During World War II, over 7,000 Japanese Americans and Japanese from Latin America were held in internment camps run by the Immigration and Naturalization Service, part of the Department of Justice. There were twenty-seven U.S. Department of Justice Camps, eight of which (in Texas, Idaho, North Dakota, New Mexico, and Montana) held Japanese Americans. The camps were guarded by Border Patrol agents rather than military police and were intended for non-citizens including Buddhist ministers, Japanese language instructors, newspaper workers, and other community leaders.

In addition 2,210 persons of Japanese ancestry taken from 12 Latin American countries by the U.S. State and Justice Departments were held at the Department of Justice Camps. Approximately 1,800 were Japanese Peruvians. The United States intended to use them in potential hostage exchanges with Japan. After the war, 1,400 were not allowed to return to their Latin American homes and more than 900 Japanese Peruvians were "voluntarily" deported to Japan. Three hundred fought deportation in the courts and were allowed to settle in the United States.

At least 14 U.S. Army facilities also held Japanese Americans during World War II. Four of the facilities were in Hawaii, one was in Alaska; the remaining nine facilities were within the contiguous United States.

 

Interesting/unusual facts

Seagoville was built by the Bureau of Prisons as a minimum-security women's reformatory in 1941. During the war, it held prisoners from Central and South America, married couples without children from the U.S., and about fifty women Japanese language teachers from California.

Camp Kenedy housed only men, many of whom were separated from family members who sent to other camps. The U.S. Army took over the facility in 1944 and Kenedy became a prisoner of war camp.

Kooskia Internment Camp was a highway construction camp. Detainees at Kooskia helped construct the Lewis and Clark Highway (today HWY 12) that runs between Lewiston, ID and Lolo, MT.

On July 27, 1942, a sentry at the Lordsburg Internment Camp shot two critically ill Japanese American internees under questionable circumstances.

The Santa Fe Internment Camp originally held Japanese American men from California, but all were transferred to relocation centers or U.S. Army custody by September 24, 1942. The camp then housed German and Italian nationals until February 1943. From February 1943 until June 1945, Santa Fe held over 2,000 Issei and Nisei men. Many of these internees at Santa Fe were from Tule Lake. In March of 1945 a large riot broke out when recently-transferred internees from Tule Lake were told to turn in their sweat shirts with rising sun motifs.

Although Crystal City Internment Camp was intended for Japanese Americans, German aliens were the first to arrive. The Germans were never relocated, but the camp was divided into separate sections for each ethnic group.

Ft. Lincoln was used to house so-called "recalcitrants" from Tule Lake Segregation Center and Santa Fe Internment Camp who had renounced their American citizenship, and Japanese nationals who were to be repatriated after the war.

Ft. Stanton was used to house German nationals during the war, but the Department of Justice also established a disciplinary camp for those termed "incorrigible agitators." Fifty eight Japanese Americans were incarcerated there.

During 1942, roughly half the internees at Ft. Missoula Internment Camp were Japanese American and the other half Italian nationals. After the Japanese Americans were given cursory hearings, they were transferred to other internment camps or relocations centers. Only 29 Japanese Americans were left in Ft. Missoula in 1943. Ft. Missoula was listed on the National Register of Historic Places on April 29, 1987.

Related Sites

Moab Citizen Isolation Center held as many as 49 men transferred there at the discretion of relocation center administrators, without formal charges. The center was located at the site of a previous Civilian Conservation Corps (CCC) camp near Moab, Utah. Today, Moab Isolation Center is on the National Register of Historic Places. For more information contact Jean McDowell, Director, Dan O'Laurie Canyon Museum, 118 E. Center St., Moab, UT 84532. Tel: 435-259-7085.

Most of Moab's inmates were transferred to Leupp, Arizona in April 1943, and then to Tule Lake in December 1943. Northern Arizona University and the Navajo Nation are initiating studies at Leupp that include archeologist, educators, local teachers, students, and community members.

The site of Catalina Honor Camp, ten miles east of Tucson, AZ, was renamed the Gordon Hirabayashi Recreation Site by the Coronado National Forest in 1999. Hirabayashi, served his sentence for curfew violation at Catalina, along with "resisters of conscience" and others convicted of Federal crimes. Hirabayashi took his case all the way to the U.S. Supreme Court, which upheld his conviction. In 1987, 55 years after he served time in hard labor at Catalina Honor Camps, Hirabayashi's conviction was overturned. For more information, contact Coronado National Forest, Santa Catalina Ranger District, 5700 N. Sabine Canyon Road, Tucson, AZ 85750. Tel: 520-749-8700. Website: www.fs.fed.us/r3/coronado.

Selected Books and Articles

Walls, Thomas K. The Japanese Texans. The University of Texas, Institute of Texan Cultures, 1987.

Daniels, Roger, Sandra Taylor, and Harry Kitano. Japanese Americans: From Relocation to Redress. Seattle: University of Washington Press, 1991.

Gardiner, Harvey. Pawns in the Triangle of Hate: The Peruvian Japanese and the United States. Seattle: University of Washington Press, 1981.

Culley, John J. "Trouble at the Lordsburg Internment Camp." New Mexico Historical Quarterly 60 (1985): 225-248.

Wegars, Priscilla. "Japanese and Japanese Latin Americans at Idaho's Kooskia Internment Camp." In Guilt by Association: Essays on Japanese Settlement, Internment, and Relocation in the Rocky Mountain West, Mike Mackey, ed. Powell, WY: Western History Publications, 2001.

Fiset, Louis. Imprisoned Apart: The World War II Correspondence of an Issei Couple. Seattle: University of Washington Press, 1997.

Websites

www.texancultures.utsa.edu/txtext/japanese/htms/9.htm
Historical photos of Camp Kenedy and Seagoville, from Thomas Wall's The Japanese Texans.

www.ins.usdoj.gov/graphics/aboutins/history/eperm.htm
Immigration and Naturalization Service website with table of Permanent Detention Facilities established for enemy aliens.

www.tsha.utexas.edu/handbook/online/articles/view/WW/quwby.html
Handbook of Texas Online website: comprehensive article about the WWII Department of Justice Camps.

www.uidaho.edu/LS/AACC/kooskia.htm
Kooskia Internment Camp Project

www.montana.com/ftmslamuseum/alien.htm
Historical Museum at Fort Missoula - Fort Missoula Alien Detention Center.

www.nd-humanities.org/html/wwiiinternment.htm.
North Dakota Humanities Council - The Fort Lincoln Internment Camp.