Densho Digital Archive
Densho Visual History Collection
Title: Tokio Yamane Interview
Narrator: Tokio Yamane
Interviewers: Sachiko Takita-Ishii, Yoko Murakawa, Noriko Kawakami
Location: Japan
Date: May 23, 2004
Densho ID: denshovh-ytokio-01-0010

<Begin Segment 10>

[Translated from Japanese]

I2: How was daily life in the stockade?

TY: There wasn't much to do. Bob Hayashida used to throw balls.

I2: Baseball?

I1: Like playing catch?

TY: We had balls provided for us. There was a waiting room for MPs right next to here. There were always a few MPs there. Supplies sent from the camp were delivered to that room. We received letters there too. We were able to exchange letters with family members. This is the mess hall. And this side, you could see the camp in distance. There were tall fences here, and these sections were separated. We could see people waving to us at the fences.

I1: Were you able to identify them?

TY: We weren't. We couldn't see the faces clearly.

I1: Showers were here. What about meals?

TY: We had meals at the mess hall here.

I1: Did you cook meals specifically for Japanese?

TY: I cooked everything. I could only cook simple meals like hamburgers, steak, eggs and ham, or vegetable stir fry. They gave us rice, and I cooked it. Bread was also provided.

I1: Did they provide as much food as they did in the camp?

TY: Soldiers and people in the camp had similar meals. It was ordinary food such as sausages, ham, eggs, vegetables, and so on. [Laughs] We had coffee too.

I2: There were originally fifty people in the building you were in, correct? Eleven people from the same building went on a hunger strike?

TY Eleven people from this stockade were the last ones left.

I2: Last? What about the other buildings?

TY: Everyone in the other buildings was gone. It was a bunch of people viewed as potentially dangerous by the authority like those who were registered in the Japanese military or former schoolteachers. We were all potential troublemakers, and some were involved in organizations. One of us was Mr. Kai, the Buddhist priest.

I1: How many meters did you say it was? The length of this....

TY: This was very large.

I1: Wasn't it? This is two meter here...

TY: On the bullpen side was only 10 meters long, but this area was big. Those big buildings were all there.

I1: That's right. The length of a bed was approximately 1.5 meters, and let's say they were 50 centimeters apart from each other. That's two meters. One building would be 50 meters long with 25 beds lined up. There were three buildings.

TY: It was a very large area.

I1: It was a lot larger than I thought it was.

TY: They said these buildings were built in compliance with the international laws.

I1: Is that so?

TY: So, each person...

I1: The square footage per person was regulated by the standards...

TY: It was up to the standard. You could calculate how big it was.

I1: We should be able to calculate. That's right. Square footage per person determines the size of the building. So, you spent your spare time playing baseball and such?

TY: Everyone was just lying around.

I1: Did you have any serious conversations with others?

TY: No. We didn't have anything to talk about.

I1: Didn't you talk about what you should do next, what you would do when you return, or whether you should contact your family or not?

TY: Highlight of the day was the daily treat delivery for us from the camp. We shared the food or cigarettes that we received. We didn't fight. I was very busy working at the mess hall and telling the younger guys to "peel potatoes, chop onions." [Laughs] There wasn't anything special about inside. Many people were coming in and out. There was an office for MPs, and there was a building for interrogation on this side.

I1: Just outside of the stockade?

TY: Yes. This side. MPs came to pick up people to interrogate and took them to the building. Dies Committee investigators or FBI agents were there. It could be at midnight. They would show a photo and ask, "You did it, didn't you?" We would say, "What is this? [Laughs]

I1: The FBI was also there?

TY: Yes.

I2: What kind of investigation did they conduct with you?

I1: Similar things?

TY: I was asked why I ended up being there.

[Interruption]

TY: I answered, "I was suddenly attacked, tortured, and put into the bullpen." That's all I told them and nothing else.

I2: Why do you think you were confined there for eight months?

TY: I think it is because I was the first one to get arrested after the incident. Todoroki was too. The leaders in the camp, Kai and Kutaromi, were hiding. They finally tuned themselves in at the end. They were searching for the two all over the camp. They were able to hide and dodge the search for a long time.

I2: How were they able to hide?

TY: It was a big place. It was hard to spot them if they went underground. Other people helped them too.

I1: One of them was hiding in the female only residence area. He hid in a cardboard box when someone came to look for him. The searcher picked up the box and found him.

I2: That was the end?

I1: That was the end. I heard that's how they found him.

I2: How many people were in the stockade when you went on a hunger strike?

TY: There were less than ten. We...

I2: Several people were released from the stockade along with you when the hunger strike ended?

TY: Yes, over ten people. We were sent to a hospital at the end. The hunger strike was over, and we were all released together, right?

I2: What do you mean by all?

TY: We all got together to go on a hunger strike. We didn't know if we could go on like that any longer. They stopped the daily delivery of snacks and supplies on the previous day. This was the biggest reason for the hunger strike. We asked why we were not receiving cigarettes and newspapers and were told, "We are no longer receiving deliveries."

I1: Did they tell you why?

TY: They didn't. We kept asking but they didn't give us an answer. I was pretty close to one MP, and we talked to each other. He once told me, "I cannot tell you exactly what, but we found something we didn't like written in a letter and found something enclosed." "That's why we can no longer receive deliveries." They stopped the daily delivery. If we hadn't done anything, we would have been locked up there for one full year. We didn't know if or how long we would continue to be kept in the stockade after the one year milestone. We decided to go on a hunger strike to win unconditional release. Kai and Kuratomi proposed it.

I2: Those two didn't get arrested until the end, right?

TY: Right. They were confined after they came out from hiding. [Laughs]

<End Segment 10> - Copyright (c) 2004 Densho. All Rights Reserved.