The logistical impossibility of rounding up hundreds of thousands of Germans in America meant only certain non-citizens were chosen. A paranoia or fear spread through the United States that these German (or Japanese or Italian) citizens would side with their birth country, and spy for the enemy. On February 19, 1942, American President Franklin Roosevelt signed Executive Order 9066 allowing the Department of State’s Special War Problems division to round up “enemy aliens” and incarcerate them in internment camps.
The Train to Crystal City: FDR’s Secret Prisoner Exchange Program and America’s Only Family Internment Camp During World War II The Train to Crystal City The book Train to Crystal City devotes equal time to German and Japanese internees and includes stories resulting from interviews with German and Japanese internees.) It is not my intention to belittle their experience. I am fully aware that Japanese Nationals and Italian Nationals were also housed in Crystal City, as well as other internment camps. ( note- Because of the nature of my website, I will refer primarily to Germans and German Americans. The camp, which stayed open from 1942 until 1948, wasn’t just a place to “house” people, Crystal city was considered a holding place for individuals while waiting to be traded for POWs and other Americans behind “enemy lines”. After being refitted and enlarged, entire families found themselves living in cottages and huts on the 300 acre property.
Crystal City itself rose from a migrant worker camp in south Texas.
Jan Jarboe Russel’s “Train to Crystal City” takes an in-depth examination of the government’s policies regarding Japanese, Italian, and German “enemy aliens” after the bombing of Pearl Harbor. So, I responded the way I always do when I want to understand more about history… I headed to the bookstore.
Like many American school children, I learned about the Internment of thousands of Japanese who lived in the US, but my teachers never told us about the over 11,000 German Americans locked up at the same time. I recently read about Democratic Representative from Texas Joaquin Castros Congressional Bill: The Wartime Violation of German American Civil Liberties Act of 2022.
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