Interviews

1. My father’s business in America (Japanese)

2. School life in Japan (Japanese)

3. Identity (Japanese)

4. The horror of Hiroshima after the atomic bombing (Japanese)

5. Feelings upon listening to the imperial rescript (Japanese)

6. Returning to America after the war (Japanese)

7. Enlisting in the U.S. Army (Japanese)

8. Working tirelessly after the war (Japanese)

9. What I wanted to pass down to my children (Japanese)

10. Father owned a café in Minot, North Dakota

11. Japanese in Minot

12. Didn’t speak Japanese until moving to Japan

13. Being enlisted into the Japanese Army

14. Wasn’t told he was being trained for kamikaze bombing

15. Experiences in Hiroshima after the A-bomb

16. Reaction to the Emperor’s surrender

17. Worked for the occupation force in Japan after the war

18. Fitting back into American life

19. Speaking about his wife

20. Comparing basic training of US and Japanese Armies

21. Helping youth in the community

(1928 - 2008) Drafted into both the Japanese Imperial Army and the U.S. Army.

Returning to America after the war (Japanese)

(Japanese) Now here’s a story about my returning to America… Since I had been a part of the Japanese military for a long time, I thought there was no way I’d be able to return to America. However, the man I mentioned earlier—George Suematsu—he looked something up for me, and told me “Since you were still a minor when you joined the military—since it was before you turned 17 years old, according to American law, you haven’t broken the law. If you’re a minor, it doesn’t matter if you’ve been in another country’s military; in fact, even if you commit murder, if you’re 16 or 17, there’s some sort of law that will protect you.” I said, “Oh, really? Such a thing exists?” and so I went to ask the American consulate, and sure enough, they told me “Yes, it does.”　“For you, it doesn’t matter if you were with the Japanese military when you were 17. You’ll have dual citizenship until you turn 21, and when you do turn 21, you’ll have to decide to either renounce your Japanese citizenship or your American citizenship. You’ll be able to make your own choice,” he told me. Well, there was my life in Japan, but I decided “I’ll try my luck back in the U.S.,” and I asked my uncle (in America) to take me in, and thankfully he did. So in June of 1952… no, June of 1951, I returned to America.

postwar war World War II

Date: June 17, 2008

Location: California, US

Interviewer: Yoko Nishimura

Contributed by: Watase Media Arts Center, Japanese American National Museum

Interviewee Bio

Henry Eiichi Suto was born on February 5, 1928 in Minot, North Dakota to Issei parents. After the death of his father and younger sister, his mother returned to Japan with Henry and his brother. Henry was 7 years old and since he knew little Japanese, he worked hard to learn and try to fit in with his classmates. When he was approached by his teacher to sign up for the Japanese Army at the age of 17, he accepted—knowing he wouldn’t be able to afford to go to college. After basic training, he was 1 of 34 selected to train under a special unit, which he later found out was a “suicide” unit to man a one-man torpedo boat. He was in this unit when Hiroshima was bombed and was one of the first soldiers to arrive with aid, thirty-six hours after the bombing.

When the war ended, he returned to the United States and lived with an uncle after his mother passed away. He enrolled in Belmont High School, but 3 months later was drafted into the U.S. Army to fight in the Korean War. He was trained to become an interpreter and was taught the Korean language at Camp Palmer. He was to go to the front lines in Korea to interrogate, but while on their stopover in Japan, he was asked to stay to serve as an interpreter there instead.

He returned to the U.S. after being discharged from the army and went to Los Angeles City College where he majored in foreign trade. He found a job at the Otagiri Company and worked there till his retirement in 1993.

He passed away on October 17, 2008 at the age of 80. (January 30, 2009)