Petition and letters to get Hirouemon Yamamoto and other internees out of internment camp in Santa Fe, New Mexico, 1942-1945.

On the U.S. mainland, every person of Japanese ancestry was placed in concentration camps soon after Japan attacked. But in Hawaiʻi, which was ironically much closer to the war than the west coast, only about 1,200 Japanese people (mostly adult men) were interned. Initially they were held in temporary camps on Oahu, but were later transported the larger mainland facilities. In a sad irony, some young Japanese men who joined the U.S. Army had family members imprisoned in camps at the same time. These documents show the efforts of one man from Hawaiʻi to be released, who protested that he had done nothing to deserve imprisonment.

Call Number: MS Group 197
Location: Bishop Museum Archives