Occupation Writer and physician Genre Essays | Name Shinichi Ikejiri Died 1945 | |
Notable works Itameru Ashi, Gun-i Tensen Oboegaki | ||
Shinichi Ikejiri (池尻 愼一, Ikejiri Shin'ichi, 1909 – 1945), pen name Shinichi Ōra (邑楽 慎一, Ōra Shin'ichi), was a physician for Hansen's disease patients at Kaishun Hospital of Hannah Riddell and Tama Zenshoen Sanatorium and a writer. His book Itameru Ashi (Diseased Reeds) sold well. He was drafted into the Imperial Japanese Army in 1937 and again in 1941, and shot dead in Indonesia in 1945.
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Life
Ikejiri was born in 1908 in Ukiha, Fukuoka Prefecture. He graduated from Private Kyushu Medical School (Kurume University), where he studied physiology. He was a convert to Lutheran Christianity. Unable to find a post in the Nagashima Aiseien Sanatorium, he became a physician at the Kaishun Hospital of Hannah Riddell at Kumamoto in April 1934. He gave his blood to a critically ill patient with leprosy through blood transfusion, an event which was written about in newspapers at the time. In August 1936, he was transferred to the Tama Zenshoen Sanatorium. In August 1937 he was drafted and sent to China.
In 1940, he published his book Itameru Ashi, which sold well; more than 30 printings were done within the year. Later that same year, he published Gun-i Tensen Monogatari (Memos of a Military Doctor in Battle). In 1941, he was again drafted, and went to Burma. In April 1944 he went to Jakarta University, to study leprosy under Professor Kentarō Higuchi. According to Higuchi's account, Ikejiri was shot dead in January 1945 by a third-country national.