Densho Digital Archive - Terry Aratani - Fred Matsumura - Kenneth Okuma - Henry Bruno Yamada Interview (denshovh-aterry

<Begin Segment 15>

TI: This one is a tangent, but earlier this week I interviewed Senator Danny Inouye, and he got his battlefield commissions right after the "Lost Battalion," right near, right about that time. But the interesting thing, it sort of took me aback. I wasn't ready for this. But he said one of his first things as an officer is, I guess during the Champagne Campaign, that period, he was what he called a whorehouse officer. That he had to go to the whorehouses and make sure that, I guess if the men went to a whorehouse, they had to sign, or go to a specific station or something? And I meant to ask the senator this but I never did. But was it common for the men to go to whorehouses? Is this something that [Laughs] answer -- I'm just, like what percentage? I mean, is it, was it something that was pretty common. I know because when you guys went down, you guys had to relieve your tension and everything.

KO: I would say a good percentage, frankly.

HY: They had the pro stations.

TI. Had the what?

HY: They call that the pro stations, where you had to go before you to go to the --

TI: The pro stations you call it?

TA: Yeah.

FM: No, you go after.

TA: Oh, yeah, yeah, yeah. Get examined.

FM: Yeah.

TI: And so was this, for many of the men, because you were all young, fairly young --

KA: Yeah, right.

TI: Was this like the first experience, sexual experiences were in Europe?

KA: Uh-huh.

TI: And I mean, was it sort of like when you went, I mean, I imagine in some ways, there were experiences, in not only the whorehouses, but the drinking and partying. It was probably new to a lot of the men because back in Hawaii or the mainland, they probably were the raised in a fairly strict environment. And then all of a sudden, you're in Europe, you're fighting. Then you go to these towns, and it was like, everything -- anything goes. How was it like? Do you remember that part?

FM. I, myself, I never did drink before I went in the service. And well, while we were training we had, one of our men that goes to a PX quite often, he liked to have a few beers. So we tag along with him, just to make sure that he gets home okay. So we go and we sit with him for -- he drink about a case of beer. We might drink about one or two. And we more or less bring him home every night from the PX. And actually, I started to drink when we went overseas, after we went to the combat. Some of the guys got killed. And then we had beer rations. So we all gather all the beers together, and then we all sit around. And we drank and talk about what happened, how certain guy got killed or things like that.