To the confusion of their guards they assembled each morning to raise the Stars and Stripes and salute it while their Boy Scout drum and bugle corps (every camp had one) played the national anthem. At Camp Topaz 3,250 adults were enrolled in camp courses; the two most popular were the English language and American history. Saturday evenings they sang ‘America the Beautiful,’ and after January 28, 1943, the men of military age did a lot more than sing.
On that Thursday Stimson announced that the Army would accept Nisei volunteers. Immediately more than 1,200 signed up, and before the war’s end, 17,600 Japanese had joined the Army, taking the recruit’s oath of allegiance while still behind barbed wire. In Italy they served with distinction in the 100th Infantry and the 442nd Infantry. No Nisei ever deserted. During the Italian campaign the 442nd alone suffered the loss of three times its original strength while winning 3,000 Purple Hearts with 500 oak leaf clusters, 810 Bronze Stars, 342 Silver Stars, 47 Distinguished Service Crosses, and 17 Legion of Merit awards. In Europe these units were a legend. Bill Mauldin wrote that ‘to my knowledge and the knowledge of numerous others who had the opportunity of watching a lot of different outfits overseas, no combat unit in the Army could exceed them in loyalty, hard work, courage, and sacrifice. Hardly a man of them hadn’t been decorated at least twice, and their casualty rates were appalling.’
Those who fought beside the Nisei knew what drove them. They were trusting that when word of their war records reached California, attitudes toward their families would improve, and that the Issei’s prewar possessions would be returned to them. It was a vain hope. Japanese–American homes, farms, and businesses had been taken over by white Californians, most of whom, with Hearst’s aggressive support, kept their loot. The Nisei themselves, returning in uniform, were rejected by barbershops and restaurants. After the San Francisco Examiner had run the headline SOLDIERS OF NIP ANCESTRY ALLOWED TO ROAM ON COAST, a Nisei who had lost a leg in the ETO was publicly beaten. That was too much even for bigots, and overt outrages subsided.
To imply that everyone in the state was a xenophobe would be to compound injustice. But a great many people sat on their hands and looked the other way. The War Department became concerned about Nisei incidents; white officers who had served with them were sent on West Coast lecture tours to describe their gallantry to farmers and businessman. One first lieutenant was asked by a lanky farmer, ‘How many of them Japs in your company got killed?’ The lieutenant replied, ‘All but two of the men who started in my platoon were killed by the end of the war.’ The farmer said, ‘Too goddam bad they didn’t get the last two.’ People stared at the ceiling, at the floor, at their laps. No one said a word.
William Manchester, The Glory and the Dream,
(New York: Bantam Books, 1980) 301–302
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