In the space for post-enrollment changes and their reasons there is only one word, written in pencil: “Death.”

The school attendance registers that list most of the 541 first- and second-year students at Hiroshima First Municipal Girls’ School who became victims of the Aug. 6, 1945, atomic bombing as they helped to demolish buildings for fire lanes, as mobilized students, are archived at Funairi High School in Hiroshima’s Naka Ward.

The thickness of the materials speaks to the fact that so many students died. Many columns in their report cards had already been left blank, showing how students at that time hardly had the chance to attend classes since entering the school.