The History Hour9 Aug 2025

Nagasaki bomb and Brazil’s biggest bank heist

Max Pearson presents a collection of the week’s Witness History interviews from the BBC World Service. Our guest is Simone Turchetti, Professor of the History of Science and Technology, at The University of Manchester in the UK.

It's 80 years since the US dropped atomic bombs on Hiroshima and Nagasaki, forcing Japan to surrender at the end of the Second World War. We hear from a British prisoner of war who was in Nagasaki at the time.

Then, the son of musician Dmitri Shostakovich tells of his famous father’s confrontation with Stalin in the 1930s.

Also, the story of a man who survived an 8.6 magnitude earthquake that shook the Himalayan mountains in 1950.

Plus, Singapore's tense and tearful 1965 separation from the Federation of Malaysia and the detective who tracked down the gang responsible for Brazil's biggest bank heist.

Contributors: Simone Turchetti - Professor of the History of Science and Technology, at The University of Manchester. Maxim Shostakovich – son of musician Dmitri Shostakovich Manjeet Kaur- remembering Singapore independence in 1965. Antonio Celso Dos Santos – detective in Brazil Plus, archive recording of Geoff Sherring, a British prisoner of war in Nagasaki and Frank Kingdon-Ward who survived an earthquake that shook the Himalayan mountains in 1950.

(Photo: Nuclear explosion over Nagasaki. Credit: Pictures from History/Universal Images Group via Getty Images)

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