Internment Camp Documents
RESOURCES
Commemorating Tuna Canyon Detention Station
On December 2, 2021, Adam Schiff, a California delegate to the House of Representatives, spoke to the Congressional Record, recognizing the 80th anniversary of the opening of the Tuna Canyon Detention Station in California and commending the Tuna Canyon Detention...
History of Crystal City Internment Camp now online
Joseph O'Rourke, who commanded the Crystal City, TX Family Internment Camp, wrote this "Historical Narrative of the Crystal City Internment Camp" in 1945, as the facility was slowly being emptied. The report detailed its establishment, construction, organization and...
Crystal City, Texas Family Internment Camp map
Crystal City, Texas Family Internment Camp map (2018) annotated by former internee Werner Ulrich—includes plot plans, drawings of building types, and location of work areas, as well as lists of internees held in the camp, births, and deaths. Staff, including teachers...
Ellis Island petition for release of German civilian internees
A petition was submitted to Congress on January 24, 1947, signed by 156 internees held on Ellis Island, asking for their release, rather than enforced deportation/repatriation to Germany. They requested the same for internees being held in Crystal City and other...
Ellis Island 29 Feb 1944 name list
A three page Immigration and Naturalization Service list of civilian enemy aliens of German ethnicity in custody on Ellis Island, New York Harbor, New York on 29 February 1944. (A few internees of Italian and Japanese ethnicity are included.) NARA, RG 59, State Dept,...
1944 lists of internees held in various detention stations
Following are short lists of internees of German ethnicity held in a variety of internment situations around the country during 1944. The lists include name, sex, age, alien registration number, occupation, country in which they were picked up, and in some cases, next...
30 June 1945 Ft. Lincoln census
Ft. Lincoln, Bismarck, North Dakota, the largest WW II internment camp for men in the U.S., housed more than 4000 civilians, mostly of German and Japanese ethnicity, during the war, closing its doors in 1946. This 30 June 1945 census of German Americans and Latin...
Seagoville, TX internment camp inspection reports
During WWII, internment camps in the U.S. were visited periodically by neutral representatives, usually from the International Red Cross, or from Switzerland, acting for German interests, or Spain, overseeing Japanese interests. These representatives were...
Inspection report for Ft. Lincoln, Bismarck, ND, 1945
On October 24-25, 1945, Ft. Lincoln was inspected by Dr. Rudolph Fischer, Swiss Legation representative, and Van Arsdale Turner, Department of State. Activated in 1942 as an internment camp for civilians of Japanese ethnicity, it later became exclusively a camp for...
Seagoville, Texas internment camp census—1943
In 1942, the facilities of Seagoville, formerly a prison, were converted into an internment facility to hold German, Japanese and Italian U.S. resident and Latin American internees. Although it was intended to serve primarily as a facility for families in which both...