Masao Iwamasa
Private First Class
442nd Regimental Combat Team
2nd Battalion, F Company
Masao Iwamasa was born on February 28, 1913, in Niulii, North Kohala District, Hawaii island, Territory of Hawaii. He was the seventh of the eleven children of Matsuemon and Tsugi (Hirotsu) Iwamasa: sons Sadaichi, Yasuichi, Masaichi, Haruto, Richard Takeo, Masao, Yoshio, and Fred Matsuto, and daughters Sumiyo, Patsy Tsuruyo, and Fusako.
Masao’s parents arrived from Yamaguchi Prefecture, Japan, in 1898, after marrying the previous year. They settled in North Kohala, where they worked as vegetable farmers. By 1920, Matsuemon was working as a laborer on the Halawa sugar plantation. By 1930, Matsuemon had retired, and the family was supported by son Takeo, who worked on the sugar plantation, and daughter Sumiyo, was a dressmaker in a tailor shop.
1940 at family home in Niulii. Above: Tsugi and Masaemon.
Below: Iwamasa children – L to R top/4th row: Sadaichi, Yasuichi; 3rd row: Takeo, Haruto, Masaichi; 2nd row: Sumiyo, Masao; bottom row/1st row: Patsy Tsuruyo, Matsuto Fred, Fusako. Behind Matsuto is Yoshio.
In 1940, Masao was living with his older brother Masaichi, wife Toshiko, and their four children. Masaichi was a carpenter engaged in building construction, and Masao was a carpenter’s helper for a contractor. They lived on Kawaihae Road in Kamuela (Waimea).
He registered for the draft on October 26, 1940, at Local Board No. 4 in A.W. Carter’s office in Kamuela. His address was P.O. Box 38, Kohala, he was unemployed, and his point of contact was a friend, Kazuo Kumoto. However, this address was later crossed out and his address was written in as 13 Field Area, U.S. Engineer Department (USED), at Marconi Airfield in Kahuku on Oahu. He was 5’4-1/2” tall and weighed 127 pounds.
Masao Iwamasa enlisted in the Army in Honolulu on March 23, 1943. At the time he was working as a carpenter for the USED. He was sent to the “tent city” known as Boomtown at Schofield Barracks on Oahu where the other new soldiers were gathering. He attended the aloha farewell ceremony given by the community on March 28 at Iolani Palace. On April 4, the new soldiers left on the S.S. Lurline for Oakland, California, from where they were sent by train to Camp Shelby, Mississippi.
Masao was assigned to 2nd Battalion, F Company.
After a year of basic, unit, and combat training and maneuvers, Masao left Camp Shelby with the Combat Team on April 22, 1944, by train for Camp Patrick Henry, Virginia. They sailed to the Theater of War on May 2, 1944, from nearby Hampton Roads in a convoy of about 100 ships, and arrived at Naples on May 28.
The 2nd Battalion, however, after entering the Straits of Gibraltar had stopped at the port of Oran, Algeria, on May 21. They were immediately moved to a bivouac area – Staging Area 2 – located 21 miles from the port. The men were kept busy by performing guard duty for the quartermaster supplies they had brought on their ship, the S.S. Elbridge Gerry. After two weeks, they departed Africa on June 5 aboard the British ship, HMT Samaria, for Naples. Upon arrival on June 9, they went to Staging Area No. 4 in nearby Bagnoli. On June 15, they sailed on LSTs for the trip to Civitavecchia, where on June 17 they met up with the rest of the Combat Team who were already there in bivouac.
The 442nd entered combat near Suvereto – in the Rome-Arno Campaign in Italy on June 26. After driving the enemy north to the Arno River, on September 6 the 442nd was pulled from the lines and sent south to the port of Piombino, 14 miles from Suvereto. From Piombino they sailed to Naples on September 11. On September 27, the 442nd sailed from Naples to France. Upon arrival near Marseilles, they were transferred to LSIs (similar to LSTs) and landed on the beach in high seas, rain, wind, and mud. The next day, they were sent by rail boxcars and motor convoy to a bivouac area near Septèmes. During the 10-day stay in their bivouac, day passes to Marseilles were issued and men also helped unload cargo at the port.
The 442nd fought during the Rhineland-Vosges Campaign. They left Septèmes by motor convoy on October 9 for the nearly 500-mile trip north to the Vosges Mountains. After two overnight halts, they arrived at the Seventh Army assembly area near Pouxeux on October 11. After going to two more assembly areas closer to the front, the attack began in the vicinity of Bruyères on October 14.
Pfc. Iwamasa was in combat during the bitter fighting to liberate the important rail and road junction of Bruyères, neighboring Biffontaine and Belmont, and the “Rescue of the Lost Battalion,” the 1st Battalion, 141st (Texas) Infantry that had advanced beyond the lines and was surrounded on three sides by the enemy.
The weather was cold, wet, snowy, and miserable, as the men fought in the heavily wooded forests still in their summer uniforms. They were subjected to living in water-logged foxholes, and incoming artillery raining down on them in “tree bursts.” Many 442nd soldiers contracted trench foot during these terrible weather conditions.
After the fierce fighting in the Vosges, the 442nd was at half-strength due to high casualties, and was sent to the south of France. There, they could rebuild to full combat strength while fighting in the Rhineland-Maritime Alps Campaign.
