Censored letters from camp

By Ted T. Miyamoto

Excerpt from “Pearl Harbor Dec. 7, 1941”

Miyamoto, who was in the town of Lahaina on Maui during the war, describes corresponding by mail with his friend who was interned at a mainland internment camp.

During this period, one of my close friends, Takashi, was evacuated to the relocation camp with his family because his parents were outstanding leaders in the Japanese community. As true friends we started to keep in contact through the mail but it was a sad disaster. Every letter I received was censored, not by blacking out words but physically cutting them out from the letter leaving very little paper after the censorship. About the only thing I can remember of his letters is the one where he wrote that it was such a beautiful day today and how happy he was because he was able to go hunting for Indian arrow heads in the desert sand and having been lucky to find two, I presume most of his letters were of miserable living conditions and were eventually censored. I also wondered how much of my letters were censored because I hardly received any reply to my questions. Under these conditions our correspondence became meaningless and was sadly discontinued.

Source:  Talk Story: Growing up on a Sugar Plantation, by Ted T. Miyamoto
Publication:  Fullerton, CA: Nikkei Writers Guild, 2010
Page #s:  101-102
Call No. in JCCH Resource Center:  H B Miyamoto

MLA citation:  Miyamoto, Ted T. "Pearl Harbor Dec 7, 1941." Talk Story: Growing up on a Sugar Plantation. Fullerton, CA: Nikkei Writers Guild, 2010. The Untold Story: The Internment of Japanese Americans in Hawai‘i. Web. [date of access]