Internment Locations
Arrested: June 1942
Sand Island Internment Camp, Honolulu, Oahu Island
This internee was among forty-nine men (mostly Issei) who were sent in the fifth transfer group for internment in U.S. Army and Justice Department camps on the Mainland. The internees were sent together from camp to camp, with some paroled to War Relocation Authority camps to reunite with family or transferred for repatriation to Japan.
Angel Island Detention Facility, California
August 1942
Lordsburg Internment Camp, New Mexico
August 1942 - June 1943
Santa Fe Internment Camp, New Mexico
June 1943 - October 1945
Returned to Hawaii: November 1945
Arrived in Honolulu with 450 other internees aboard the military troopship the Yarmouth.
Before the war, Genichi Nagami ran the family's soda bottling business with his wife and eldest son. He also was an executive officer with the Hilo Japanese Chamber of Commerce and Industry, an organization that worked to expand commerce with Japan, eliminate trade barriers, and develop direct steamship service between Hilo and Asia. All of JCC&I's prewar senior executive officers were interned. Along with Nagami, they included Yoichi Hata, Kashin Isa, Hisato Isemoto, Katsujiro Kagawa, Mitsuji Kasamoto, Masato Kiyosaki, Gunichi Kuwahara, Eikichi Ochiai, Takaichi Saiki, Takuji Shindo, and Shizuma Tagawa.
In the spring of 1943, with Genichi Nagami in internment on the Mainland, two of his younger sons, Toshio and Hiroshi, volunteered for the U.S. military, both serving with the 442nd Regimental Combat Team, 2nd Battalion, F Company. On July 12, 1944, in fighting in Italy, Pvt. Toshio Nagami was severely wounded and younger brother, Sgt. Hiroshi Nagami, was killed in action.