Diaries....who has them?

[Der Texaner]

Unlike the US soldier fighting in the Pacific, Japanese soldiers were encouraged to keep them and write in them daily. I can only imagine the stories in them, and there must be a lot of them out there, but I have never seen one for sale, which really surprises me. I'm guessing complete translations are unlikely but interesting items would be translated. So do you have one? Seen one around? Thanks!

Joel

[GeorgeP]

If there are a large amount of diaries out there, they sure don't make it to the market all that often, at least veteran bringbacks. Diaries pop up from time to time on ebay and a couple examples had very competitive bidding a year or two back. I feel that a goodly amount of Japanese paper items have unfortunately been thrown away due to lack of knowledge of what the paper items are or just lack of interest in figuring out what all that Japanese means. I have 5 diaries and a fragment of one in my collection. They show various levels of usage, from just a couple of pages written in them to dozens of pages. Although the majority point to usage by soldiers in the IJA, two were used by personnel in the IJN. Long term goal is to get them thoroughly translated. Fascinating and irreplaceable pieces of history.


Tom

[blinky]

Anything like a diary would have been considered "intelligence" and would have been turned over to field intelligence (think of all the Japanese photographs and other odds and ends with the US stamp on the back of them). Probably 99% of personal diaries were turned in, examined and disposed of. The few that did make it back to the US were most likely snuck out of the field.

[peleliuexplorer]

I have a copy of one from a Japanese soldier who died on Attu. Lost the bid on ebay for the original but at least got a copy. A friend helped to translate...facinating! NARA in College Park, MD has a box of captured Japanese diaries from Guadalcanal.

-Eric

[Der Texaner]

Thank you all for the responses. Blinky, I hadn't thought about them being turned in as captured intelligence. You are absolutely correct and likely accounts for the lack of them available to collectors. That and you can see why a GI wouldn't be interested in a bunch of paper he can't read and isn't what you would call a dazzling war trophy. Eric, do you happen to remember what that diary sold for? Many thanks....

Joel