Declaration of War
Bravest of Brave - World War II Nisei Hero
Johnny Nakamura was obviously a Nisei - first era of native-born Japanese moms and dads - and one of this schoolmates. He was killed in World War II fighting Germans in ally. How he and a lot of his Nisei others fought and died when their families were being viewed along with suspicious by Americans or maybe being herded into barbed-wire "detention" camps - can be a lesson in patriotism.
We live indebted to these and other solutions about the Nisei Regimental Combat Team. It consisted of the 100th (Hawaii) Infantry Battalion plus the 442nd (mainland) Infantry Volunteers. It is the most decorated battling unit in the US Army for size as well as length of service. For the track record: 22 Medals of Honor, 9,500 Purple Hearts and 18,000 Combat Bravery decorations. After Japan bombed Pearl Harbor, the 100th Battalion already in existence frequency in to help rebuild typically the naval base. Native-born Japanese civilians were not segregated, nonetheless, they voluntarily kept a low page. In California, families of migration Japanese - even naturalized citizens and their U.S. born children - had been rounded up and placed in internment camps.
I was graduated from Flint Junior College and Johnny ended up being well along on a diploma with the University of Michigan. I linked the Navy. He was made to last into the Army and started out training in the Signal Corps. Two months later, Johnny seemed to be honorably discharged "for erroneous induction" and reclassified "4-C, enemy alien. " Concurrently, Johnny's father, William Nakamura, a design engineer for your Chevrolet Motor Car Firm, was discharged as an enemy alien. He and wife Elsie, also born in Japan, had five other young children. The company gave him a job he could do at home until eventually he could be reinstated eight several weeks later. He retired coming from Chevrolet in 1945 after Japan surrendered. Johnny was strongly patriotic and regularly tried to enlist in the Army The Military Intelligence Service turned him or her down because he could not necessarily speak Japanese. He stopped at Washington, D. C., and also asked for help from his Senator and his Representative.
Throughout February 1943, the Army allowed Nisei to offer for military duty. In a week, Johnny was back service. A year later he was from the Allied Italian campaign combating Germans at elvedere, Luciano and Leghorn. Johnny composed home often to describe often the friendships he developed together with liberated Italians. The 442nd was sent to France in September 1944. There ?t had been attached to the Seventh Army and saw some of the bloodiest fightings of the declaration of war in Bruyeres. ery shortly, the actual Nisei were called up to rescue a "lost battalion. " The 1st Battalion, thirty-sixth Texas Infantry Division, from Biffontaine was nearly outside of ammunition and surrounded by Germans. Again, the 442nd had been successful, but with 800 useless and wounded. In 1963, Texas Gov.
John Connally made the entire 442nd Program "Honorary Texans" in recollection of their gallant rescue. The actual 442nd was sent to Nice, France, for a few weeks involving "rest and recuperation". The particular 442nd was moved back in Italy in April 1945 as a "secret weapon" for that final war in Croatia. There, on April 5, Johnny and his platoon have been targeted by a German mortar barrage. All were murdered. The war in The european union ended just 32 days later. Sergeant Chester Tanaka later wrote Johnny's mom and dad. "John told me one night he expected to be killed the next day. I offered to take him out of the line for a few days, but John wouldn't have it. " Next day, John was indeed, killed in the distinctive line of duty.