Fukuyama Castle (Fukuyama Air Raid Heritage Site)

Fukuyama Castle (福山城) stands at the heart of Fukuyama City, Hiroshima Prefecture, immediately north of JR Fukuyama Station. Originally constructed between 1619 and 1622 by Mizuno Katsunari, a cousin of Tokugawa Ieyasu, it served as the seat of the Bingo-Fukuyama Domain throughout the Edo period. The castle's five-story tenshu was famed for its iron-plate reinforcement on the northern face — a unique defensive feature among Japanese castles.

On the night of August 8, 1945 — just two days after the atomic bombing of Hiroshima and one day before the Nagasaki bombing — 91 B-29 Superfortress bombers from the Mariana Islands attacked Fukuyama. Beginning at approximately 22:25, the bombers dropped an estimated 556 tons of incendiary ordnance including M-47 napalm bombs and M-17 cluster incendiaries over roughly 70 minutes. The resulting firestorm consumed approximately 80% of the urban area (314 hectares), killing 354 people (355 in some accounts), injuring over 860, destroying 10,179 houses, and leaving 47,326 residents (roughly 81% of the city's population of 58,745) homeless.

Fukuyama Castle suffered catastrophic damage. The tenshu, which had been designated a National Treasure in 1931 under the National Treasures Preservation Law (国宝保存法), burned to the ground along with the Oyudono (bathhouse), the Suzumi Yagura turret and other structures. The Fushimi Yagura (a three-story turret relocated from Fushimi Castle in Kyoto during the original construction) and the Sujigane Gate survived the inferno, and both are now designated Important Cultural Properties of Japan.

The castle's massive stone walls survived the air raid but bear lasting scars: the stones show distinctive red discoloration and rounded edges caused by the extreme heat of the firestorm. These heat-damaged stones remain visible today, serving as silent testimony to the intensity of the August 8 attack. An air raid shelter carved into the castle hill cliff face was also used by civilians during the bombing, though it has since been backfilled due to collapse risk.

The tenshu was reconstructed in reinforced concrete in 1966, closely replicating the exterior appearance of the original. In a major 2022 renovation, the castle's iconic iron-plate cladding on the north face was restored, and the interior was converted into a modern museum (Fukuyama Castle Museum) showcasing the castle's history from the Edo period through wartime destruction and postwar reconstruction.

Fukuyama's proximity to Hiroshima gives the air raid particular historical resonance: the city was attacked between the two atomic bombings, at a moment when Japan's military leadership was still deliberating surrender. The timing underscores how conventional strategic bombing continued relentlessly alongside the nuclear strikes in the war's final days.