War Disaster Victims Memorial Kannon Statue (Ote Kannon)

The War Disaster Victims Memorial Kannon Statue, commonly known as the Ote Kannon (大手観音), stands at the northeast corner of Fukui City Hall's No. 2 annex, in front of the NTT West Ote building in the Ote district, close to the Fukui Castle ruins. It was erected in July 1964 (Showa 39) by bereaved families and staff volunteers for the 23 people — employees of the Fukui Post Office telephone section (福井郵便局電話課) and others — who perished during the Fukui Air Raid on the night of July 19, 1945.

On that night, the 23 postal and telephone workers were on duty maintaining critical communications infrastructure when the B-29 incendiary attack began. As the firestorm consumed the city, they were unable to evacuate and died at their posts. Their sacrifice represented a particular tragedy within the broader catastrophe: while the city burned around them, these workers attempted to maintain telephone and telegraph services until the very end.

The Kannon statue — depicting Avalokitesvara, the Bodhisattva of Compassion — was originally installed in the courtyard of the Fukui Telegraph and Telephone Bureau's trunk exchange (福井電報電話局市外局中庭) at Fukui City Chuo 1-chome 17-16. When the trunk exchange relocated in January 1987, the statue was moved to its current location near the City Hall annex.

To mark 1995 (Heisei 7), the 50th year after the war, a permanent Kannon Hall (観音堂), dated March 1996, was constructed to house and protect the statue, expressing the community's enduring wish for permanent peace. The memorial is registered as an official civilian war-dead memorial facility by the Ministry of Internal Affairs and Communications (総務省).

The Ote Kannon serves as a specific, personal memorial within the larger narrative of the Fukui Air Raid — while the Memorial Tower at Asuwa West Cemetery honors all victims collectively, this statue preserves the memory of individual workers who died performing their duty during the catastrophe.