It’s a little known and dark episode in Texas history: the WWII family internment camp in Crystal City. Thousands of German and Japanese immigrants — and their American-born children — were held in the Crystal City facility, deep in South Texas. Jan Jarboe Russell, a contributing editor for Texas Monthly, recounts the events in her new book, The Train to Crystal City: FDR’s Secret Prisoner Exchange Program and America’s Only Family Internment Camp During World War II.
Russell focuses her story on two American-born teens, Ingrid Eiserloh of Ohio and Sumi Utsujogawa of California. The Eiserlohs were forced to leave their home in Ohio because a neighbor reported they had a large cistern in their basement. It could be used for a secret room or “filled with quicklime used to dispose of dead bodies in the event of war.” That one unfounded, unproven accusation got them sent to the camp and eventually to Germany.
Life in the camp was strictly regimented, with rations handed out by armed guards and living conditions determined by the Geneva Convention. Detainees were denied any news of the war and allowed very little contact with anyone outside the camp. Eventually, hundreds were sent to a war-torn Europe in exchange for American prisoners of war. Like almost all the children in the camp, Eiserloh and Utsujogawa had been born in America and were American citizens. Very few spoke German or Japanese fluently, and even fewer had ever been to their parents’ homeland. All of them suffered from the experience, and until Russell interviewed them, most had not discussed their experiences.
Russell discusses and signs The Train to Crystal City today at 7 p.m. Brazos Bookstore, 2421 Bissonnet. For information, call 713-523-0701 or visit brazosbookstore.com. Free.
Thu., Feb. 26, 7 p.m., 2015
This article appears in Feb 26 – Mar 4, 2015.