Hyōsetsu no Mon, Commemorative monument in Wakkanai Park, Japan.
Hyōsetsu no Mon is a memorial in Wakkanai Park dedicated to those who died in distant lands. The installation features a central female figure gazing upward with hands oriented downward, accompanied by supporting stone structures that form a composed whole.
The memorial was constructed in 1963 to honor those who perished in Sakhalin during periods of hardship. It stands as a marker of the historical relationship between mainland Japan and that distant northern region.
Because travel to Sakhalin was closed to Japanese in the Soviet period, families could not visit graves across the La Perouse Strait; during Obon they came to this memorial instead. The pedestal inscription, dated 15 August 1963, records that people left from this land for Karafuto and returned here from it, and names Kihara Toyojirō and Sasai Yasukazu as the men behind the project.
The monument is located within Wakkanai Park and is accessible on foot or by local transportation from downtown. The park offers free access and can be visited comfortably throughout the year.
Near the gate stands the Kunin-no-Otome-no-Zo, a statue of nine telephone operators from Maoka (now Kholmsk) who died on 20 August 1945 when Soviet troops stormed the town. The pedestal inscription, dated 15 August 1963 and signed by Wakkanai mayor Hamamori Tatsuo, names Kihara Toyojiro and Sasai Yasukazu as the driving forces behind the memorial.
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