Densho Digital Archive
Manzanar National Historic Site Collection
Title: George Matsumoto Interview
Narrator: George Matsumoto
Interviewer: Kirk Peterson
Location: Orange, California
Date: June 10, 2009
Densho ID: denshovh-mgeorge_3-01-0001

<Begin Segment 1>

KP: This is an oral history with George...

GM: Matsumoto.

KP: Matsumoto. And we are at 245 Crystal View Drive? Street?

GM: Avenue.

KP: Avenue, in the city of Orange, California.

GM: Orange.

KP: And what's your zip code here?

GM: 92865.

KP: 92865. And this is tape one of an oral history with George. I am, the interviewer is Kirk Peterson, on the camera is Richard Potashin, and do we have permission to record this interview?

GM: Oh, yes.

KP: And is it okay if I call you George?

GM: Sure.

KP: Well, let's start at the beginning, for you.

GM: Okay.

KP: When and where were you born?

GM: I was born in San Francisco, 1924. July 19th.

KP: And where did your father come from?

GM: He came from Saga-ken in Japan. There's, the day he left, he left from Sasebo on Kyushu, and he heard the distant rumble of naval guns, that's when Admiral Togo annihilated the Russian-Baltic fleet. He was just a kid then. He was about fifteen, fifteen years old.

KP: What was his, what did his family do in Japan? Do you know?

GM: They were farmers.

KP: And why did he come to the United States?

GM: Well, I take it he was kinda adventurous. He was the eldest son and normally they inherit the farm, have to carry, carry out the tradition and take care of their folks. And he was kinda adventurous; he wanted to get out and see the world, so he came to the United States. That time, it wasn't, it wasn't that hard to get in. It was before the immigration restriction. 1924, they cut off all immigration.

KP: So if that was the annihilation of the Baltic fleet, what year would that have been?

GM: 1904 or '05. They sailed all the way around, half way around the world, and Admiral Togo, he was kind of a student of naval tactics, so he picked the Strait of Tsushima that was between Japan and Korea. It's real narrow, so the Russian fleet had to come single file, so what he did, he "crossed the T." It was something that Lord Nelson had done way back when, in this way, all your ships concentrate their fire on the lead battleship. So they couldn't fire too much, but you, the whole fleet was shootin' at the head, and when they annihilated the first one, then the second was their, the target. So he had "crossed the T" two times, and I think about ninety percent of the ships were sunk. But before that the Pacific fleet was annihilated at Port Arthur, and that was a kind of a typical Pearl Harbor type... they had 'em bottled up in the harbor and they just sank 'em all.

<End Segment 1> - Copyright © 2009 Manzanar National Historic Site and Densho. All Rights Reserved.