On a late October day in 1944, Louie pushed a wheelbarrow into
Tokyo, joining a guard to pick up rations. It was the first time he’d passed, unblindfolded, into the society that held him captive.
Tokyo was bled dry. The war had caused massive food shortages, and markets were shuttered. Civilians were slipshod and dirty. Children were digging trenches. The Americans were coming, and the city was holding its breath.
On a wall, Louie saw a scrawl of graffiti: B Niju Ku. Louie knew niju meant “twenty” and ku meant “nine.” He walked back to Omori, wondering what “B twenty-nine” meant, and why someone would write it on a wall.
On November 1, a wondrous new American plane lifted off a
Saipan runway. A gigantic craft, it could rocket across the sky at more than 350 miles per hour and carry giant bomb loads
over distances no other bomber could traverse. It was the B-29 Superfortress, and it would bring down Japan.
All morning, the plane flew, splitting the
air nearly six miles up. Above was a sky of intense blue; below came Tokyo.
B-29s had been used a few times over Japan, launching from a remote area in
China that had not been occupied by Japan. Largely because of the difficulty of
flying from Chinese bases, the raids failed, but the swift, huge planes terrified the Japanese, inspiring the graffiti Louie saw. Weeks after the first China-based raid, Americans captured the island of
Saipan, only 1,450 miles from Tokyo. The B-24 couldn’t make it from Saipan to Tokyo and back, but the
B-29 could. The November 1 flight was the first run. The plane carried not bombs, but cameras: it was mapping the path of B-29s that would follow.
Louie was outside when sirens sounded. Sirens were routine now, so they caused no concern. The guards shooed the POWs into the barracks.
Outside, something was different. The guards were gaping at the sky as if, wrote
Bob Martindale, “they were looking for the Messiah.” Then there was a glint above, a finger pointing urgently, and POWs bolting for the door. Running out, Louie saw a sliver of light over Tokyo, contrails curling behind it like twisting spines. “Oh God, God, an American plane!” someone shouted. In Tokyo, civilians stood in the streets, their frightened shouts carrying over the water.
Louie had never seen a plane like this. Then a new prisoner said it was an American bomber called a B-29. A cheer rang out. Men shouted, “B-29! B-29!” It was the most beautiful thing Louie had ever seen.
As the POWs ran and cheered, Louie glanced to the end of camp. The Bird was standing motionless and expressionless, watching the plane.
“It was not their Messiah,” Martindale wrote, “but ours.”
The B-29 flew at perfect liberty. The guards pursued the elated POWs, trying to force them into the barracks. The men shushed each other, fearing they’d be beaten for celebrating. The clamor quieted. Louie watched the bomber, occasionally darting between barracks to avoid the guards. The plane crisscrossed overhead for more than an hour, then flew off.
The bomber had simply passed over Tokyo, but everyone knew what it meant. Every morning at roll call, the twenty-ninth man sang out “Niju ku!” at the top of his lungs. “Not even bayonet prods,” wrote Wade, “could wipe the smiles from the POW faces now.”
The Bird wasn’t smiling.
It was an ordinary day.
Louie was in his barracks, sitting with friends. Suddenly, two guards crashed in, screaming
“Keirei!” Louie leapt up with the other men. In bounded the Bird.
Looking around, the Bird spotted Louie and charged at him. He wore the belt he’d worn on Louie’s first day in Omori. The buckle was several inches square, made of heavy brass.
“You come to attention last!”
The Bird jerked his belt off. Grasping the end with both hands, he swung it back, then whipped it forward like a baseball bat, straight into Louie’s temple.
Louie felt as if he’d been shot in the head. His legs seemed to liquefy, and he collapsed. The room spun.
When he gathered his wits, he was on the floor, bleeding. The Bird was
crouched over him, making a motherly sound, a sort of
“Awwww.” He pulled a fold of toilet paper from his pocket and pressed it into Louie’s hand. Louie held it to his temple.
“Oh, it stop, eh?” the Bird said, his voice soft.
Louie pulled himself upright. The Bird waited for him to steady himself. The corporal seemed compassionate and regretful, and Louie felt grateful. The relief was just entering his mind when the buckle, whirling around from the Bird’s swinging arms, struck his head again. Louie felt pain bursting through his skull, his body going liquid again. He smacked into the floor.
