Bells of Nagasaki’s Urakami Cathedral to Sound Together for 1st Time Since Bomb Dropped in 1945

The Yomiuri Shimbun

15:40 JST, August 8, 2025

NAGASAKI — A nonprofit organization, which promotes the study of Nagasaki culture, will hold an event Saturday to listen to the sound of bells in the city’s Urakami Cathedral, including a new bell donated to the cathedral to replace one that was damaged in the 1945 atomic bombing of the city.

On Aug. 9, 1945, the cathedral and two towers collapsed in the bombing, but the south tower’s bell was found nearly intact in the rubble and was placed in the rebuilt cathedral. But the north tower’s bell was severely damaged by the bomb.

The new bell was donated to the cathedral earlier this year in a project led by Prof. James Nolan Jr. at Williams College in the United States. Nolan Jr., 62, is the grandson of James Nolan, who participated in the Manhattan Project, which developed the atomic bomb.

Agenda NOVA Nagasaki will hold the event at Tenshu Park in Heiwamachi with Nolan Jr. and Kojiro Moriuchi, 72, a parishioner and a child of a hibakusha atomic-bomb survivor, in attendance. The gathering will be livestreamed on the NPO’s website to share the sound of peace with people around the world.

When Nolan Jr. visited Nagasaki about two years ago, Moriuchi proposed the creation of a new bell to him. Nolan Jr. agreed and began raising funds by collecting donations from Catholics and others in the United States.

The new bell was shipped from the United States, and on July 17 it was hung in the north tower with a crane.

The event will begin at 10:45 a.m. Saturday. After greetings from Nolan Jr. and others, attendees will offer silent prayers at 11:02 a.m., the exact time the atomic bomb was dropped on Nagasaki on Aug. 9, 1945. Then they will listen to the sound of the bells being rung together for the first time since World War II.