Ships
- IJN Kumano Captain from 29 March 1944
Soichiro Hitomi was born on 16 September 1899 and served as a captain in the Imperial Japanese Navy. On 29 March 1944 he took command of the heavy cruiser Kumano, relieving Toshizo Fujita. She was one of the four large Mogami-class ships, rebuilt before the war with a main battery of ten eight-inch guns. Kikumatsu Tanaka had commanded her earlier in the war, until February 1943.
In October 1944 Kumano sailed with Vice Admiral Takeo Kurita's First Diversion Attack Force from Brunei toward Leyte Gulf, passing through the Sibuyan Sea and San Bernardino Strait. She carried the flag of Cruiser Division 7. On the morning of 25 October, off Samar, American destroyers turned toward the Japanese cruisers. A torpedo from the destroyer Johnston hit Kumano far forward, tore away the bow, and flooded the ship back toward the forward bulkheads.
Hitomi reported that a single torpedo had struck near the bow, that the flooding had been checked at a reinforced bulkhead, and that the cruiser could still make about fifteen knots. The division commander shifted his flag to Suzuya, and Kumano was ordered to leave the battle and withdraw alone. She worked south and west, clear of the fight off Samar.
Carrier aircraft found her the next morning. Bombs put most of her boilers out of action, and one exploded against the starboard side of the bridge close enough to nearly kill Hitomi. The engineers raised steam again in stages, first at a crawl and then at a speed that would carry her into port. She reached Coron Bay, took fuel, and arrived at Manila on 28 October for emergency repairs.
Early in November the Navy sent the damaged cruiser toward the home islands with a convoy. On 6 November, off Cape Bolinao on the Luzon coast, American submarines attacked, and two torpedoes hit Kumano. She could no longer move under her own power. A cargo ship towed her into Dasol Bay, and she was then taken to Santa Cruz in Zambales, where repair work went on in shallow water beside the shore.
On 25 November 1944, while she still lay at Santa Cruz, aircraft from the carrier Ticonderoga struck her with torpedoes and bombs. She listed to port, capsized, and sank that afternoon in about thirty meters of water. Hitomi was lost with the ship, together with his executive officer. He was promoted to rear admiral the same day. Several hundred of the crew died in the sinking, and more than six hundred were saved. Kumano was removed from the Navy list on 20 January 1945.