Face of the Enemy: Internment on Both Coasts

Relevant History welcomes Joanne Dobson and Beverle Graves Myers, co-authors of the historical mystery Face of the Enemy, released 4 September 2012.

A former English professor at Fordham University, Joanne Dobson is the author of the Professor Karen Pelletier mystery series from Doubleday and Poisoned Pen Press. She won an Agatha nomination for Quieter Than Sleep, the first book in the series. The novels have been widely reviewed, including in the New York Times, and in 2001 the adult-readers division of the New York Library Association named her Noted Author of the Year. Face of the Enemy is her latest title. For more information, check her web site.

Beverle Graves Myers is a Kentucky native who's always loved stories and always asked "why." She made a mid-life career switch from Psychiatry to writing. Her latest project is a collaboration with fellow mystery author Joanne Dobson. Face of the Enemy launches a series that follows New York City through the challenges and triumphs of World War II. Bev also enjoys mixing murder and music in her Tito Amato Mysteries set in dazzling 18th-century Venice. Her work has been nominated for the Macavity, Derringer, and Kentucky Literary awards. For more information, check her web site.

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For decades the internment of Japanese-Americans during World War II was a barely acknowledged part of our national history. In February 1942, just over two months after the surprise attack on Pearl Harbor, President Franklin D. Roosevelt issued Executive Order 9066 that led to the relocation of some 120,000 "persons of Japanese ancestry" in internment camps for the duration of the war. Almost all were relocated from the West Coast, mainly from California.

More recently, however, this injustice has received the attention it deserves. President Ronald Reagan signed into law the Civil Rights Act of 1988, granting each survivor of the internment camps a sum of $20,000. On the fiftieth anniversary of the attack on Pearl Harbor, President George Bush offered the internees a formal apology. Several relocation centers have now been designated National Historic Landmarks and are open for tours under the management of the Park Service, and many schools include the topic in the Social Studies curriculum.

In the entertainment world, there is even a new musical set to open later this month that follows a family relocated from Salinas, California to the wastelands of Wyoming. Allegiance stars George Takei as Sam Kimuro, an elderly war veteran trying to reconcile with his family and his past. As a boy, Takei and his family were actually interned at Camp Rohwer and Camp Tule Lake.

Before we began researching the early war years for the mystery novel that eventually became Face of the Enemy, we wished we could work something about the internment camps into our plot. But we'd made a commitment to follow New York City through the war years, and like so many, we believed that the relocation was confined to the West Coast. Were we in for a surprise!

Our first task was to construct a day-to-day timeline of events using back issues of the New York Times. We started with the week of the Pearl Harbor attacks, and one article from December 8, 1941 practically jumped off the computer screen. The front-page headline: Entire City Put On War Footing—Japanese Rounded Up by FBI. We quickly scanned the article and hunted for follow-up information. This is what we learned:

Throughout the night following the attacks, the FBI, assisted by New York detectives and plainclothes policemen, conducted the extensive round-up in a fleet of government vehicles. Most of those arrested (allowed to take only what they could carry) were transported to the Federal Building at Foley Square or straight to the Barge Office on the southern tip of Manhattan for transport to Ellis Island. A ferry, surrounded by Coastguardsmen with rifles and fixed bayonets, sailed back and forth all night. The well-planned, well-organized effort eventually cast a wide net over the city's German, Italian, and Japanese residents. But the Japanese detention came first and was the most comprehensive. One man interviewed while waiting for the ferry to Ellis Island stated that he'd left Japan in 1917, graduated from New York University, and had lived and worked as a doctor in the United States for thirty-five years.

The Alien Enemy Hearing Board appointed by U.S. Attorney General Frances Biddle was sworn in right before Christmas 1941, and hearings quickly commenced. Some Japanese nationals of government interest or official status would be exchanged for Americans held in Japan. Most of the detainees were destined to be released, pardoned, or interned according the Board's findings. People had to make their cases in closed session before the members of the Board with no legal representation present. Some ended up being held at Ellis Island for the duration, without familiar food, clean beds, or school for the children. A New York Times January 24, 1942 article describes the situation best, "For the time being New York has a concentration camp of its own."

