By Phil Devlin
(June 19, 2025) — Eighty years ago this week on June 20, 1945, more than a hundred B-29 bombers of the 314th Bomber Wing stationed on Guam conducted a night raid on the town of Shizuoka, Japan, located near the base of Mt. Fuji. It was a low-altitude bombing raid using napalm.
Sgt. Kenneth Colli of Windsor Locks (photo above, top row, second from left) was part of that raid. He was just 19. Colli was a waist gunner on one of the Superfortresses.
Two of the bombers collided in mid-air after they had released their bombs and crashed. An intense thermal wave caused one of the planes to flip over and to land upside down on the other, driving both to the ground. There was a crew of eleven on each plane, plus a photographer on board one of the planes, bringing the number of American casualties to twenty-three. One of those casualties was Connecticut’s Sgt. Colli. Around 2,000 Japanese are believed to have perished in the attack as well.
A Japanese monk who observed the incident found the wreckage and buried the Americans, an act of treason in Japan during the war. Found in the wreckage was an airman’s canteen, with a blackened handprint embedded into it. At some point, a group of Japanese civilians, led by Dr. Hiroya Sugano, started to hold a prayer service at a stone memorial on a hilltop overlooking the city every year on the June 20th anniversary of the bombing, a service that continues to this day and has gotten a great deal of publicity in recent years.
The blackened canteen at the wreckage site (photo above) shows imprints of human fingers on it caused by the high heat of the fire when the plane crashed. The Buddhist monk who found it believed that the spirit of the man who held it had passed into the canteen. The canteen ritual has now become a regular part of the remembrance ceremony held annually at Pearl Harbor on December 7th. The blackened canteen has become a symbol for the reconciliation of the two countries formerly at war. Numerous videos about the canteen can be found at youtube.com by searching “blackened canteen.”
On the 75th anniversary of the June 20th bombing raid in 2020, a number of speakers at the reconciliation ceremony spoke and captured well the meaning of the “Blackened Canteen” ritual. Here is what Jacqueline Ashwell, Superintendent of the National Park Service’s World War II Valor in the Pacific National Monument had to say: “War is tragic, and it brings out the worst in us. Yet, out of war, glimmers of hope can be found amidst the destruction and despair and great acts of courage can be known. We are here to honor those who died on that fateful day in 1945, but also everyone who died during World War II.”
Ken DeHoff, Executive Director of the Pacific Aviation Museum at Pearl Harbor, had this to say: “This event with its historic tradition represents the unity our countries have shown moving forward. This canteen tradition not only honors our respective countries’ fallen but also celebrates the strength of our relationship today.”
Chaplain Robert Lawrence of Fall River, Massachusetts, who gave the benediction at the 75th anniversary ceremony, had this to say: “The blackened canteen, with all of its scars, survived because a memory was needed in order for us to remember, and to understand the need for the ongoing friendship and reconciliation between our two countries.”
In the spring of 1949, the Windsor Locks Journal carried the following information about Sgt. Colli: “Army searchers found the plane some time ago and also learned the bodies of the crewmen had been buried in Japan. Their bodies were recently returned to this country, and a group burial will take place in Louisville on March 8th. Burial occurred at the Zachary Taylor National Cemetery in Kentucky.”
Photos provided by Phil Devlin. Crew photo from Colli family. Blackened canteen photo from a brochure passed out by the government on the 50th anniversary of the incident.
Hello! My great uncle was also one of the men who died in this crash (top row, 4 from the left…Sgt Justin Patsey). There is a group of us who are relatives of these men who are currently trying to connect with all the families. Coincidentally, we have not found a way to contact the family of Kenneth Colli. If the author of this article or the Colli family could please contact me, we would be very grateful for the connection!