The 442nd left the lines on November 17 and arrived near Nice on the Mediterranean coast on November 21. The 442nd was in the area of Nice, Menton, Sospel, L’Escarène, and Peira Cava, and they received replacements during this time. Second Battalion was stationed in the vicinity of Sospel, a drive of 45 miles from the coast up steep, winding, and narrow mountain roads.
F Company was set up the village of L’Escarène and later, Peira Cava. They were able to take showers at a bath unit set up at La Bollène-Vésubie, and attend 206th Army Band concerts and movies. The period was relatively calm and was nicknamed the “Champagne Campaign” as the men were often given passes to Nice on the French Riviera.
However, the overall mission of the Combat Team at this time was to hold defensive positions with aggressive combat and reconnaissance patrols daily, in addition to maintaining security of the French-Italian border. All F Company platoons were entrenched high atop the Alps overlooking German positions. Rations were sent up the steep mountains by mule trains. Defensive minefields, booby traps, trip wires, and trip flares were installed in front of each platoon’s position. There were sporadic artillery duels with the enemy.
In January 1945, during one such German artillery barrage, Pfc. Iwamasa was seriously injured in his head by artillery fragments. The shrapnel fractured his skull and penetrated the parietal lobe of his brain. He was evacuated down the mountain and admitted to the hospital.
In the February 22, 1945, issue of Hilo’s Hawaii Tribune-Herald, Masao was among the Big Island soldiers listed among the wounded in Europe. By May, he had been sent back to the US and was convalescing at an Army hospital. In January 1946, he was discharged from the hospital and “invalided home.” On January 3, he discharged with disability – deaf in one ear and partially deaf in the other ear. He was also diagnosed with post-traumatic encephalopathy caused by the injury.
For his military service, Private First Class Masao Iwamasa was awarded the Bronze Star Medal, Purple Heart Medal, Good Conduct Medal, American Campaign Medal, European-African-Middle Eastern Campaign Medal with three bronze stars, World War II Victory Medal, Distinguished Unit Badge, and Combat Infantryman Badge. He was awarded the Congressional Gold Medal on October 5, 2010, along with the other veterans of the 100th/442nd Regimental Combat Team. This is the highest Congressional Civilian Medal.
Once he was back in Hawaii, Masao and his brother Haruto (also a recent returnee) traveled to their family home in Niulii where they were given a welcome home party by their mother (their father had died at the beginning of the war) and brother Takeo and his wife on February 2, 1946. Also honored at the party were local Kohala friends Mitsuru Hirano and Katsuyoshi Takaki who were home on furlough, and other 442nd RCT friends who were recently discharged: Masa and Matsu Komoto (both of 3rd Battalion, Headquarters Company), Akira Doi (K Company), Yutaka Nakashima (100th Battalion, Headquarters Company), Tadashi Umamoto (C Company), and from Kau District, Chikanori Fukunaga.
Before returning to Honolulu, Masao attended a luau held at 6:00 p.m. on February 16 in the former Japanese Language School in Niulii, hosted by some of the town’s young people in honor and memory of the local men who had served in the war. A moment of silence was observed for the two who had died in the war: Yoshio Iwamasa and Roy Sueichi Inkyo. Those honored for their service were Yutaka Nakashima, Roy T. Hiraoka, Tadashi Umamoto, William Moku, Jacob Kupakaa, and Waichi Hiraoka. Masao’s brother Takeo Iwamasa was the general chairman of the event.
In July 1948, Masao and his younger brother Matsuto returned to the Big Island for a week to visit their brother Masuichi in Waimea. At the time, Masao was employed at Holau Market in Honolulu. While on their visit, they enjoyed fishing at Kawaihae.
In 1950, Masao was living with his younger brother Matsuto at the Hongwanji Mission’s dormitory/boarding house on Isenberg Street in Moiliili, Honolulu. He was employed as a butcher at a meat market and his brother was a glass bender at a neon sign shop.
In 1953, Masao was living at 3317 Castle Street when on June 14, he and Shizue (known as “Sue”) Wakamiya of 2602 Ahekolo Street were married. Sue was the daughter of Mr. and Mrs. Masataro Wakamiya of Holualoa, Hawaii island. She had moved to Honolulu to attend sewing school. Several years later, they moved to Kaneohe and lived at 45-514 Keole Street. Over the years, they raised a family of two sons. Masao was employed by the U.S. Navy as a meat cutter.
Sue Iwamasa died on January 12, 1993. She was survived by her husband, two sons, one brother, and two sisters. Masao Iwamasa died on October 23, 2001, at his residence in Kaneohe at the age of 88. He was survived by his two sons and one sister, Patsy Kuwahara. Masao Iwamasa was buried at the National Memorial Cemetery of the Pacific at Punchbowl, Section D, Site 213, in the plot with his brother Yoshio.
Masao Iwamasa had two brothers who served with the 442nd RCT: Yoshio Iwamasa in the 3rd Battalion, I Company (killed in action) and Haruto Iwamasa in the 522nd Field Artillery Battalion, B Battery.
Researched and written by the Sons & Daughters of the 442nd Regimental Combat Team in 2024.