<h1 class="pgc-h-arrow-right" data-track="1" >introduction:</h1>
On December 1, 2010, an elderly man died at his home in Jinan, Shandong Province, at the age of 103. The old man's name was Hiroshi Yamazaki, and as soon as he heard the name, he knew that he was Japanese.
With his death, the old man's life was gradually known to the world. It turned out that he had been an invading Japanese army, and later because he could not stand the atrocities committed by the Japanese army in China, after 6 months of being a ghost soldier, he resolutely chose to flee, risked being shot, left the army, and fled all the way to Jinan, Shandong.
Later, with the help of the Chinese people, he settled in Jinan, completely concealed his identity, and became a doctor who treated diseases and saved people. It was not until thirty years later that his daughter-in-law learned that her husband had been a Japanese invader who everyone hated.
He once said that he had been a soldier in China for six months, and he had not fired a single bullet or killed a Chinese. However, he still felt ashamed of China and the Chinese people who had saved him, so he was determined to stay in China and use the rest of his life to redeem the crimes of that year.
Hiroshi Yamazaki
<h1 class="pgc-h-arrow-right" data-track="6" graduated from Japan Medical University > and was forcibly recruited to work as a military doctor in China</h1>
Hiroshi Yamazaki was born in November 1908 in Okayama Prefecture, Japan. Because his family has been practicing medicine for generations, his parents also hope that he will be able to inherit his father's business and become a doctor in the future.
Hiroshi Yamazaki has been sensible and obedient since childhood, and his academic performance is excellent. He is a good son in the eyes of his parents and a good student in the eyes of his teachers. After graduating from high school, he lived up to expectations and was successfully admitted to a medical university in Japan.
After graduation, he should have naturally become a pediatrician and performed the duties of a doctor to treat patients and save people. He was also supposed to have a happy family in Japan and live a peaceful and comfortable life.
However, yamazaki's graduation coincided with the Lugou Bridge Incident in 1937 and the outbreak of a full-scale war of aggression against China. The Japanese people were instigated by militarism and the whole country was a soldier. The whole country set off a frenzied militant mood. At that time, the Japanese government recruited soldiers throughout the country, requiring every household to send a young male to join the army, and the Yamazaki Hiroya family was naturally no exception.
Because Yamazaki's brother was already married at that time and had his own wife and children, the family's task of joining the army naturally fell to his younger brother Yamazaki Hiroshi, who had just graduated and had no worries.
Of course, 30-year-old Hiroshi Yamazaki also wants to stay in Japan like his brother and live a peaceful life. However, although he could not resist the torrent of the times on his own, Yamazaki was eventually forced to recruit soldiers and came to China to become a military doctor.
<h1 class="pgc-h-arrow-right" data-track="13" > unable to accept the atrocities committed by Japanese soldiers, they fled and fled</h1>
In this way, the 30-year-old Yamazaki Hiroshi came to China alone and landed in Tianjin with the Chichai Company of the 10th Infantry Division of the Samurai Army. At this time, he still retained the kind nature of a doctor, and he thought that his job was to treat diseases and save people in the army. He also thought that the purpose of the Japanese army's arrival in China was to establish the so-called "Greater East Asia Co-Prosperity Sphere." It is to make the whole of Asia prosper together.
It wasn't until the next few months that what he saw and heard made him fully aware of the brutality of the Japanese army and the ugly purpose of Japan's launching of this war.
His power is too small. He was just a military doctor who had never fired a gun. From the day he came to China, his unit fought almost every day, and every day he saw countless unarmed Chinese brutally slaughtered by the Japanese army.
A few days later, Chichai troops stormed a small village with only 40 households, killing people at the entrance of the village, and corpses could be seen everywhere by the river. Men, women and children who had time to escape in the future were gathered in front of a wall and strafed with machine guns.
On September 7, Chichai troops raided the village of Garden, surrounding more than 40 villagers who had been hiding in the depression all day and had just returned home to get food, strafing them in a string of machine guns, and then stabbing them one by one with bayonets.
On October 25, two japanese squads entered the city and forced more than 300 merchants and people who had rushed to the market to the door and checked their hands one by one. All those who had no cocoon on their hands were tied up in three batches and thrown into large pits, and fired with bayonets and machine guns, killing a total of 128 people. Before leaving, six more people were taken to the village and let the military dogs bite them alive.
These are only a small part of the bad deeds done in China by the Chichai Company of the Japanese army invading China.
In this way, Hiroshi Yamazaki, who had a pure heart, watched his compatriots burn and loot on other people's territory, and watched innocent Chinese people being brutally killed by the Japanese army. He tried to persuade them to stop, but no one listened to him. He wanted to save the slaughtered Chinese people, but there was nothing he could do.
His heart was broken, and an intellectual's conscience told him that this was an unjust war and that ordinary Chinese people should not be treated in this way. All those involved, including himself, are guilty.
