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RM: So you went overseas when?

JK: I went overseas in September of '44, it would be. And my brother who was, had seventeen weeks of basic training in Camp Blanding was in a earlier replacement group in Camp Blanding, Florida -- his group came to Camp Shelby, and we had our furloughs together to go back to visit the folks at Minidoka. He was married at that time.

RM: Did, you must have had a lot of friends who were in the 442nd, and some of them got killed. How did you react to that, the knowledge, that...?

JK: Well, you know, it's hard to just say, because I had guys that I trained with that were killed in a machine gun... I was trained as a machine gunner, and I was the gunner, you might say. And when we went overseas, I was a rifleman, and I was given a rifle, and I was given the position of first scout on a infantry squad. And, you know, I had no training, whatsoever, zero. I had very little training with the M-1 rifle, to start with. At thirteen weeks you don't learn much at all. And, but my Hawaiian-born sergeant, for the, squad sergeant was very good to me, knowing that I had no training. He trained me as a first scout, something like, "You're in, at the point, but you don't worry about Germans shooting at you. They know that you're not too important, you're just a GI. But the third or fourth guy, they -- so you look for mines and trip wires. And the guy behind you, the second scout, kinda looks for the enemies." But he says, "The one thing to remember is -- " no, there's two things to remember. "One thing is to remember is, if you always, as you go forward looking for the traps, trip wires and whatnots, fresh dug mines," he says, "Always look for a place you could dive to if somebody shot at you." Said, "The first shot will almost never be for you, it'll be for somebody that's 'bout the third down the line." And he said, "The other thing is carry a lot of toilet paper with you." Now not for the reason you use toilet paper, normally, but the idea was if I found a trip wire, a raw spot in the ground that looked like it was freshly dug, to leave a lot of toilet paper there for everybody else behind to...

RM: Spot.

JK: ...spot, yes, uh-huh. Those are the two things he told me, just absolutely... and then I think, you think being on the point is the most dangerous place. I don't think it really was, although it was the most dangerous place once you got in the firing, 'cause you're way kinda more open to the snipers and whatnot.

<End Segment 7> - Copyright © 2000 Densho. All Rights Reserved.