For weeks, Louie was deaf in one ear. The Bird beat him daily. Louie bore it with clenched fists, eyes blazing, but the assaults were wearing him down. The corporal began lording over his dreams, his features alight in vicious rapture. Louie spent hours in prayer, begging God to save him, and lost himself in fantasies of running in the Olympics. He thought of home, tormented by thoughts of what his disappearance must have done to his mother.
One day in mid-November, two Japanese civilians found Louie in his barracks. Friendly and respectful, they said they were producers from
Radio Tokyo. They handed Louie a piece of paper. It was a transcript of an American radio broadcast announcing his
death. The news that Louie had been declared dead, privately delivered to his
family in June, had become public that week.
The producers said they were distressed that Louie’s family had been told he was dead. They invited him to write a message to his family and read it on a program called
Postman Calls.
Louie didn’t trust them.
Postman Calls was a propaganda show, performed in English and broadcast to Allied troops to demoralize them. The broadcasters were POWs known as “
propaganda prisoners,” usually working under threat of execution or beating. Wary of being made into a propaganda prisoner, Louie wouldn’t commit. The producers told him to think about it. Louie asked
Martindale what to do. Martindale said as long as Louie wrote his own message, there was no harm in accepting.
Louie set to work. Knowing his family might not believe it was he, he added details he hoped would convince them. To ensure his message aired, he decided to speak positively about his captors.
He was driven to Radio Tokyo. The producers gave his message a hearty approval. It would be taped for later broadcast. The Japanese planned to use that day’s broadcast to tease the audience, then wait two days before airing his voice, proof they were telling the truth. Louie taped his message, then returned to Omori.
In San Francisco at 2:30 a.m. on November 18, a young woman named Lynn Moody was working the graveyard shift in the Office of War Information. A colleague was listening to Japanese broadcasts and typing them up for review by propaganda analysts. The colleague asked Moody to fill in during her break.
Moody slipped on the earphones. She was startled to hear a name she knew: Louis Zamperini. Moody was a USC graduate, and Louie was an old friend. Moody began typing.
Recently a news report … stated that First Lieutenant Louis Zamperini is listed as dead by the United States War Department.… Louis Zamperini is alive and well as a prisoner of war here in Tokyo.
This is one of the many examples of the men missing in action erroneously reported and later being established as a lie.… Much suffering and heartaches could have been avoided by the transmittal of reliable information to the parties concerned regarding the whereabouts of men.…
So chin up, Mrs. Louis Zamperini.… Louis is neither missing nor dead.… Keep on listening, Mrs. Zamperini, and don’t mention it; the pleasure is all ours.
Later, Moody wrote that when her colleague returned, “I practically danced around the room telling her about it.”
Two nights later, Moody was back on the night shift when a transcriber yelled to her. Moody ran in and put on the earphones.
“Hello, America,” the announcer began, “this is the postman calling and bringing a special message … to Mrs. Louis
Zamperini.… Her son has come down to the studio especially to send her this message of reassurance after the erroneous report of a few days ago by the United States War
Department that he was officially given up as dead and missing.”
A young man began speaking. Moody knew in an instant: it was Louie.
Hello, Mother and Father, relatives, and friends. This is your Louie talking. Through the courtesy of the authorities here I am broadcasting this personal message to you.
This will be the first time in two and one half years that you will have heard my voice.… I am uninjured and in good health and can hardly wait until the day we are together again.… I am now interned in the Tokyo prisoners’ camp and am being treated as well as can be expected under wartime conditions. The camp authorities are kind to me.…
Before I forget it, Dad, I would be very pleased if you would keep my guns in good condition so we might do some good hunting when I return home. Mother, Sylvia, and Virginia, I hope you will keep up your wonderful talents in the kitchen. I often visualize those wonderful pies and cakes you make. Is Pete still able to pay you his weekly visits from San Diego? I hope he is still near home.… Merry Christmas and a happy New Year.—Your loving son, Louie
At the Zamperini house, a military telegram arrived, and on it were Louie’s words. The telegram stressed that officials couldn’t confirm Louie was really the speaker or a POW. But the Zamperinis focused on one sentence:
Keep my guns in good condition. Growing up shooting rabbits, Louie
was fastidious about his guns. To the Zamperinis, this was the fingerprint, the detail only Louie would have thought to include. Louise and Sylvia began sobbing and shouting with joy.
Pete picked up the phone,
called a friend, and shouted two words.
“He’s alive!”
