National Post (National Edition)
‘You know that we had nothing to do with this war’
LONG-LOST LETTERS FROM INTERNED JAPANESE-CANADIANS
“SURELY THERE MUST BE A TERRIBLE MISTAKE SOMEWHERE!”
Within weeks of the Japanese attack on Pearl Harbor on Dec. 7, 1941, more than 20,000 JapaneseCanadians were evacuated from the B.C. coast and ordered to turn over their land and possessions to the state. As they were trucked to internment camps in Interior B.C. and Alberta, evacuees were explicitly promised that their property and possessions would be protected until the war’s end. Then, starting in 1944, internees suddenly started receiving notices that the government had sold everything they owned at obscenely low prices. “Surely there must be a terrible mistake somewhere!” wrote Macer Okamoto in a letter typical of how many reacted. “I can’t even imagine any possible reason for our property being confiscated.”
“BEFORE OUR OPPRESSION BECAME POLITICALLY FASHIONABLE …”
Toyo and Kosaburo Takahashi were model citizens of Victoria, B.C. Their award-winning garden at 42 Gorge Rd. was a local tourist attraction, and even caught the attention of the visiting King and Queen in 1939. They fundraised enthusiastically for local charities. When war came, the Takahashis quickly led efforts to sell Victory Bonds to the city’s JapaneseCanadian community. When evacuation was ordered, they dutifully paid their own way to an address in Toronto. “Please remind yourselves that before our oppression became politically fashionable … the Japanese minority had the best reputation for morals and for civic spirit of any minority in British Columbia,” Toyo wrote in his 1944 letter. “This property is our home, our reward for long years of toil … a stake in the future of Victoria.” The Takahashis never returned to Victoria. Their beloved house, and whatever gardens remained, were forcibly sold off to a William and Gladys Henney for $10,000 ($136,250.00 in 2017 dollars).
BROKEN PROMISES
Many of the victims of internment were farmers; a group of Canadians that has always been uniquely prideful of their self-reliance. But suddenly these farmers found themselves completely dependent on a bureaucracy whose heartlessness would become legendary. In a letter from Winnipeg, Tokuji Hirose appeared resigned to the fact that his property will be sold against his wishes. But he had one simple request: that he be allowed to sell his property to his friend Bruce McCurrach for a fair price rather than let the government sell it at giveaway rates. “I was under the impression that your office is there to look after the interests of the Japanese people,” he wrote. His request was immediately rejected. Letter-writers were assured that their remarks had been “carefully read,” and would “remain on record.” But the letters had absolutely no effect on government plans to liquidate their property.
“WHAT ARE WE FIGHTING FOR?”
Several internees, some of whom had sons in the Canadian Armed Forces, noted the hypocrisy of a country fighting for freedom in Europe while simultaneously steamrolling the rights of its own people. “What are we … fighting for?” wrote Aya Suzuki in a letter from the Slocan City Internment Camp. “Not that (the) same treatment the Nazis gave the Jews be Long forgotten in the bowels of Library and Archives Canada lies a trove of some of the most remarkable first-person documents in Canadian history: letters from Japanese-Canadians protesting their Second World War internment. These letters, addressed to the Vancouver-based “Custodian of Enemy Property,” explode with outrage and betrayal. They are the expressions of Canadians who knew their rights, loved their country and reacted much the same as any modern Canadians would if their homes and livelihoods were arbitrarily seized by the state. The letters form part of Landscape of Injustice, a massive internment research project led by University of Victoria historian Jordan Stanger-Ross. The National Post read through the entire digitized archives of the Office of the Custodian of Enemy Property, and presents the most compelling examples below. practiced here in our own country!” At the time, it wasn’t yet widely appreciated in Allied countries that Nazi oppression of European Jews had already moved into its final stage of industrialized mass murder. However, the letter-writer would be justified here in comparing Canada’s actions to Nazi Germany’s pre-war policy of Aryanization — the systematic government seizure of Jewish property
THE JAPANESE-CANADIAN FIRE SALE
One of the letters, from 1944, came from the Tofino Board of Trade, which was looking to capitalize on the properties of interned former residents. “There are several white fishermen in the village who desire to purchase suitable properties if such could be obtained at a reasonable price,” it wrote to the Custodian of Enemy Property. Many Canadians got very rich because of the “Japanese Evacuation.” Farms routinely sold at less than a quarter of their value. One man reported that his land had been sold for less than the cost of the chicken houses on it. A family saw all their possessions — books, records, rare musical instruments — auctioned off for less than $7.
