Yōsuke Yamahata (山端 庸介, 1917 – 1966) was a Japanese photographer best known for extensively photographing Nagasaki the day after it was bombed.
On August 10, 1945, a day after the Nagasaki bombing, Yamahata began to photograph the devastation and hibakusha survivors, still working as a military photographer. Over a period of about twelve hours he took around a hundred exposures; by late afternoon, he had taken his final photographs near a first aid station north of the city. In a single day, he had completed the only extensive photographic record of the immediate aftermath of the atomic bombing of either Hiroshima or Nagasaki.
Yamahata’s photographs were published in the Mainichi Shinbun issue of August 21 and in 1952, his photographs of Nagasaki appeared in the September 29 issue of Life. The same year, they appeared in the book Kiroku-shashin: Genbaku no Nagasaki.
Yamahata died of cancer in 1965, on his forty-eighth birthday and the twentieth anniversary of the bombing of Hiroshima.
Boy carrying his wounded brother on his back near Nagasaki station following atomic bomb blast; NagasakiDazed boy, his face cut by glass, standing with his injured mother holding rationed rice balls, following the atomic bombing of NagasakiInjured mother suckling baby as they both await doctor following atomic bomb blast, NagasakiA man in Nagasaki searching for a doctor to treat his wounded baby the day after the bombing.Dead mother and child, lying on the platform of the Uragami train station, victims of the atomic bombing of NagasakiWoman emerges from the basement after atomic bombing of NagasakiSurvivors of the atomic bombingPartially incinerated child in NagasakiA dead horse and a wagon south of Nagasaki’s ground zero, the day after the bombing.Distant of survivors of atomic blast walking along road amid ruims of city, looking for relatives, following dropping of atomic bomb on Nagasaki, Japan.Around 6:00 a.m., 1500 meters from epicenter of blast, men carry a body while searching for survivors amid ruins, following dropping of atomic bomb on Nagasaki2,500 meters from epicenter, civilians flee and search for survivors, following dropping of atomic bomb on Nagasaki
