The Girl with the White Flag by Tomiko Higa, translated by Dorothy Britton (Kodansha International)

The Girl with the White Flag was originally published as 白旗の少女 (Shirohata no Shojo) in 1989 by Kodansha. It is a memoir of Tomiko Higa’s experiences she had during the last days of World War 2. She was only seven-years-old when war came to her town. It is the story of how she and her siblings became refugees in their own country and how she became the focus of international attention when a photographer named John Hendrikson took her picture coming out of a cave carrying a white flag. 

Tomiko Higa was born and raised in Shuri, Okinawa which is now part of Naha City, the capital city of Okinawa Prefecture. She was born in 1938, the youngest of nine children. her mother died three weeks after she turned six years old. It was March 19, 1944. Her two eldest sisters were already married and had moved out of the house. Her two older brothers were serving in the Imperial Army, one in China, the other working on the mainland. That left Tomiko, her two older sisters Yoshiko and Hatsuko, and her older brother Chukuyo at the family home.

American soldiers landed on Okinawa on April 1, 1945. A month later, bombs and shells began to fall near Tomiko’s house. Their father gathered his children together and told them, “If by any chance there is an enemy attack in this immediate area while I am away and I can’t get back, you will each have to decide for yourself what to do”. He left it up to his oldest daughter to look after her younger brother and sisters. It would be the last time they would see their father. 

Yoshiko, the eldest of the five, said that they should follow their father’s instructions and head south. They managed to scrape by with a little food and spent their nights in caves which are abundant in Okinawa. Some of the places they stayed were already full of refugees and in some caves there were the remains of human bones.

As the children continued to walk south, they made a stop to rest. They dug holes in the ground to sleep in. Tomiko and her brother made more of a hollow, just big enough to hold their bottoms. They were awakened just a few hours later by soldiers who told them there would soon be fighting in the area. As Tomiko tried to wake up her brother, she noticed that he was sleeping with his eyes wide open. 

Yoshiko, the oldest sister, took the cloth that was wrapped around his head and “saw that his head had a hole in it and there was blood all over the back of his head and on his shoulders and down his back”. It was explained later to Tomiko that her brother was hit by a stray bullet and probably died instantly. 

As they fled Komesu, Tomiko, who had always held Chukuyo’s hand, clutched her sister’s dress as they continued to flee to the south. However, when she looked up, she was staring into a stranger’s face. She looked for her sister Yoshiko and Hatsuko but could not find either one of them. Now, she really was all alone. 

As Tomiko continued to head south, going from cave to cave, calling out for her sisters, people would either tell her to be quiet or leave. Some even threatened her with death. One of the final caves she came to was occupied by an elderly man and a blind woman. Tomiko also noticed something strange about the man. “Both his arms had been amputated at the elbows and both his legs at the knees”. 

It was these two invalids who probably saved Tomiko’s life. It was the two who made the white flag for Tomiko to hold high when coming out of the cave. She was led to a beach where there were other women and children and she was reunited with her sisters.

This is one of the saddest but most inspiring stories you will read about children surviving the horrors of war. Thanks to her father’s strict upbringing, her brother’s knowledge of edible plants, and the kindness of strangers, Tomiko was alive and well. She would also meet John Hendrickson, the man who took the picture forty-three years ago. If only all wars could end with such a happy ending. ~Ernie Hoyt