These photographs reveal what daily life was like for the people living in Japanese internment camps of the United States during World War II.
During World War II, the U.S. government forcibly relocated and incarcerated about 120,000 people of Japanese ancestry — two-thirds of whom were American citizens — in camps across the interior West and Arkansas. This radical move came in the wake of Japan’s attack on Pearl Harbor on Dec. 7, 1941, as fear of sabotage and invasion fueled anti-Japanese sentiment that had already been brewing on the West Coast.
On Feb. 19, 1942, President Franklin D. Roosevelt signed Executive Order 9066, authorizing the military to designate “exclusion zones” and remove people deemed a threat to national security. While the order never explicitly named Japanese Americans, though, it was used almost exclusively against them.
The process was overseen by the War Relocation Authority (WRA). Families were given mere days — sometimes, just a few hours — to sell property and pack whatever they could carry. They were first sent to temporary “assembly centers,” often converted fairgrounds or racetracks, then to one of 10 main internment camps in remote, harsh locations like Manzanar, Heart Mountain, or Tule Lake. Conditions were cramped, with families living in barracks surrounded by barbed wire and armored guards.
See what life was like inside America’s Japanese internment camps through our gallery below:
However, according to PBS, the government eventually admitted it "had in its possession proof that not one Japanese American, citizen or not, had engaged in espionage, not one had committed any act of sabotage."
Furthermore, the Commission on Wartime Relocation and Internment of Civilians wrote that internment was "motivated largely by racial prejudice, wartime hysteria, and a failure of political leadership."National Archives and Records Administration, Records of the War Relocation Authority
While some people entrusted their possessions with sympathetic neighbors, others would have to leave behind a lifetime of belongings, hoping that their homes would not be vandalized or burgled while they were away. National Archives and Records Administration; Records of the War Relocation Authority
The government never bothered to explain why Italian and German-Americans were not also sent to camps, and the military was not required or even pressured to provide concrete evidence that Japanese-Americans posed a threat to national security.Ansel Adams/Library of Congress
PBS reported that one farmer told the Saturday Evening Post: “If all of the Japs were removed tomorrow, we’d never miss them… because the white farmers can take over and produce everything the Jap grows."
In 1942, the agricultural coordinator for the Japanese-American Citizens League warned that Japanese farmers "stand to lose approximately 100 million dollars in investments” if the government confiscated or forced them to sell their land. By 1942, the Farm Security Administration had transferred more than 1,000 Japanese farms, totaling 50,000 acres, to new owners. National Archives and Records Administration; Records of the War Relocation Authority
Once the government announced the internment plan, they gave Japanese-Americans one week to register with authorities, and report to assembly centers, where they would then be transported to the camps.
However, not all the camps were complete, so many Japanese-Americans were held for months in temporary holding centers, usually converted stables at local racetracks, like this one. National Archives and Records Administration, Records of the War Relocation Authority
In the words of one internee, Mary Tsukamoto, who recalls what it was like to first arrive at the camp: "I never will forget, the train stopped and we got off and they put us on a big truck. It looked like one of those cattle cars. Anyway, we stood up because there were no chairs for us to sit on this pickup and crowded into this truck. They drove us to the Fresno Assembly Center. And then we got off there... I will never forget the shocking feeling that human beings were behind this fence like animals...We were going to also lose our freedom."National Archives and Records Administration, Records of the War Relocation Authority
The residents set up newspapers, sports teams, and fire and police departments, though any community organization had to be approved by the War Relocation Authority. Ansel Adams/Library of Congress
David Masumoto wrote that "Japanese-American farmers transformed the barren acres of Manzanar [one of the ten camps]," by farming and irrigating the soil. His relatives, who were interned during the war, "worked the farms, dairy, and produce-shipping operations at Gila River Relocation Center," in Arizona.
Furthermore, the documentary "Passing Poston: An American Story" reveals that at the Poston internment camp in Arizona, residents of the camp created infrastructure like schools, dams, canals, and farms that the U.S. government later used when consolidating Arizona's Native American tribes onto one large reservation.Ansel Adams/Library of Congress
Even the War Relocation Authority knew that they were subjecting the internees to abhorrent living conditions, writing that, “for the great majority of evacuated people, the environment of the centers – despite all efforts to make them livable – remains subnormal and probably always will.”Ansel Adams/Library of Congress
According to Smeltzer's reports from 1942, "bathing facilities were quite inadequate, running water was late in being made available and two weeks elapsed before hot water was available.” Later, he wrote that a "serious lack of sanitary facilities” lead to widespread dysentery.
In addition, a report from the Heart Mountain Relocation Center in Wyoming said, "The water was terrible because of the rusted and oiled pipes, and it really was not fit to use." At the Jerome and Rohwer Relocation Center in Arkansas, contaminated milk and water even resulted in an E. coli outbreak. Clem Albers/National Parks Service
In her paper, "Psychological Effects of the Camps on Japanese Americans" Amy Mass wrote that, "For the honor-conscious Issei [those born and raised in Japan], it was the repudiation of many years of effort and hard work in this country."
