Densho Digital Archive
Densho Digital Archive Collection
Title: Tetsuo Nomiyama Interview
Narrator: Tetsuo Nomiyama
Interviewer: Martha Nakagawa
Location: Westminster, California
Date: May 2, 2010
Densho ID: denshovh-ntetsuo-01-0016

<Begin Segment 16>

MN: Tell me what Leavenworth was like. Describe it to me.

TN: That's very tough place. It's very, history, they have long history. And when you go through into your room, I think you have to go through about five gate, I remember, to get to your room.

MN: Were you scared at Leavenworth?

TN: No.

MN: Were all the Nisei soldiers in one section in Leavenworth?

TN: Leavenworth, big, and inside, they have a wing. And our group is one wing, and all separate. And one door handle to shut the, oh, maybe twenty room at a time. Then upstairs. Then the window is far away.

MN: At Leavenworth, did the army try to change your mind again?

TN: I think so. There's barrack there, so time to time, they interviewed, "You willing to go back to the army?" Yes.

MN: Did some people change their mind?

TN: One out of our group.

MN: What was your answer? What did you tell them at the interview?

TN: No mistake. We stick to original, my, his idea. That's all.

MN: So you were still protesting. You were still protesting.

TN: Yes.

MN: In your group, do you think there were informants, inu? In your group, do you think there were informants, inu? One more time?

TN: Your voice kind of high.

MN: Oh, go lower? In your group, do you think there were informants, inu?

TN: Oh, inu? I suspect.

MN: Why?

TN: I don't know why. They come to you, talk nicely, but they don't come too close, you know.

MN: They were friendly, but you didn't feel very close to them?

TN: No. Then that, few people left, they don't come 'til the end yet. Some way they get out.

MN: So you suspect that they were there to be friendly and get information from people and then go back out? You think that's what they were doing?

TN: For what?

MN: As a inu?

TN: Inu, yeah.

MN: Did you think they were, they're friendly with you --

TN: I don't know. Just a feeling, I think. So we just stay away, you know. Just don't go in through the...

MN: Were you friends with the black prisoners at Leavenworth?

TN: Yes.

MN: How did you become friendly with them?

TN: Oh, Mr. Nozawa, he's a really talkative, friendly people, person. He make hakujin group, black people group, very friendly. And especially black people, we tell them what we're here for, and they feel also, we are brothers. We really together feeling.

MN: Do you, is that how you protected yourself in prison, to be friends with the black prisoners? Did you protect yourself, Japanese Americans, from other criminals by being friends with the black prisoners? Were you friends, did you become friends with the black prisoners? Did you become friends with the black prisoners as protection from the other criminals?

TN: Black people?

MN: There's other criminals in Leavenworth, right? Other criminals. Other criminals. There's other criminals at Leavenworth. Other prisoners.

TN: Other prisoners, that's all.

MN: And sometimes you get attacked, and you have to protect your group. How did you get protection? Did you get protection from the black prisoners?

TN: Alabama stockade, they really have a racial feeling. Black here, Japanese here, us, and white. And Nozawa friend, a hakujin, gave us the information, how they're feeling, what they're gonna do. And the black prisoner come us, you know, "We're gonna help your case." White attack Japanese. Evening, each day, all the prisoner had to fall out... let me see. Japanese, white, and black people, and they come. Then one day, white group throw the rock, us.

PM: You call yourselves DB Boys because of Fort McClellan or Fort Leavenworth?

TN: McClellan. I'm talking about the stockade.

PM: Which one?

TN: McClellan. I'm sorry.

MN: That's okay.

<End Segment 16> - Copyright © 2010 Densho. All Rights Reserved.