In Face of the Enemy, all this backstory sits on the slender shoulders of Masako Fumi, a brilliant avant garde artist married to a Columbia University professor of Asian history. Raised in Paris while her father was Japan's ambassador to France, Masako has broken with her family and has not seen Japan since she was three years old. After she was picked up in the December 8th sweep, her troubles multiply: she is accused of murdering the art dealer who, due to public protests, was removing the paintings from her solo show. Is Masako guilty of murder? Or is she simply a victim of the prevailing racial paranoia?

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A big thanks to Joanne Dobson and Beverle Graves Myers. They'll give away a hard cover copy of Face of the Enemy to someone who contributes a comment on my blog this week. I'll choose the winner from among those who comment by Sunday at 6 p.m. ET. Delivery is available in the U.S. and Canada.

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Comments

[Linda Austin]

I would love to receive a copy of this! I read mostly cultural/historical memoir and historical fiction, with a particular interest in wars from the civilian viewpoint. My mother survived WWII in Japan and I only found out about the U.S. internment camps when I was researching to write her memoir. I have heard of the roundup of Japanese on the East Coast and their being housed temporarily at Pinehurst golf club, but this New York internment is new to me. (BTW, I do post book reviews online)

[Linda Austin]

Oops, sorry, Japanese, Italian, German and various other nations' embassy staff and their personal employees were taken away to Greenbrier Country Club, not Pinehurst, to await deportation. That's quite an interesting story as the different nationalities did not get along at all, regardless of being allies.

[Warren Bull]

I had no idea. Thanks for the information.

[Chris Verstraete]

This sounds like a fascinating book. Never knew this part of history, sad to say.

[Chris Roth]

My ghosts of this treatment of Japanese-American families come from my father's minimal involvement as a police officer. I have a couple of the posters that were put up all over Tacoma, Washington, at that time as well as a wax sealed small bottle of Saki given to my grandfather by a dear friend and neighbor of his as a parting gift as the friend was being taken away to a camp. I shudder each time I dust these relics and am grateful my Norwegian ancestors never declared war on the U.S.

[Suzanne Adair]

Linda, thanks for stopping by! I chuckled at your comment: the different nationalities did not get along at all, regardless of being allies. This doesn't surprise me. The cultures you named are quite different. When you wrongly incarcerate people from those cultures with the implication that some of them are traitors, criminals, and spies, it only makes matters worse. I got a taste of this volatility where I grew up, in South Florida: a melting pot of Cubans, Haitians, New Yorkers, Canadians, cowboys and Indians (Seminole).

[Suzanne Adair]

Warren, nice to see you back! A lot of us had no idea. But that's what the Relevant History feature is all about. ;-)

[Suzanne Adair]

Welcome, Chris Verstraete. You aren't alone in not knowing this piece of U.S. history. We were taught some seriously biased history. The fact that so many Americans don't know about this stuff should warn everyone that it'll be just as easy to replicate wrongful treatment of American citizens of other nationalities.

[Suzanne Adair]

Chris Roth, I'm so glad you visited my blog and left a comment. And I gotta say that this made me sad: I shudder each time I dust these relics and am grateful my Norwegian ancestors never declared war on the U.S. It shouldn't be that way.

[Beverle Graves Myers]

I love all these comments! I feel like we're doing a good deed by bringing the Ellis Island detention into the forefront. Who says you can't learn something along with your mystery?

[Sarah Glenn]

I would LOVE to get a copy of this book! Beverle is a fantastic writer. Our SinC chapter got a little taste of it before I relocated to Florida, and the team-up was great. I have been waiting for this book to come out.

[Suzanne Adair]

Hi Beverle! Learning something, occasionally righting some very wrong perceptions, is the business of Relevant History. I'm delighted to have you participate in this feature.

Where's Joanne? She needs to join the party.