Similarly, internees who were American citizens felt as though their very identity was under attack. The camps' residents were subjected to horrifying conditions, witnessed the humiliation of their families, and felt deeply ashamed of their cultural heritage, leaving them depressed, lonely, and confused. National Archives and Records Administration, Records of the War Relocation Authority
According to the Digital Public Library of America's exhibit on Japanese internment, "religious organizations advocated for fairer treatment of Japanese Americans, while working to Americanize them through religious indoctrination."
Though Christian churches in the camp provided social services and organized recreation, the camps also saw a resurgence in Buddhist practices, as Japanese-Americans pushed back against Americanization. Ansel Adams/Library of Congress
Their elders, who had worked for years to build stable lives for their families in America, no longer enjoyed the positions of respect and leadership they would have in their own homes. Ansel Adams/Library of Congress
Traditional Japanese family structures were patriarchal. However, during internment, this changed. Women were afforded independence because marriage and child birth were often delayed in the camps.
In addition, cramped living quarters required shared responsibility of domestic duties. The same jobs were offered to men and women in the camps, and without their previous careers and business, men ceased to be the family breadwinners. Ansel Adams/Library of Congress
As one War Relocation Authority official wrote: "3,971 students are crowded into makeshift buildings without adequate desk and chair facilities."
To help improve things, some churches and relief agencies donated desks, books, and other school supplies. Ansel Adams/Library of Congress
In the words of Mary Tsukamoto: "We had no thought about defying the government. And of course the Japanese people respect the elderly, and those who are important, the President of the United States, we wouldn't, you know, even if he's wrong, we wouldn't say anything."Ansel Adams/Library of Congress
In an interview with NPR, internee John Tateishi said that after internment ended, "There were no complaints, no big rallies or demands for justice because it was not the Japanese way."
Nevertheless, in 1988, President Reagan signed the Civil Liberties Act, which offered a formal apology to all living former internees and their families. Surviving victims were also paid $20,000 in reparations. Ansel Adams/Library of Congress
"A Date Which Will Live In Infamy": The Attack On Pearl Harbor
On Dec. 7, 1941, Japan launched a surprise military strike on the U.S. naval base at Pearl Harbor, Hawaii, with the goal of crippling America's Pacific Fleet before it could interfere with Japanese expansion into Southeast Asia during the Second World War.
Just before 8:00 in the morning, two attack waves of more than 350 aircraft targeted battleships, airfields, and other key installations at the base. In less than two hours, four battleships were sunk, four others damaged, and more than 180 aircraft destroyed. More than 2,400 Americans were killed, another 1,200 or so wounded.
Japan had hoped the attack would buy time to consolidate its territorial gains, but it instead had the opposite effect of rallying the United States to arms. The next day, President Franklin D. Roosevelt called it "a date which will live in infamy," and asked Congress for a declaration of war against Japan, bringing the United States fully into World War II. Days later, Germany and Italy declared war on the U.S. as well.
With the United States preparing to make moves across the sea, however, Roosevelt worried about dissent back on the home soil. His response? Executive Order 9066, which read in part:
"I hereby authorize and direct the Secretary of War, and the Military Commanders whom he may from time to time designate, whenever he or any designated Commander deems such action necessary or desirable, to prescribe military areas in such places and of such extent as he or the appropriate Military Commander may determine, from which any or all persons may be excluded, and with respect to which, the right of any person to enter, remain in, or leave shall be subject to whatever restrictions the Secretary of War or the appropriate Military Commander may impose in his discretion."
Simply put, the Executive Order authorized the Secretary of War and designated commanders to prescribe certain areas of the United States as military zones, and to exclude or remove any persons from them as deemed necessary for national security.
Notably, the order did not specifically name Japanese Americans, but it did serve as the legal basis for their mass removal from the West coast. And when 120,000 people of Japanese ancestry were forced into camps, the conditions were anything but comfortable.
Life In World War II's Japanese Internment Camps
Public DomainA truckload of Japanese Americans being transported to a relocation camp.
One particularly infuriating aspect of the internment camps was that, according to the National WW2 Museum, neither the Office of Naval Intelligence nor the Federal Bureau of Investigation believed the Japanese American population posed any significant threat to national security. The American public, on the other hand, were far more worried.
By early 1942, Japanese victories in Guam, Malaya, and the Philippines only bolstered anti-Japanese sentiment along the West Coast. People were paranoid that Japanese Americans were supplying information to Japan that could result in another disastrous attack.
Journalists fueled the fire. Pulitzer Prize-winning columnist Westbrook Pegler — described by journalist Max Blumenthal as "one of the godfathers of right-wing populism" — wrote, "The Japanese in California should be under armed guard to the last man and woman right now and to hell with habeas corpus until the danger is over."