He decided to leave, since he couldn't dissuade the bastards, but at least he couldn't participate in the atrocity himself. So he made up his mind to become a deserter. Even if he is shot, he has to leave.
According to the old man's own recollection, he left the army between August 1937 and December 1937. He escaped on a dark and windy night, and Yamazaki was completely unfamiliar with China's geographical location, but he had seen a map of China. He remembered that there was a corner in Shandong that extended outward, and from there it should be the closest to Returning to Japan.
He begged for food all the way to the corner of the Shandong Peninsula. There was no change of clothes on the road, and when the villagers saw a man in a Japanese military uniform asking for food, instead of retaliating against him, some well-meaning people gave him a bite to eat. It was also at that time that he was determined to repay Chinese.
Later, Yamazaki worked as a custodian in a company's warehouse in Jinan, and because he was homeless, he treated the warehouse as his home. Because his company belonged to the Japanese puppet government occupation area at that time, he could already have a stable income at that time.
During the occupation of Shandong by the Japanese army invading China, the Japanese expatriates enjoyed a very high status in the local area, and it can almost be said that they were the best people who did whatever they wanted. As long as Yamazaki Hiroshi was willing, he could fully enjoy this "special treatment", but he did not, he did not despise this shameful glory.
<h1 class="pgc-h-arrow-right" data-track="29" > lived in seclusion in China to open a clinic, settled in Jinan to marry and have children</h1>
The Japanese were defeated in 1945. In 1946, the Chinese government began to repatriate more than 3.1 million Japanese invaders and their families who surrendered. Hiroshi Yamazaki could have left with these people, but he didn't. In fact, ever since he took the bowl of rice from ordinary Chinese people on the way to escape, he had already made the decision to stay in China.
Later, he fled all the way to Jinan, Shandong, and was introduced to a Jinan woman who fled from Tangshan with her daughter and married her. He also gave his younger daughter a beautiful name: Shan Yongyun.
During this period, in 1944, Yamazaki joined the army in Jinan and became a veterinarian with the army. Subsequently, he was admitted to the Chinese physician qualification certificate. Opened a clinic in Jinan and officially became a pediatrician.
After nearly a decade of ups and downs, Yamazaki finally had a stable life in this small suburb of Jinan. His Chinese level is also very good, and he is able to communicate with the locals normally. While running the clinic, Yamazaki still remembered his ambition to spend his life contributing to the Chinese and atonement for the atrocities committed in Japan.
At that time, China experienced many years of war and chaos, and the lives of ordinary people were very difficult.
Many people get sick and don't have money to buy medicine. At that time, although Yamazaki was not rich himself, when he treated people, if it was a family with good economic conditions, he would charge medical expenses. If it is a poor person who comes to see a doctor, he often takes nothing. Because of his high medical ethics and exquisite medical skills, many people from other places came to see him.
He often left people to come down for lunch after seeing people from other places, and when he left, he would give others travel expenses. During this period, he often hung on his lips: "Serve the people."
At that time, he often heard a name on the radio: Chairman Mao. He knew that it was Chairman Mao who saved the Chinese people and that Chairman Mao ended the war. At the same time, Chairman Mao also taught people to serve the people wholeheartedly. He felt that this sentence was well said, so it became his motto.
<h1 class="pgc-h-arrow-right" data-track="38" > hide the identity of Japanese veterans, and the daughter-in-law who has been married for 30 years knows</h1>
After the founding of new China, Yamazaki's small clinic was transformed into a joint clinic after socialist transformation, which was the predecessor of the health center. Yamazaki became a doctor with a formal staff, paid by the state every month.
In this way, he and his wife and daughter lived a quiet and busy life in Jinan. As Yamazaki's wife, she only knows that her husband is Japanese and a superb pediatrician. Others know nothing.
Regarding his identity, Yamazaki has always been tight-lipped. He hadn't told anyone about his past in thirty years. On the one hand, he was reluctant to mention the years that made his conscience uneasy, on the other hand, he also knew that this heavy identity would bring a lot of trouble to himself and his family.
For thirty years, Hiroshi Yamazaki has been keeping this secret in his heart. For countless nights, his scene on the battlefield was like a ghost haunting him, making him sleepless. The wife asked him what was wrong, and he could only respond with a sigh and silence.
Until his wife, who had accompanied him for thirty years, was finally coming to the end of his life, Yamazaki Hiroshi sat by his wife's hospital bed and looked at his lover affectionately. The wife was already dying, and she gasped hard and heavily, accompanied by a sharp rise and fall in her chest. As a doctor, Hiroshi Yamazaki knew that his lover was leaving.
He stroked his wife. Suddenly, his wife grabbed Yamazaki's hand and asked with all her strength: Have you ever been a Japanese soldier? Hiroshi Yamazaki didn't show any look of surprise, he knew it was time to tell her.