[Suzanne Adair]

Thanks for coming back to my blog, Sarah. And I agree with you about Beverle's writing. I haven't read this book yet, but I highly recommend her Tito Amato series.

[Elisabeth Storrs]

Thanks for the great post, Joanne and Bev, unfortunately the Australian government also interned Japanese residents during WWII in a country town called Cowra - they rose up and broke out of the compound which is now well known history here. A terrible injustice.

Great blog, Suzanne!

[Suzanne Adair]

Thanks for stopping by, Elisabeth. You need to tell us how the story ended, what happened to the Japanese-Australians. I've never heard this story!

[Beverle Graves Myers]

Hi Sarah--Hope things are relatively calm and peaceful in Florida. Miss you and Gwen at Sisters in Crime.

[Beverle Graves Myers]

Elisabeth--I'd never heard of the Australian internment either. So much we don't know. Someone has to tell the story.

[Beverle Graves Myers]

Everyone--My poor co-author is having a necessary but uncomfortable medical procedure today. Great timng! She'll be on board soon.

[Judy Alter]

Fascinating, and, yes, a great setting for a mystery. Although we heard so much about those relocation camps on the West Coast, Texas had its own similar camps. I did some research on the one at Crystal City and have always wanted to write about it. Maybe some day. Meantime I'd love to read this novel.

[Suzanne Adair]

Welcome, Judy! Wow, what a can o' worms we've opened. Internment of Japanese-Americans in Texas, too.

[Beverle Graves Myers]

Judy--I've also heard of a camp in Arkansas. So far from home for the Californians! You need to write your Texas story.

[Linda]

Wow...knew there were internment camps, but like so many others, I assumed they were all on the West Coast. Suzanne, this is why I love your blog so much--I learn something awesome every time I visit!

It is so sad how little history we were taught even back in my day, and my granddaughter is learning even less :-(

Face of the Enemy has been anxiously awaited--it has a great pedigree in its authorship and an extremely intriguing backdrop. Beverle, please pass prayers for the best of health to Joanne and good luck on this corroboration. Your Tito series is wonderful!

[Suzanne Adair]

Linda, I couldn't make this blog happen without such wonderful author guests.

Beverle, I also send my best to Joanne!

[Beverle Graves Myers]

Linda--Thanks for the kind words about Tito. He will be back for a sixth book--working on it now. Whispers of Vivaldi is the working title.

[Suzanne Adair]

Beverle, I'm so glad to hear that Tito will be back. Sometimes authors stop a series at the fifth book, and I was afraid you were going to do that. Thanks for continuing the series. Tito is such an engaging protagonist.

[Gloria Alden]

I would love a copy of this. I've always known they were on the west coast and visited a beautiful garden in Seattle created by one of those unfairly treated Japanese Americans. I never had any idea this happened in N.Y.C. I know my siblings would enjoy reading it, too.

[Connie di Marco]

I remember my mother talking about German neighbors who were taken away in the middle of the night - this was in Boston, so there was a great deal of concern about enemy ships. Italians were interned as well, but I remember reading somewhere that FDR decided to release Italian-born and Italian-American prisoners, saying they were no threat, but a nation of "opera singers."

[Jody]

Sounds like a fascinating book. I grew up in Kansas & didn't know until after I was grown that there had been POW camps for Germans in the state. Our history books never mentioned that.

[Shomeret]

I've read a number of books about Japanese American internment, but Face of the Enemy is certainly a new one on me.

I was delighted to learn about Allegiance . San Diego where it's premiering is also where children's librarian Clara Breed was based when she wrote to her young Japanese American patrons after they were interned and sent them books. People need to remember Clara Breed. She was very supportive toward Japanese Americans.

[Megan McKinney]

Really looking forward to reading this. I love the Tito Amato books, too.

[Suzanne Adair]

Huge thanks to everyone for being patient with the lag in posting your comments. I've been a guest author at the Carolina Mountains Literary Festival since Thursday. The event is way up in the mountains of North Carolina. All during that time, I only got 30 minutes of Internet access. I was definitely NOT expecting that!