Government officials were hesitant to simply remove Japanese Americans from their homes without clear reason, with some even questioning the legality of such a move. Eventually, advisors to Roosevelt convinced him enough that Executive Order 9066 went into effect, to a mixed reception. Some officials, such as Montana Governor Sam C. Ford, worried about the impact and the safety of Japanese Americans.
Others, like Idaho Attorney General Bert Miller, turned to blatant racism, saying, "We want to keep this a white man's country. All Japanese [should] be put in concentration camps for the remainder of the war."
Soon enough, the WRA was confiscating homes and dispatching families of Japanese ancestry to hastily constructed camps in desolate regions, including deserts, swamps, and frozen plains.
Dorothea Lange/National Archives and Records AdministrationInternees at Manzanar working the fields.
"It is hard to overstate just how quickly this happened," Densho Content Director Brian Niiya wrote in 2023. "At the Owens Valley site in central California — what would eventually become Manzanar — lumber began arriving on March 14 and the first building went up three days later. The first Japanese American 'volunteers' arrived on March 21. By April 11 — just three weeks later — there were over 3,300 Japanese Americans there."
Barracks were uninsulated and barely furnished. Families shared cramped spaces with only cots and coal stoves. Hot water was rare. Camp life was hardly any different from a rigid military routine: communal meals, regimented schedules, and ever-present watchtowers, which were supposedly for the "protection" of Japanese Americans.
One internee later countered this, asking, "If we were put there for our protection, why were the guns at the guard towers pointed inward, instead of outward?"
Some comfort came from within. Residents organized schools, produced camp newspapers, and worked in communal gardens. At Manzanar, internees even set up sports leagues, from baseball to golf, and landscaped parks with pools and rockwork, applying skills from their previous lives. Still, it did little to offset the toll of the overcrowding, poor sanitation, and limited access to medical care that led to illness and death.
The Lasting Impact And Aftermath Of The Camps
By 1944, stronger resistance to internment started to emerge. One Supreme Court case, Korematsu v. United States (1944), showed just how desperate people had become. 23-year-old Fred Korematsu had refused to comply with the order to leave his home and job, opting instead to get eye surgery to change his appearance, go by the name Clyde Sarah, and pretend to be of Spanish and Hawaiian descent.
Korematsu was jailed in 1942, later allowing the American Civil Liberties Union to represent him in his case against the country to test the constitutionality of the Executive Order. In a divided 6-3 decision, the Supreme Court upheld Korematsu's conviction, citing his detention as a "military necessity."
Public DomainAfter the closure of the internment camps, dozens of people waiting in the street for transport back to their homes.
However, another case in 1944, Ex parte Endo, challenged the government's definition of what a "loyal" citizen was. Mitsuye Endo, a loyal U.S. citizen, sued, and the Court unanimously ruled the government could not detain a citizen conceded loyal without cause, raising further questions about how, exactly, Japanese Americans had been profiled and selected for internment.
The Endo ruling forced the government to release "loyal" citizens, and gradually the WRA began phasing out the camps. Manzanar closed in November 1945; Tule Lake, the last and most heavily guarded camp, shut down in March 1946. Families were given nothing more than $25 and a one-way train ticket back to communities that often did not want them.
Internment in the camps also had long-lasting psychological influence on the Japanese Americans held within. According to a study from the National Institute of Health in 2019, the unjust imprisonment by the government was described "as a betrayal by a trusted source."
One interviewee reflected on the camps, saying that "Being labeled as an enemy alien and incarcerated in a concentration camp was the most traumatic experience of my life. My thoughts at the time were, this country which I loved and trusted has betrayed me." Another described feeling like a "second-class citizen," and that the camps emphasized "that I didn't belong in this country."
Cindy Chu/Wikimedia CommonsA man whose family had been placed in an internment camp protesting Trump's 2017 Muslim travel ban.
Most internees returned to find their homes, farms, and businesses lost, either sold cheaply or seized during their absence. Seeking anonymity and work, many settled in cities rather than rural areas, and the Japanese-American community as a whole largely had to rebuild from the ground up. Estimates place property losses at around $1.3 to $3.4 billion (in 1983 dollars).
The trauma extended to later generations as well, as many internees refused to speak about the camps until the redress movement of the 1960s-80s. In an unprecedented acknowledgment of previous governmental wrongdoing, the 1988 Civil Liberties Act issued a formal apology to interred Japanese Americans and offered reparations of $20,000 to each surviving internee, attributing the injustice to "race prejudice, war hysteria, and a failure of political leadership."
There is an unfortunate, bitter irony that the United States, which fought so strongly against Nazi concentration camps and persecution, was also driven to a great injustice brought about by widespread racial prejudice. Still, it is an important part of our history — and only by acknowledging the mistakes of the past can we do our best to ensure they are not repeated in the future.
For more on World War II, read about its eight most bad-ass women. Then, find out how one heroic woman who delivered babies while in Auschwitz.
