Tetsuden Kashima was an infant when his family was sent to an incarceration camp in Utah during World War II. More than 50 years later, he still has questions about that experience. In a search for answers, he has spent endless hours sifting through archives in New Mexico and Washington, D.C., uncovering intriguing information about the camps along the way.

Tetsuden Kashima is writing a book about the internment camps and is teaching a course on the subject. Photo by Mary Levin.

"There are more than 100 books on the incarceration of Japanese Americans, but everything hasn't been discovered," says Kashima, associate professor of American ethnic studies. Through his own research, Kashima recently uncovered information about a Department of Justice (DOJ) camp at Fort Stanton, New Mexico, that held German and Japanese internees identified as "troublemakers." "No one really knew about this camp," says Kashima. "The government did not want people to know it existed."

Located within a larger camp that held captured German seamen, the facility was called a "Segregation camp," and its 48 inhabitants were called "segregants." Kashima believes the terminology is significant. "At the camps where some 116,000 Japanese Americans were held, they were called 'relocatees' or 'evacuees,'" explains Kashima, "with the implication that we evacuate people--in flood or famine situations, for example--for their own good. But the people at Fort Stanton were called 'segregants' and they were viewed differently."

Who was sent to Fort Stanton? Of the 17 segregants of Japanese ancestry, 10 were born in America but faced an unusual situation when, in 1944, the U.S. allowed Americans to renounce their citizenship in time of war, on American soil. "Anyone who renounced his or her citizenship was treated as an alien," says Kashima, "and many were scheduled for deportation to Japan. But these inmates were instead first brought to the DOJ camp at Fort Stanton."

Most of the 31 German segregants were German nationals, although some appear to have been naturalized American citizens. They were branded as "troublemakers" because they had caused disruptions or escapes at other camps.

Kashima learned of the Fort Stanton camp a while ago while sifting through National Archives materials for another project. "The words 'Segregation camp' came up, and I was intrigued," he recalls. "Through a federal grant from the Civil Liberties Public Education Fund, I was able to spend more time at the archives recently and piece together this information about Fort Stanton. I had to go through tons of material."

"Kashima finds that people often are surprised to learn that individuals of German and Italian ancestry were interned during the war."

Kashima finds that people often are surprised to learn that individuals of German and Italian ancestry were interned during the war. In fact, more than 11,000 Germans--mostly German nationals--and more than 2,700 Italian nationals, half of whom were Italian seamen, found themselves in various DOJ camps. That's in addition to the more than 17,400 Japanese Americans who were interned by the DOJ and the U.S. Army.

"This is therefore not just a Japanese American story," says Kashima, who is working on a book about the internment camps and teaches a course on the subject. He also recently wrote an article for The Washington Post on the redress issue of Japanese Americans.

"There is still much to be learned about this subject," Kashima says. "Vital aspects of the experience have yet to be explored. The story of the incarceration--and efforts to obtain redress--is a supremely American tale. As such, it should not and must not be forgotten."

[Autumn 1998 - Table of Contents]