ID #220264

Photographic album with eighty mounted black and white photographic illustrations of varying sizes, a further four photographs loosely inserted. Unpaginated. Some with captions, some with handwritten descriptions on the verso. 25 x 17cm. Faux leather blind stamped decorative binding, a little worn on the edges, the rear gutter has been neatly strengthened. Good condition.

A strange and very disturbing but historically significant album of photos taken by a Japanese man before and during the Asia-Pacific War. Some photos have been removed from the album, but those remaining include family images and school photos taken at the 80th anniversary of Takefumi Higashi Junior School in Echizen City, Fukui Prefecture, Japan, in 1951. A set of five photos, stamped with the mark of "E. Tsukio", and the place name Takefumi Higashi show the aftermath of an exceptionally heavy snowfall.

The photographs in this album seems to be associated with a family surnamed Hiroba, as a number have handwritten notations on the back bearing the names of various individuals with that surname. The album includes a set of commercially produced photographs of the aftermath of the 1923 Great Kanto Earthquake, including grim images of piles of bodies of earthquake victims. These are annotated as having been a present from a man named Hiroba Shigenobu. A photo at the rear of the album shows a photo of a Japanese army officer with sword and medals, and is annotated "Hiroba Shigeharu, 6 October 1940, on the eve of the third expedition to Manchuria, given by Takeda Fumio".

Next to this is a set of commercially produced photographs of Port Arthur, focusing on the monuments to the 1905 Japanese victory there in the Russo-Japanese War. (These monuments were a popular tourist attraction for Japanese people visiting Manchuria before or during the Asia-Pacific War). There are also numerous original photos taken in Harbin and the surrounding area, mostly in March and April 1941. These include pictures of the streetscape of Harbin, and local people participating in an ice festival on the river, but also of Japanese military actions in the area - setting up an observation post, transporting goods by horse-cart etc. One photo shows the range of cigarette brands available for sale in wartime Harbin.

Four photos show a ceremony celebrating the establishment of the "Shimizu Unit, no. 24" in Northeast China. The celebrations included a sumo wrestling competition and a party where Japanese troops were entertained by Chinese "beautiful geisha", raising the disturbing spectre of the recruitment of "comfort women" by the wartime Japanese military. More shocking still are nine photos of beheadings and other acts of extreme violence being perpetrated on people during the war in China. The precise locations of these scenes are unclear. Some of the photos appear to have been commercially produced, as they contain title inscriptions in within the print, but others may be original. One titled photo shows "the heads of bandits being transported by train".
A haunting reminder both the horrors of war, and of the way in which these can be interwoven into apparently normal family lives.

When referring to this item please quote stockid 220264.

Price: $950.00 AU

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