The Japanese city was destroyed on 6 August 1945 when the United States dropped the world’s first atomic bomb.

Initial reports of the destruction caused by the bomb were censored but after the full effects, including radiation sickness, became more widely known in the UK, politicians, philosophers, scientists and church leaders came together to campaign against nuclear weapons with peaceful protests, marches, music and artwork among the responses.

The Bubble Theatre, Southwark, has launched a project to see how Londoners reacted to the news that heralded the nuclear era. Their research project has been made possible by a grant of £74,000 from the Heritage Lottery Fund (HLF). The information they uncover will be shared with theatre groups in Hiroshima as part of that city’s commemoration of the traumatic event.

The research, much of which will be handled by volunteers, will cover a wide range of issues. They will set out to discover how newspapers in London reported the bomb explosion that destroyed more than ten square miles of Hiroshima and killed up to 135,000 people. The researchers want to learn how Londoners received the news, what reaction came from Japanese people living in London and how families of British servicemen who had served in the Far East or had been prisoners of war under the Japanese felt at the time. The project will cover the period up to October 1963 when an international Test Ban Treaty was signed by the United States, the UK and the then Soviet Union. The early days and protests by the peace movement will also be studied.

Much of the research will be based on recorded interviews undertaken by the estimated 180 volunteers. The information and personal stories gathered during the project will be presented in a number of ways including dramatic presentations of testimony, a new website and teaching resources available to schools. The archive of information uncovered will be shared with the Hiroshima Peace Museum.