Professor withdraws pictures of Hiroshima

HNN Editor: A few weeks ago Sean Malloy, an assistant professor at the School of Social Sciences at the University of California Merced, posted pictures purportedly never seen before of the effects of the Hiroshima bombing. He has now withdrawn those photographs after questions were raised about their provenance.

The Robert L. Capp collection at the Hoover Institution Archives at Stanford University contains ten photographs purportedly showing the immediate aftermath of the Hiroshima bombing. Mr. Capp was assigned to the occupation forces outside Hiroshima after World War II. According to to Mr. Capp's oral history (available along with the photographs in the Robert L. Capp collection), he found these photos among rolls of undeveloped film in a cave outside of Hiroshima. Since making these photographs publicly available, I have received reliable proof that several of these photos are actually of the 1923 Kanto earthquake. While I cannot speak for the entire collection, this evidence raises grave doubts about all of the photos and strongly suggests that the identification provided by the Hoover Archives is incorrect. I take full responsibility for my own failure to take additional steps to verify that the original archival designation was correct. I have removed the photographs, sent a correction to my publisher, and forwarded all evidence that I have received casting doubt on the photos directly to the Hoover Archives so that they can conduct their own investigation.

Related Links
Oliver Kamm: Hiroshima and Le Monde

Read entire article at Malloy website