Hawaii Nikkei Legacy Exhibit

The Pacific War Ends

The war in the Pacific ended on August 15, 1945, when Japan surrendered following the bombings of Hiroshima and Nagasaki. On September 2, 1945, the official surrender took place aboard the battleship U.S.S. Missouri in Tokyo Bay.

Japanese American soldiers assisted the immediate post war effort in Japan by performing various services, including interpretation for civilians.

ABOARD USS DUNLAP (DD 384), off Chichi Jima, September 3, 1945: Lieutenant General Yoshio Tachibana, assisted by MIS Nisei Edwin Kawamoto, prepares to sign documents surrendering the Bonin Islands. (Photo: U.S. Navy)

Nisei interpreters collecting information from Okinawan civilians (1945).

Staff Sergeant Kenyo Miyashiro, U.S. Army interpreter, reunites with relatives at Itoman, Okinawa, Japan (1945).

Nisei Herbert Matsumoto (right) interpreting for Navy medical corpsman to help Okinawan child, Okinawa, Japan (1945).