Marietta museum to return half-century old Japanese war flag

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Posted 3:55PM on Wednesday, December 4, 2002

MARIETTA - The small prayer flag, a red dot on a field of aging white cloth inscribed with a spiral of ancient Chinese characters, came to America as a spoil of war. Wednesday, after more than a half-century in America and months of research among officials in Marietta, Tokyo and a small monastery in Japan, the flag began its journey back home. Officials from the Marietta Museum of History, which possesses the flag, meticulously wrapped the flag to send it home. In the closing days of World War Two, Kijuro Torio was a Japanese Navy sailor who was conscripted into service as a Pacific Island sniper. He kept pictures of his loved ones -- and the prayer flag -- close to his heart. ``To Mr. Kijuro Torio: We pray your (good) fortune in the war lasts long,'' the ancient characters read, penned by Torio's unit members. But Torio's fortune would not last. On a small island near Okinawa, the sniper came across George Barnett ``Barnie'' Hagood, an Army combat engineer. Only one man walked away from the fight. Hagood, a Marietta man who died in 2000, found the small flag on the sniper's body. He returned home to his family and kept the flag until his death. In April, Hagood's wife, Christine Bramlett Hagood, brought a box of her husband's World War Two items to the Marietta museum. Museum director Dan Cox had never seen anything like the small flag. He contacted friend Karen Beyke, who taught English for two years in Japan, to have the Japanese writing translated. The handwriting was intricate, detailed and complex. Beyke sent a photocopy of the flag and its mysterious writing to friends in Japan. They sent the sample to a Buddhist monastery, who were able to translate it. There they found the flag had an owner. And possibly a family who could claim it. They found a survivor of Torio's family who wanted the flag. Now it's on its way to Japan.