American Historical Ephemera and Photography

30 1/2 x 30 1/2 in. map printed on color cloth; mounted, 38 3/4 x 40 in. With autograph inscription, signature and flight-path diagram by Co-Pilot Robert A Lewis: "Hiroshima bombing Aug. 6 1945 8:15 A.M. This map was carried on flight by Capt. Bob Lewis Attested as true Capt. Robert A. Lewis"

The map depicts "C-53 East China Sea," extending from parallels 15° to 37° North and meridians 120° to 146° (with map C-52 on verso), and was prepared by the Army Map Service, dated February 1945.

Provenance: Captain Robert A. Lewis; Stephen K. Lewis, his son; Sotheby's 31 October 1985, lot 212; Christie's, New York, Rockefeller Plaza Sale 1685, 15 November 2005, Lot 209.

A detailed military map, produced on fine-weave cloth for durability, carried on the Hiroshima Mission by Co-Pilot Robert A. Lewis. Tinian Island (where the aircraft took off) and Iwo Jima Island are circled in ink in the lower right portion, and Lewis has carefully drawn arrows representing the aircraft's flight path to Hiroshima and back. At the far right, in large block letters, Lewis has written "Hiroshima Bombing Aug 6, 1945 8:15 a.m. This map was carried on flight by Capt. Bob Lewis." Below, in cursive, he adds: "Attested as True Col. Robert A. Lewis."

Captain Robert A. Lewis of Brooklyn, NY, flew as co-pilot aboard the Enola Gay with Colonel Paul Tibbetts, Commanding Officer of the 509th Composite Group, a unit specially formed and trained in the highest security for the special mission during which the B-29 bomber would drop the world's first atomic bomb used in war. The historic flight lifted off from Tinian Island at 2:45 A.M. on 6 August 1945. At 15 seconds past 8:15 a.m., "Little Boy," a 9,000-pound uranium-235 core-fissionable atomic bomb was released over Hiroshima, Japan. Forty-three seconds later, after the bomb detonated at 1,890 feet, the city was decimated; 71,000 were killed or assumed dead, 68,000 were injured and 60,000 buildings were destroyed.