Samuel Nakashiba

Samuel Nakashiba had Japanese parents but was born in Cairns in 1924 and did not speak Japanese. Prior to his internment he worked as a junior clerk for the Burns Philp shipping company in Darwin. He was interned on 8 December 1941 and sent to the camp at Hay in NSW before being transferred on to Loveday in May 1943. Official records give as the reason for internment, ‘Australian born Japanese.’

Nakashiba lodged his first application for release from internment as early as the end of June 1942, when he was still just 18 years of age. That first attempt at release, however, came to nothing, but by 1944 authorities adopted a more generous attitude. The officer commanding the Woolenook wood-cutting camp, where Nakashima was employed, noted that he was a willing and well-behaved worker and that he was unpopular with other internees because of his pro-British views.