In 1935, there were 1,146,462 Japanese and people of Japanese descent living outside Japan. During World War II, both the Allied and Axis Powers interned people of enemy origin in the name of national security. Before the outbreak of the Pacific War, Japanese migrant communities had been well established throughout the Asia Pacific region. When the war in Europe began in 1939, Australia interned Germans, and later, Italians. The internment of Germans and Italians was in principle, selective, but when Japan entered the war on 8 December 1941, almost all the Japanese residents in Australia were taken into custody within 24 hours. The promptness and thoroughness of the internment of Japanese can be explained by the security implications of Japan’s entry into the war, exacerbated by Australia’s long held belief that Asian countries threatened Australia. 1,141 Japanese were interned in Australia, including naturalised subjects, Australian-born children, and wives of Japanese residents.

Internees who were transported to Australia

As part of pre-war planning, Australia had agreed to accept civilian internees from other governments. During the war, 7,877 civilians of enemy nationalities were transported to Australia from around the world for internment. The locally interned Japanese were joined by 3,160 other Japanese internees who were transferred from neighbouring countries – 1,949 from the Dutch East Indies (now Indonesia), 1,124 from New Caledonia, 50 from Aotearoa / New Zealand, 34 from the New Hebrides (now Vanuatu) and three from the Solomon Islands.

Taiwanese Internees

Many internees categorised as Japanese were in fact of various origins. The Dutch East Indies government interned approximately 500 men, women, and children of Taiwanese origin and some Koreans (numbers unsubstantiated). They were regarded as Japanese subjects because they had been under the Japanese colonial rule since 1895 in Taiwan, and 1910 in Korea. Under Japanese policy, Taiwanese and Koreans were indoctrinated to accept their roles and responsibilities as Japanese subjects. While Taiwanese kept their Chinese names, many Koreans were forced to adopt Japanese surnames, and so it was not always easy to know if internees were Korean or Japanese.

Movements of internees

The Japanese internees arrested in Australia were initially held in local prisons, and transported to staging camps either by land or sea, before reaching their permanent camps. They were divided into three groups – single males went to Loveday Internment Camp in South Australia and Hay internment Camp in New South Wales. Women and family groups were held at Tatura Internment Camp in Victoria. Most of the internees had arrived in their designated camps by the end of March 1942. For the first 12 months or so, the population of the camps continued to change due to transfers of internees. In August 1942, the first civilian prisoner exchange with Japan took place, and 867 people, including 34 diplomatic officials, left Australia. A second exchange was contemplated but did not eventuate.

Camp life

Eventually, life for the internees settled into the artificially imposed rhythm of camp routine. Internees were treated in accordance with the Geneva Conventions. Their camps were run by their own elected committees and many internees at Loveday and Tatura willingly participated in paid employment schemes for 1 shilling a day. At Loveday, many able-bodied men worked cutting fire wood, while others worked on vegetable and poultry farms. At Tatura, many women were employed in a clothing factory. However, at Hay, the participation rate in paid work was much lower than in the other two camps because of the protests against the reclassification of merchant seamen as POWs (PWJM).

All three camps organised sports events and concerts. At Tatura, there was a camp school where children were taught Japanese language, history, and culture. All of the internees who needed medical attention were treated either at a camp hospital or at a local Australian general hospital. A total of 193 internees, including 11 Taiwanese and one Korean, died during internment from illness and old age. Some of the others failed to adjust to life in internment and a few took their own lives.

Repatriation

During the war, a small number of local Japanese were granted release back into the Australian community. When the war ended, there were still over 3,268 internees classified as Japanese in Australia, including Taiwanese and Koreans. Those Japanese who were born in Australia or who had family members born in Australia were allowed to remain. Only 141 were in this category, and the rest left Australia by ship in February and March 1946.

–Yuriko Nagata (Excerpted from Cowra Japanese Cemetery Online Database Website 2019)

During the Pacific War, many people were incarcerated in Australia either as Japanese military prisoners of war (POW) or as ‘Japanese enemy aliens’. From small beginnings in the early stages of the war, the total number of POWs reached over 5,000 in 1945. As for civilian internees, about 4,300 were interned in Australia. They consisted of residents of Australia and those who were transferred to Australia from surrounding areas, such as the Dutch East Indies (now Indonesia), Kanaky / New Caledonia, and Aotearoa / New Zealand. Before the release of the survivors in 1946, over 500 of POWs and civilian internees had died in Australia. For the POWs, 234 deaths during the Cowra Breakout in August 1944 was the largest number of casualties, and they were buried in a plot next to the Australian War Cemetery in Cowra, New South Wales. For internees and other POWs, causes of death were mostly illnesses, and the dead were buried in cemeteries near where they were interned or died. In 1942 and 1943, several Japanese planes crashed near Darwin, and their crews’ remains were recovered from the wreckage. They were buried in Berrimah War Cemetery in Darwin in the Northern Territory

The issue of Japanese war graves became a matter of concern for both the Australian and Japanese governments in the 1950s. The Japanese Embassy initiated a survey of Japanese graves in 1955 and explored the possibility of repatriating remains to Japan. Instead in 1959, it was decided that a war cemetery in Australia would be established, and subsequently, in September 1962, Cowra was selected as the location for this cemetery.

Encounters by the residents of Cowra with the Japanese started when the Japanese POWs were transferred to the Cowra POW camp in 1943. While the large-scale breakout in August 1944 generated a sense of threat to the residents, the post-war decision by local RSL (Returned and Services League of Australia) members to maintain the Japanese cemetery demonstrated their generosity. The Cowra community responded positively to the Japanese Embassy’s proposal to establish a Japanese cemetery there.

The land next to the Australian War Cemetery was chosen for the site, and the Japanese government obtained a perpetual lease from the Australian government. Shigeru Yura, a Japanese architect who taught at the University of Melbourne, designed the entrance and ceremonial space at the cemetery. All the graves of people interned as ‘Japanese enemy aliens’ were transferred to Cowra from various places in Australia. The cemetery was officially opened on 22 November 1964.

Commemorative ceremonies are held at the cemetery in August every year to honour the memory of those buried there. Each grave has a metal plate engraved with the deceased person’s name, date of death, and in some cases, their age at the time of death. With few exceptions, their background stories and the causes of death are largely unknown.

-Keiko Tamura, (Excerpted from Cowra Japanese Cemetery Online Database Website 2019)