History of the 442nd

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This Time in 442nd RCT History (Mar 2018)

This Time in 442nd RCT History (Jan 2018)

The Champagne Campaign in the French Maritime Alps, Part 2 A brief summary of the “Champagne Campaign” was included in the November 2017 E-newsletter.  The 100th/442nd was assigned to protect the right flank of the Sixth Army Group along the French-Italian border in the French Maritime Alps from November 1944 to March 1945.  Despite the use of the term “champagne” and the liberty granted many of the men to Nice, Paris and other French towns and cities, there was still war at hand and daily patrols and fighting took place. Excerpts from the Headquarters 442D Regimental Combat Team Monthly Historical Report for the month of January 1945 will serve to highlight some of what the men lived through during this “campaign”. New Year’s Day 1945,...

This Time in 442nd RCT History (Nov 2017)

This Time in 442nd RCT History After the Vosges: The Champagne Campaign in the French Maritime Alps October 30, 1944 was a Monday but for many with a sense of history it is the day the 442nd RCT reached the 1st Battalion, 141 Infantry Regiment in what has come to be known as the “Rescue of the Lost Battalion.”  This is a short summary of the movements of the 442nd following the brutal fighting in the Vosges Mountains, including the Rescue. According to historical information in the National Archives, the 100th Infantry Battalion was detached from the RCT on November 10 and was sent to Nice on the southern coast of France.  The rest of the 442nd RCT was given relief on November 17 after...

This Time in 442nd RCT History (Sept 2017)

RHINELAND CAMPAIGN-VOSGES (October 10, 1944 – November 21, 1944) There were five major battle campaigns that were fought by the 442nd Regimental Combat Team, of which the Rhineland Campaign-Vosges was one of them.  The 442nd arrived in France in October 1944 to join the 36th Division as part of the 7th Army, after fighting in and then leaving Italy, where the 442nd and 100th Infantry Battalion had joined up to form the RCT.  At this point in time, the Allies were about 40 miles from the France/Germany border but the Vosges Mountains brought a new type of terrain experience for the 442nd soldiers. map from https://1stabtf.com/wp-content/uploads/2016/10/map-bruy%C3%A8res-17-octobre.png In order to proceed ahead towards the border, the soldiers needed to secure the town of Bruyeres.  Bruyeres is...

This Time in 442nd History (July 2017)

The Flight of the Anti-Tank Company (photo courtesy of the U.S. Army) The 442nd Regimental Combat Team was an U.S. Army infantry unit, as we the friends and family of the 442nd veterans know. Not all may know, however, that just weeks after the 442nd arrived in Italy and entered combat in June of 1944, the men of the Anti-Tank Company were separated from their 442nd brethren to be trained as glider troops taking to the air to transport anti-tank guns, Jeeps and ammunition. Here are some details of the flight of the Anti-Tank Company. For general background, the 442nd HQ, 2nd and 3rd Battalions had all arrived in Italy by mid-June 1944. The battle hardened 100th Infantry Battalion was attached to the 442nd RCT...

Stories of SSgt Seiji Nakahara, I Company

Stories of SSgt Seiji Nakahara, I Company By First Sgt Keith Nakahara SSgt Seiji Nakahara, I Co. My Father was in “I” company, he got shot the day before they rescued the “Lost Battalion.”  He got shot in the chest, but luckily, it hit his binoculars and wallet first, then penetrated into his chest and went out through his side, he had a big scar from it. He thought that was his ticket home, but was patched up and sent back into the front lines with the rest of the 442nd, they told him it didn’t hit any vitals, lol. He fought from Italy, France to inside somewhere in Germany, I saw his discharge papers or maybe it was his DD214. He was wounded 3...

Stories From My Grandpa

Stories From My Grandpa By Kristen Nemoto Jay photo of Sgt. Wilbert “Sandy” Holck, 442nd RCT Cannon Co. I don’t remember my grandfather. Not personally, anyway. The only memories I have of him consist of a bleak image of a large J.F.K. velvet painting that he loved, which greeted (or scared) folks who’d walk through the front door of my grandmother’s house. That house was burglarized more times than I can remember growing up but not a single one thought to steal Jr. from the wall. I’d like to think it’s because they knew Grandpa would hunt them down, which—from what I also heard growing up—wouldn’t have been too far off from the truth. No, sadly, I didn’t know him. There were stories about his...

This Time in 442nd History (May 2017)

This Time in 442nd RCT History Start of Life at Camp Shelby for the 442nd RCT: our Fathers, Uncles, Grandfathers E Company, 2nd Battalion of the 442nd RCT, Camp Shelby, Mississippi. May 13, 1943. (National Archives and Records Administration.) After the activation of the 442nd RCT in February and formation by March 1943, our men from Hawaii and the mainland went to train at Camp Shelby, Mississippi. Most arrived in April, though some AJAs who were already in the U.S. Army and who were assigned to the 442nd got to Camp Shelby earlier. The 442nd started training at about the time that the 100th Infantry Battalion, who had come to Camp Shelby from Camp McCoy in Wisconsin, was wrapping up theirs and readying for departure...

This Time in 442nd History (Mar 2017)

This Time in 442nd RCT History The following quote is one example of many where a commander of soldiers writes of the horribleness of war (the “plague of Mankind” refers to war). “My first wish is, to see this plague to Mankind banished from the Earth; & the Sons & daughters of this World employed in more pleasing & innocent amusements than in preparing implements, & exercising them for the destruction of the human race.” George Washington in a letter to his former aide-de-camp David Humphreys, 25 July 1785, written nearly 2 years after the end of the Revolutionary War. The 442nd RCT and the Po Valley Campaign, April-May 1945 This is a synopsis of several written accounts of the Po Valley Campaign, links are...