Internment Locations
Left Hawaii: August 1942
Part of a group of almost forty Hawaii families (wives, mothers and children) sent to the Mainland for intended repatriation to Japan along with their husbands and fathers already in incarceration. The families' transfer was overseen by the War Department, and the group was accompanied by Hawaii physician Isao Murai, a representative of the American Red Cross.
Grove Park Inn, Asheville, North Carolina
Assembly Inn, Montreat, North Carolina
Crystal City Family Internment Camp, Texas
Returned to Hawaii: December 1945
Arrived in Honolulu with about 775 other internees aboard the military troopship the Shawnee.
Hatsuko Yamauchi was born on Maui Island and grew up in Wahiawa on Oahu, the daughter of a carpenter and one of twelve siblings. Following her graduation from McKinley High School in Honolulu, Hatsuko was sent by the local Shin-Jodo Buddhist mission to receive religious training in Kyoto. She returned to the islands in 1933, the first locally-born woman in Hawaii to become a Buddhist priest. The next year, she married fellow missionary Rev. Giko Tsuge and together they served at the Honoka'a Hongwanji Mission on Hawaii Island.
During the war, four of Hatsuko Tsuge's brothers served in the U.S. Army. Tatsumi Yamauchi was a member of the 100th Infantry Battalion and the 442nd Regimental Combat Team. Taketoshi Yamauchi was inducted in November 1941 and also served in 100th and the 442nd. He was wounded in action in late 1943. Brother Manabu Yamauchi received linguistics training at the army's Military Language School at Fort Snelling, Minnesota, and was a member of the Military Intelligence Service. Chiyoaki Jerry Yamauchi volunteered in March 1943 and was an infantryman with the 442nd. In October 1944, he was killed in action in France.