WASTED TOIL
Many of the liquidated properties were pioneer farms that had been single-handedly carved out of the B.C. wilderness by its Japanese-Canadian owners. Many letter-writers attempted to explain just what the government had robbed from them: years of toil, an inheritance for their children and the hopes of a comfortable retirement. “Money can never buy my youthful days spent, uselessly, now, on that wonderful farm,” wrote Rokusaburo Taniguchi in a letter he described as being written through “tears.”
“YOU KNOW THAT WE HAD NOTHING TO DO WITH THIS WAR”
Not one spy was found among B.C.’s Japanese-Canadians. Not one traitor nor pro-Japan extremist. History has only proven that the community was completely beyond reproach. Japanese-Canadians knew this, and they suspected the government knew this, too. “Remember that you are not dealing with animals,” wrote Shig Kato in a letter. “You know that we had nothing to do with this war.”
“I NOW KNOW THAT MY COUSINS … HAVE DIED IN VAIN”
More than 200 of B.C.’s Japanese-Canadians served in the First World War. It wasn’t an easy feat; as coastal recruitment offices would not accept any Asians, they would have needed to travel to Alberta to enlist. Of those, nearly a quarter were killed in France. Ryushin Koyanagi had a life typical of many Canadians in the late 1930s. He had lived on property that his immigrant parents had purchased with “sweat and tears,” and he had lost family members in the First World War. He wrote in a letter that his cousins had “died in vain” for a country that was now reminiscent of Nazi Germany. “You have cunningly taken advantage of this war to deprive illegally the properties, which I, a Canadian subject had acquired legally,” he wrote.
“I DIDN’T THINK FOR A MOMENT THAT SUCH A THING AS THIS WAS POSSIBLE”
Part of the reason Japanese-Canadians evacuated coastal B.C. so willingly was a sense of national duty. Remarkably, even after two years in an internment camp, many letter-writers continued to express complete faith in the country that had betrayed them. For Canadian-born Tatsuo Onotera, his faith in Canada was shaken only by the surprise 1944 notice of his farm having been liquidated. “I have been brought up as any one of your other citizens believing this a fair and Democratic country,” he wrote. “But the way we are being treated I have my doubts.”
PROUD TO BE CANADIAN
One of the most difficult letters in the archives to read is, in effect, a love letter to Canada. Rikizo Yoneyama remembered the exact day he had become a Canadian citizen, and expressed his pride at being able to raise a family of Canadian sons and daughters. His modest house in Haney, B.C., was “more than just a home,” he wrote. “It was to us, the foundation of security and freedom as Canadian citizens.” What’s more, Yoneyama had no qualms with internment. “I realize that we are the victims of a war emergency and as such are quite willing to undergo the hardship of breaking family ties to help safeguard the shores of our homeland,” he wrote. All he wanted was to be allowed to keep his house. Like everyone else, this entreaty was ignored and was met with the disingenuous response that Yoneyama’s remarks had been “carefully read.”
“I WILL, WITH ALL MY EFFORTS, LET THE CANADIAN PUBLIC KNOW”
One of the most tragic aspects of internment was how many believed a reckoning would come. “I believe that British justice and decency will some day make a fair adjustment,” wrote interned farmer Teizo Nakashima. In a 1946 letter written from Lemon Creek Internment Camp, Takeo Yoshida vowed: “I will, with all my efforts, let the Canadian public know what form of injustice is carried on ...” Many retained lawyers, and confidently told the Custodian of Enemy Property that they would see him in court “after the war.” But there was no restitution, and men like Yoshida encountered a public that was largely indifferent. Ian Mackenzie, the openly racist cabinet minister most responsible for the internment, was even honoured after the war with an appointment to the Senate. An official apology did finally come from the Canadian government in 1988, long after many of the people who had written these letters had died.
YOU HAVE CUNNINGLY TAKEN ADVANTAGE OF THIS WAR TO DEPRIVE ILLEGALLY THE PROPERTIES, WHICH I, A CANADIAN SUBJECT HAD ACQUIRED LEGALLY. — RYUSHIN KOYANAGI, WHO WROTE IN A LETTER THAT HIS COUSINS HAD ‘DIED IN VAIN’ IN THE FIRST WORLD WAR