Chiran

Chiran is small town centered around a collection of samurai houses dating from the early 18th century. The Sata family, one of the richest factions of nearby Kagoshima's Shimizu clan, built these buke-yashiki along a landscaped lane as their primary residences. Oddly, the Shimazu clan fought England in 1863, and the town features a small Anglo-Satsuma Museum. More recently, an airfield in Chiran was used as the point of departure for kamikaze pilots en route to Okinawa. The Special Attack Peace Hall memorializes the 1035 teenagers who attempted suicide attacks on Allied ships in the Battle of Okinawa. All in all, only 56 American ships were sunk, and just over 400 were severely damaged. On display in the hall are a number of soldiers' relics, uniforms, and even the remains of a detonated kamikaze plane unearthed from the Pacific. The main room features poetry, farewell letters, and photos of the pilots, the majority in their late teens or early twenties.

The manicured gardens on the grounds of some of the buke-yashiki houses:





Memorial to Special Attack Forces and an original kamikaze bomber:

Reconstructed pilots' barracks:

A few of the 1035 stone lanterns in memory of the kamikaze pilots who died in the Battle of Okinawa: