Densho Digital Archive - Henry Shimizu Interview (denshovh-shenry-01-0022)

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TI: So were there very many, or any government restrictions on Japanese in Prince Rupert, or, or with the fishing fleet?

HS: Well, that started happening in January. Especially after Hong Kong, then I think they got a lot more agitation, agitated, and they thought something has to be... they started then, at that point, and I know, I'm sure it was probably true in the United States, that the military and the navy especially, thought the Japanese fishermen could be spies. I mean, they never did accuse anybody of being spies, but they said they could be a "fifth column," and that was the term that was very prevalent at that time, the idea of a fifth column being in the country. And that, that came from Hemingway's idea that there was another enemy within. And so they did that business of going around and checking up on all the Japanese fishermen, and eventually, by that time, by January, I think it was, in January, they ordered all Japanese fishermen to bring their boats down to the -- bring 'em in, they prevented them, they prohibited, first thing, they prohibited that they could not fish. That was the first thing. Then they brought, brought, told them all to gather in Prince Rupert harbor, and these boats were then told that they would have to travel down the West Coast and take their boats to the Fraser Valley. That's the, that's a journey with these small little boats, these putt-putt boats, that would take almost a week. 'Cause it, how far could they go? They could only go by day, and when the weather was good. So they did, took all the boats, took 'em down to the Fraser Valley, and all these boats were tied up on the, the delta, right on Fraser, in the Fraser River. It was a great, and there is a famous picture of all these Japanese fishing boats stretching on for, way into the distance, all tied up to each other in kind of a big v-shape. That these boats were there until they, they were sold. A lot of them were sold, about, in about two or three years' time.

TI: In addition to doing the fishing fleet, were there, did the, did the Mounties pick up any, like, community leaders or anything like that?

HS: They did, they had a few what they called Japanese nationals, people who did not have Canadian citizenship. They began picking them up, I think, either in late December, early January, because they were considered citizens in Japan, and now they were at war with Japan, these people were, would become, in a way, prisoners of war.

TI: Well, when you say "Japanese nationals," now, your parents...

HS: They were not, most of them were, most of the Japanese, most of the Japanese that came, that were in Prince Rupert, most of 'em were, had taken out citizenship.

TI: Oh, so your parents had taken out Canadian citizenship.

HS: Oh, yeah. That was before, see, that was way back in the '20s.

TI: Okay, so they had citizenship, so it was, so the... okay, so they could pick up people who had not applied.

HS: Uh-huh. What they called Japanese nationals, they, apparently they had, I get the, this has been going on, this has been ongoing for the six months prior to World War, before Pearl Harbor. During 1941, the Mounties had been quietly making up a list of what they called Japanese nationals, because already the -- and they knew who they were because they had to register. And then, then we, during that period, we had to register, by the way, in, in... when did that happen? That happened in December, late January of 1942, we had to register.