<Begin Segment 39>

TK: From there until VE Day, was there anything significant that you remember in terms of the 522?

MT: Well, from there we were, keep pushing the Germans back. They kept pushing back and we were heading for Munich. And so the war ended in Munich and we were in Augsburg, Munich area. And but... it's kind of interesting is, when we got to Munich, Augsburg area, Eva Braun, which, you know, was the girlfriend of Hitler, her mother lives in Augsburg there. And we got to meet her. We talked to her and, in fact, I don't know if I... I didn't mention it, but when we were fighting Bruyeres, division wanted to make sure that the combat team was getting enough food, hot food, in that cold weather and everything like that. So I asked the, I think it was the general -- I can't remember his name -- that if I can take all the dried potatoes and, "Could I trade 'em for rice?" Because nobody wanted dried potatoes. And so the general says, "No, I'll tell you what I'll do, I'll give you nine tons of rice and you keep the potatoes." So we, from ever since Bruyeres, we, all the Hawaiian Niseis, they all ate ochazuke at night. From camp they got tsukemono, they got shoyu, they got all kinds of different food and of course we had plenty of rice, so, besides, then evening came they were still Japanese Americans, I guess. They all ate ochazuke, we had ochazuke. So when we, what I'm getting to is when we met Eva Braun's mother, food was very scarce then. So, we, we made lots of rice for her and she brought chicken and, chicken that she'd raised there and some vegetables and we made okazu and fed her and put the... that was quite an experience to find out that Eva Braun's mother had lived there. And then, I didn't know that the German people liked rice so much, that in Italy they did and in France they did, but Germans they really were, loved rice.

But just before, as we got into Munich before the war ended, it was interesting that all the, lot of the German soldiers, instead of going to the hakujins -- and the Russians were in that area, too -- and instead of giving up to them they had a tendency to come to all of us because they knew that we would, being Japanese American, that we'd treat 'em a lot better. And we tried to do everything we possibly could because, after all, I mean...

TK: How did your unit meet Eva Braun's mother and how would you describe her, both personally and then physically?

MT: I completely, I can't even picture her no more.

TK: Okay.

MT: The name comes to me and the fact it's, Eva Braun was in, up there in Eagle's Nest with Hitler.

TK: Eagle's Nest, yes.

MT: Uh-huh.

TK: Okay. Where were you on VE Day, Victory in Europe Day?

MT: Right in Augsburg, there.

TK: In Augsburg.

MT: Uh-huh.

TK: Do you remember your reactions when you first heard the news that the war was over in Europe?

MT: Well, yeah, it was, it was actually fantastic, I guess, because we had gone through combat all up to there and then, at that time it was sort of joyful because all the German soldiers became our prisoners and they were happy that the war was over. But 'til the night before we were shooting at each other, actually, although we were in a pushing position all the way up that... but no, we were real happy that the war was over, that we will be heading home and meet our families.

TK: So, here's a picture of the 522? Is that the 522 or is that just part of it? The battalion?

MT: [Ed. note: narrator holds up a photograph] No. These are part of the 422's I guess. And anybody that came back.

TK: Oh, the 442nd, yes.

MT: MIS, MIS, I suppose. But this is in 1951, we paraded down Second Avenue near the Frye Hotel and, but, this is Yanagimachi from Garfield, Garfield that played football, I guess.

TK: Oh.

MT: I don't know which one it was, but John Kusakabe and George Abe. This is me here. But it's just a mixture of all the --

TK: I see.

MT: -- GIs that were back in Seattle in 1951.

TK: So, that's in Seattle?

MT: Uh-huh, right by the Frye Hotel under the Smith Tower.

TK: Okay.

MT: We were coming down this way.

TK: Can we go back to your mother and your brother for a few minutes? Your mother was in Tule Lake.

MT: Uh-huh.

TK: And she went to Minidoka?

MT: Minidoka, uh-huh.

TK: Was your brother there at the same time, and what happened to your brother, by the way, and his wife?

MT: Well, they, they were in Minidoka, I don't know just how long they were. By that time, correspondence was very thin as far as Mother writing to me and brother writing to me and... but they left Minidoka camp, and they, they, lot of the White River valley Shirakawa people evacuated to Ontario, Oregon before the, about the camp time, they were going to camp, they evacuated that way. So there was a lot of White River valley people in Ontario, Oregon. So my brother and my mother wanted to go out to Ontario and they went to a place called Vale. And they started to raise onions and, I think primarily onions there for a couple of years. And then by the time I came back he wanted to go to the Snake River over in Payette and buy a ranch over there so he went over there. But they worked on the farms primarily beet farming and onions and potatoes, I guess. So, Mother worked in that hot weather.

TK: So your mother was with your brother?

MT: All that time, uh-huh.

<End Segment 39> - Copyright © 2003 Densho. All Rights Reserved.