--- title: Hiroshima: Photos of Survivors of the World's First Atomic Attack description: Photographs -- most of them never published in LIFE magazine -- made in Hiroshima after the end of the Second World War. canonical: https://time.com/3879427/hiroshima-portraits-of-survivors/ author: Ben Cosgrove article:opinion: false article:content_tier: free article:published_time: 2014-03-20T17:29:31.000Z article:modified_time: 2026-05-11T05:03:45.164Z og:title: Hiroshima: Photos of Survivors of the World's First Atomic Attack og:description: Photographs -- most of them never published in LIFE magazine -- made in Hiroshima after the end of the Second World War. og:url: https://time.com/3879427/hiroshima-portraits-of-survivors/ og:site_name: TIME og:image: https://static.time.com/v3/assets/bltea6093859af6183b/blt3b18162a86f9252e/698847935f570f46a9b1a934/16_111063788.jpg?branch=production&width=1047&quality=75&auto=webp&crop=16:9 og:image:width: 1047 og:image:height: 589 og:image:alt: Hiroshima Japan 1949, atomic bomb survivor og:type: article twitter:card: summary_large_image twitter:title: Hiroshima: Photos of Survivors of the World's First Atomic Attack twitter:description: Photographs -- most of them never published in LIFE magazine -- made in Hiroshima after the end of the Second World War. twitter:image: https://static.time.com/v3/assets/bltea6093859af6183b/blt3b18162a86f9252e/698847935f570f46a9b1a934/16_111063788.jpg?branch=production&width=1047&quality=75&auto=webp&crop=16:9 ---  # After Hiroshima: Portraits of Survivors > Sponsored content. 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They are at time.com/newsletters and are separate from a paid subscription. by [Ben Cosgrove](https://time.com/author/ben-cosgrove/) ## Ben Cosgrove Mar 20, 2014 5:29 PM UTC  Not published in LIFE. A boy badly burned by the Hiroshima bomb four years earlier, seen in 1949. Not published in LIFE. A boy badly burned by the Hiroshima bomb four years earlier, seen in 1949.Carl Mydans—Time & Life Pictures/Getty Images by [Ben Cosgrove](https://time.com/author/ben-cosgrove/) ## Ben Cosgrove Mar 20, 2014 5:29 PM UTC On July 16, 1945, the Atomic Age was born when a device with an explosive “yield” roughly equal to 20 kilotons of TNT was detonated in the desert of southeastern New Mexico. The explosion was so inconceivably violent, so fearsome, that one witness to the event, the physicist [J. Robert Oppenheimer](http://www.pbs.org/wgbh/amex/bomb/peopleevents/pandeAMEX65.html), famously claimed that a line from the Bhagavad Gita, a Hindu scripture, ran unbidden through his head: “Now I am become Death, the destroyer of worlds.” Less than a month later, American forces dropped atomic bombs on the Japanese cities of [Hiroshima and Nagasaki](http://www.history.com/topics/world-war-ii/bombing-of-hiroshima-and-nagasaki), killing tens of thousands of men, women and children in an instant; condemning thousands more to slow, agonizing deaths from burns and radiation sickness in the months and years to come; and, in the eyes of most historians, both Western and Asian, hastening the surrender of the Japanese and bringing about the end of the Second World War. Here, LIFE.com presents a selection of photographs, most of which were never published in LIFE magazine, taken in Hiroshima after the war ended. In the landscape of a ruined city, and on the scarred skin and misshapen limbs of Japanese who survived the world’s first nuclear attack, photographer Carl Mydans discovered the legacy — part nightmare, part surprising, wishful dream — of those world-changing explosions. As LIFE put it to the magazine’s readers in September 1947: --- > “” --- --- > “” --- --- > “” ---  Not published in LIFE. Hiroshima, Japan, 1947. Carl Mydans—Time & Life Pictures/Getty Images  Not published in LIFE. Young survivor of the United States' atomic attack on Hiroshima, Japan, 1947. Carl Mydans—Time & Life Pictures/Getty Images  Not published in LIFE. A survivor of the United States' atomic attack on Hiroshima, still hospitalized two years later, shows the damage to his hands, 1947. Carl Mydans—Time & Life Pictures/Getty Images  Survivors of the United States' atomic attack on Hiroshima, still hospitalized two years later, 1947. Carl Mydans—Time & Life Pictures/Getty Images  Not published in LIFE. A Japanese survivor of the United States' August 1945 atomic attack on Hiroshima displays his horribly scarred back two years later, 1947. Carl Mydans—Time & Life Pictures/Getty Images  Not published in LIFE. A survivor of the United States' atomic attack on Hiroshima, still hospitalized two years later, 1947. Carl Mydans—Time & Life Pictures/Getty Images  Not published in LIFE. Hiroshima, Japan, 1947, two years after the United States' August 1945 atomic attack. Carl Mydans—Time & Life Pictures/Getty Images  Not published in LIFE. A "Peace Festival" in Hiroshima Japan, on the two-year anniversary of the United States' August 1945 atomic attack on the city. Carl Mydans—Time & Life Pictures/Getty Images  Not published in LIFE. A "Peace Festival" in Hiroshima Japan, on the two-year anniversary of the United States' August 1945 atomic attack on the city. Carl Mydans—Time & Life Pictures/Getty Images  A tree-planting ceremony during a "Peace Festival" in Hiroshima Japan, on the two-year anniversary of the United States' August 1945 atomic attack on the city. Carl Mydans—Time & Life Pictures/Getty Images ![Caption from LIFE. "Japanese weep for dead friends and relatives while a memorial bell tolls at the exact hour of the \[August 1945 Hiroshima\] blast. A moment later they dried their eyes to watch a parade."](https://static.time.com/v3/assets/bltea6093859af6183b/blte7f45551d0f130d4/69884790524fc092ebdf1b53/11_05572855.jpg?branch=production&width=1200&quality=75&auto=webp) Caption from LIFE. "Japanese weep for dead friends and relatives while a memorial bell tolls at the exact hour of the \[August 1945 Hiroshima\] blast. A moment later they dried their eyes to watch a parade." Carl Mydans—Time & Life Pictures/Getty Images  Not published in LIFE. Small homes being built within a Hiroshima cemetery, 1947. Carl Mydans—Time & Life Pictures/Getty Images  Caption from LIFE. "Flash-burned boy is measured by pediatrician. Growth of such children is checked regularly." Hiroshima, 1949. Carl Mydans—Time & Life Pictures/Getty Images ![Hiroshima's children patiently wait their turn for a complete and detailed physical examination in ABCC's \[Atom Bomb Casualty Commission\] temporary laboratory clinic.](https://static.time.com/v3/assets/bltea6093859af6183b/blt7f93f071358c3208/698847923c16394d98456f30/14_00717439.jpg?branch=production&width=1200&quality=75&auto=webp) Caption from LIFE. "Hiroshima's children patiently wait their turn for a complete and detailed physical examination in ABCC's \[Atom Bomb Casualty Commission\] temporary laboratory clinic." Carl Mydans—Time & Life Pictures/Getty Images  Not published in LIFE. A boy badly burned by the Hiroshima bomb four years earlier is checked by a pediatrician in 1949. Carl Mydans—Time & Life Pictures/Getty Images  Not published in LIFE. A boy badly burned by the Hiroshima bomb four years earlier, seen in 1949. Carl Mydans—Time & Life Pictures/Getty Images  Not published in LIFE. Hiroshima survivors look out over the city two years after the United States' August 1945 atomic attack. 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