Hiroshi Yamazaki asked his relatives in the ward to leave, leaving him alone to guard his wife. When everyone was out, Yamazaki looked at his lover with a smile and gently hummed a Japanese folk song while stroking her old hand.
Melodious exotic melodies echoed in the room, and the wife slowly closed her eyes to the old man's song. She finally learned of her husband's identity hidden for 30 years on her deathbed. This husband who spent time with herself was once a Japanese devil, but she did not regret it.
The Yamazaki Hiroshi she knew was a good husband, a good father, and a good doctor. Even if he is a Japanese devil, he is a good Japanese devil.
In 1978, China began to implement the policy of reform and opening up, and the whole country underwent earth-shaking changes. And the elderly Yamazaki Hiroshi is still diligent and earnest in his work. At this time, more than 30 years have passed since the war, and China and Japan have established friendly relations. It was this year that the old man finally had the opportunity to return to Japan to visit his relatives. The daughter thus learned the identity of the old man.
Back in his hometown after nearly 40 years of absence, Yamazaki's heart surged and everything changed. The relatives thought that he had died in a foreign land, and had already established a spiritual seat for him at home. Seeing that his brother, who had disappeared for many years, was still alive, Yamazaki's brother was extremely excited.
He thought his brother would never leave again when he returned. So he went around and helped him find a job in Japan for 300,000 yen a month. Who knew that the old man had only been in Japan for 3 months and then left in a hurry. He only had China in his heart, he could not rest assured of his patients, he could not give up his feelings for Chinese people. He did not want to renege on his vows.
<h1 class="pgc-h-arrow-right" data-track="72" > beloved pediatrician and admirable Japanese soldier</h1>
After returning to China, he worked harder than before, pressing a small note with glass on his desk, which read: "Serving the people is the noblest virtue" This is what he learned from Chairman Mao and practiced this sentence with practical actions.
In addition to sitting in the hospital from Monday to Friday, Yamazaki Hiroshi will see the people of Jinan for free every Saturday and Sunday. This habit persisted until the end of his life.
In 1983, Japan's Waka City hoped to form a sister city with Jinan. Hiroshi Yamazaki, as a Japanese overseas Chinese in China, is obligated to run for this matter at both ends. He paid for his own travel expenses to travel between the two cities and wrote to the prime minister of Japan at the time. Later, the prime minister personally replied to him, and sent him four big words with the letter: "There is no door on the road."
The media learned of the old man's deeds and began to rush to interview him, and he revealed his thoughts on atonement for the first time in the interview. He said everything he did in China was atonement for his sins. Although he did not kill a single Chinese in the war. But he deeply Chinese the suffering of the people in the war, and he felt that he should also bear the responsibility for Japan's crimes.
This is Hiroshi Yamazaki. A Japanese soldier who has spent his life to atone for his sins, a Japanese who has quietly dedicated himself in China for 70 years, and a pediatrician who works until the last moment of his life.
For a person who has spent his whole life atoning for his sins, the whole meaning of life is in giving. He decided to do one last thing for the country while his head was still clear. So he invited the Staff of the Red Cross to his home and solemnly wrote his name on the body donation book.
At the end of November 2010, Yamazaki's physical condition began to deteriorate, and he could not eat and was extremely weak. By noon on December 1, the old man felt dizzy and weak, and a cough appeared. Her daughter helped him to lie in bed and tried to take him to the hospital for treatment, but he refused. After a while, the old man slowly stopped breathing and heartbeat.
Then, on the day of his death, the old man insisted on working in the clinic for two hours, prescribing medicines for several patients.
<h1 class="pgc-h-arrow-right" data-track="81" > Conclusion:</h1>
We have reason to believe that in Yamazaki's heart there is guilt for the Chinese people, and we also believe that the Chinese people will never forget the atrocities committed by the Japanese in China, and the Chinese people will never forgive the Japanese soldiers who brutally killed our compatriots. But we forgive the elder Yamazaki.
A Japanese, a Japanese army that had participated in the war of aggression against China, practiced Chairman Mao's teaching with his life: "Serving the people." Only because of those six months of forced military experience, he dedicated the rest of his life to China. Such a person will certainly be forgiven and admired by the people of the Chinese.
< h1 class="pgc-h-arrow-right" data-track="85" > reference:</h1>
Liu Pu,Chen Qiang. The Chinese Love affair of a Japanese veteran: Remembering a folk friend Mr. Hiroshi Yamazaki[J].Yusheng, 2013(03):48-51.
Wang Yan,Kang Xi. The Last Devil Soldier in China- Hiroshi Yamazaki[J].Party History, 2011(04):46-48.
WANG Xiao. The Last "Japanese Devil" Left in China[J].China Railway Literature and Art, 2011(08):14-16.
Zhang Lusheng. Japanese veteran Hiroshi Yamazaki: "I want to stay and atone for the sins of the Japanese"[N]. National Defense Times, 2010-11-03(021).