<Begin Segment 25>

SS: Harvey, when did you eventually come home to Edith?

HW: Oh, okay. That was after four months in Japan, and finally, the point system got down to a point where I can leave.

SS: Tell me about that point system.

HW: Well, the point system was set up so that the people with the most service could leave the earliest, depending on how much they're needed also. And I left Tokyo Bay, New Year's Eve, I mean, Christmas Eve, 1945. And I had the, what I had done was, I wanted to see my relatives that I knew once more, so I missed two boats. So when I showed up again, they said, "You missed two boats, you're gonna go on a third boat, but you're gonna have a job." And I said, "What's the job?" They said, "You're gonna be the mess hall server aboard that ship." [Laughs] So I was.

SS: What was it like seeing those relatives? Because you had just fought in a war against their country.

HW: Yes.

SS: But you were blood relatives.

HW: Yes.

SS: What was it like seeing each other?

HW: Well, my uncle in Japan was an artist, very famous artist in Japan. And he was not, he was artistic temperament and didn't like wars. And his three sons, one of them the same age as myself, and one older, and one younger, were, they were in school. They got certain amount of benefit from being in school. Two of 'em, I think, served -- no, one served in the army but, but didn't get out of the country. They were all glad to see me, and as a matter of fact, my uncle brought out a fifth of Black Label whiskey that he had hoarded all through the war.

SS: No grudges, no bad feelings?

HW: No, no. And he had, his home was burned out in the firebombing. But he had made seventy trips by streetcar up to his summer home in Hakone, and had moved as much stuff as he can get there. So he didn't lose everything.

<End Segment 25> - Copyright © 1996 Densho. All Rights Reserved.