Starting from 1944, the US carried out heavy bombing raids on Japanese cities. The following account by a Japanese woman describes what happened during one of those raids.
Flames rose everywhere. A four or five-year-old girl who must have got separated from her parents approached me and said, "Take me with you." Holding her soft little hand, I told her, "Let's get away from here together." Her eyes shone bright with relief.
Just then I saw a firebomb dropping towards us, spewing flames and making a shrill noise. I dropped the little girl's hand and ducked into a nearby vacant house. Then, "Oh no, the girl!" I cried. I turned around to see behind me the girl engulfed in a ball of flame, a fragment of her hood drifting high into the sky.
一九四四年開始，美軍大舉轟炸日本城市。一個日本婦女描述一次轟炸中的經歷如下。
四處火起。一個四、五歲女孩想是和父母失散了，走到我跟前說：「帶我走吧。」我抓住她柔軟的小手說：「我們一起離開這裏。」她眼睛露出寬慰的神氣。
就在這個時候，我看見一個燃燒彈正向我們落下，噴着火，夾着刺耳嘯聲。我甩掉那小女孩的手，躲進附近一幢空房子裏，然後驚覺：「不好，那小女孩！」我轉身一望，只見那小女孩陷身火球之中，她頭上風帽的一塊碎片飛到半空。