Densho Digital Archive - Misako Shigekawa Interview (denshovh-smisako-01-0018)

<Begin Segment 18>

RP: Now, there was a, some people call it a disturbance or an incident that occurred around November of 1942 in Poston. A gentleman was breaking out --

MS: I think they had something at Manzanar, didn't they? That riot, something riot. Someone sort of, I think... how do you say, thought about something, what's the word? Agreed with 'em, what they were doing, and they did have something, I think, some of the people down in Poston kind of thought that, that they had right to fight about it.

RP: A man was beaten up by --

MS: You, you heard about, didn't you, the story? It was, they got, someone got shot in the back.

RP: Right.

MS: This mother's, I heard, my mother knew her and said she had the shirt that they shot him from the back, the whole, you know... what was the riot about? They picked up somebody, didn't they, suspicious?

RP: Right. They picked up somebody and --

MS: Uh-huh, and the people objected to that and they all went to object, and the army just shot them down when they were... and I think two or three were killed.

RP: Two, two people died.

MS: Two or three died, didn't they, at the time? I heard about that, and so I sympathize with some of the people, but I don't think they, they talked about it, but I don't think they really, I don't remember too much about that.

RP: You mentioned that your father had to deal with situations like drinking and murders in Poston?

MS: Yeah. Well, doesn't really talk about it, but it happened. You know, they fight, fight and he always got called in on that, but he never talked too much about it. I know it happened. But, and like, one time I think three men got out some way. They never found them. They don't know whether they drowned trying to cross the desert, they died out in the desert. They never ever found 'em. The, he and the police went to look for 'em, but they never found them. Whether the coyotes ate 'em up or whether they drowned trying to cross the river or... nothing ever... all the, like a small town, all little things, family fights and somebody complain, someone was able to get their pets sent in and the other people complain, so he had to go had to go fight. He'd come back and he'd just, he'd, so he really had it, he said.