Page 127 - Unit 731 Testimony

He used to be section head of the Iwate Prefectural Hygiene Department [in
postwar days].

There were several poison gas test sites outside of Harbin. The Anda
site was up against the side of a mountain, and I was there during human
experiments. A lot of top brass from the Kwantung Army came to watch.
Takeda no Miya was there also. Twenty or thirty maruta had their hands
tied behind their backs around wooden posts set in the ground, and the gas
tanks were on the ground waiting.

For a week before the test, the meteorological team was checking the
weather. Then, on one test, the wind shifted and the gas came blowing in
our direction, and everybody had to run.

[Takeda no Miya was an imperial prince and a cousin to Emperor Hirohito.

It was common practice for people of the imperial family to serve in the
military, but Takeda's role in Manchuria is of particular interest. He was the
officer in charge of finances for the Kwantung Army, and all money
flowing to Manchuria-based units went through his office. He went to
Pingfang on numerous occasions and to other units, obviously to check up
on how the funds he was dispensing were being spent.

At times he used a pseudonym to conceal his identity. He took one
character each from his name and title and reversed them, so that "Takeda
no Miya" became "Miyata." A story from another former Youth Corps
member recounts the time his unit received a visit from a Colonel Miyata

Sanbo. It was midsummer, and it was the custom of the unit administration
to place a large column of ice in the rooms of high-ranking guests to bring
down the temperature. The Youth Corps boy and his associates all thought it
strange that while a colonel was nowhere nearly high enough to receive this
courtesy, Miyata's room was honored with an ice column. Later, they
discovered the real identity of the man.

By the time of the Tokyo Olympics in 1964, Takeda no Miya was
known in Japan as the chairman of the Japan Olympic Committee and vice-
chairman of the Tokyo Olympic Organizing Committee. He was also
important in other sports circles.]

I remember when I had to deliver the boss's briefcase to the Imperial
Household Ministry. [The Imperial Household Agency, known as the

Imperial Household Ministry before the war, is a centuries-old organ