Prisoners in Sugamo and their Campaign for Release, 1952–1953

Abstract

The great majority of Japanese war criminals served part or all of their sentences in Sugamo Prison in Tokyo, either because they had been tried in Japan, or after repatriation from overseas. Once convicted, they tended to be invisible in historical accounts of the post-war period, but in fact they were not cut off from Japanese society or politics in the 1950s. Rather, Sugamo's inmates worked hard to win public sympathy, also exerting considerable pressure on the government in an attempt to hasten their own release and to have Japanese prisoners repatriated from overseas gaols. The early 1950s were crucial, not least because the 1952 peace treaty stipulated that the countries that had originally prosecuted them retained the right to decide on prisoners' fates even after Japan regained its sovereignty. Moreover, convicted war criminals were increasingly concentrated in Sugamo, allowing many opportunities for political activity and other campaigning. Though the last war criminals were not freed until 1958, prisoners' activities in the early 1950s played an important part in changing the terms in which discussion of war criminals took place and thus in making it more and more difficult for foreign governments to maintain their original stance on war criminals.

Acknowledgements

Early versions of this paper were given during 2010 at the International Association of Historians of Asia conference in Singapore, the Asian Studies Association of Australia conference in Adelaide, and at the University of Cambridge and the University of Leiden. I thank the organisers of those events and the audiences, as well as Robert Cribb, Beatrice Trefalt, Anne-Marie Medcalf, Stephen Large, David Wells and Takeshi Moriyama for useful comments.

Notes

¹See table in Chaen, ‘Kaisetsu’, 5.

²Ibid., 5, 7.

³On war crimes trials held by Nationalist China see Kushner, ‘Pawns of Empire’.

⁴Utsumi, ‘Kaisetsu’, 265.

⁵See Wilson, ‘War, Soldier and Nation in 1950s Japan’, 196–204; Utsumi, Sugamo Purizun, 143–149.

⁶Tanaka, BC kyū senpan, 206; Barrette, ‘Art and Exchange at Sugamo Prison, 1945–52’; Ginn, Sugamo Prison, Tokyo, 1–2. Dates given by Ginn here are unreliable.

⁷Chaen, ‘Kaisetsu’, 6–7; Tanaka, BC kyū senpan, 130; Utsumi and Nagai, ‘Kaisetsu’, xii.

⁸Chaen, ‘Kaisetsu’, 6.

⁹Vargas, ‘Sugamo Diary’, esp. 246, 292, 336, 419, 422, 424. On Tokyo Rose see also Duus, Tokyo Rose; Keene, Treason on the Airwaves; Ginn, Sugamo Prison, Tokyo, 34–36.

¹⁰Ginn, Sugamo Prison, Tokyo, 5, 10–11, 197 and Appendix E, 268–287; Utsumi, Sugamo Purizun, 94–95.

¹¹Chaen, ‘Kaisetsu’, 5.

¹²On different phases in the conditions at Sugamo see Barrette, ‘Art and Exchange at Sugamo Prison’.

¹³See, for example, Kodama, Fu-un, 273–274, quoted in Satō, Sasakawa Ryōichi, 92; Kishi, Yatsugi and Itō, Kishi Nobusuke no kaisō, 80.

¹⁴Vargas, ‘Sugamo Diary’, 357 (11 June 1946).

¹⁵See the following essays by Katō Tetsutarō, all republished in Katō Tetsutarō, Watashi wa kai ni naritai: ‘Watashitachi wa saigunbi no hikikae kippu de wa nai: senpan shakuhō undō no imi ni tsuite’ (originally published October 1952), 79–80; ‘Kurueru senpan shikeishū’ (originally published 1953), 23, 29–30; ‘Sensō wa hanzai de aru ka: ichi senpansha no kansatsu to hansei no shuki’ (originally published 1953), 59; ‘Watashi wa naze “Kai ni naritai” no isho o kaita ka’ (originally published March 1959), 117–118. Katō's writings are discussed in Wilson, ‘War, Soldier and Nation in 1950s Japan’, 197–202.

¹⁶See Sasakawa, Sugamo Diary; Daventry, Sasakawa; Vargas, ‘Sugamo Diary’; Hanayama, The Way of Deliverance. Other prison diaries include Kishi, Yatsugi and Itō, Kishi Nobusuke no kaisō, 302–378; Kodama, Unmei no mon. See also Ginn, Sugamo Prison, Tokyo, 7–11.

¹⁷Utsumi, Sugamo Purizun, 75–80.

¹⁸Kishi, Yatsugi and Itō, Kishi Nobusuke no kaisō, 80.

¹⁹Vargas watched his first movie in Sugamo on 5 January 1946: Vargas, ‘Sugamo Diary’, 245. Sasakawa Ryōichi saw his first film on 27 September 1947: Sasakawa, Letter to Okada Katsuo and Sasakawa Shizue, 30 September 1947, in Sasakawa, Sugamo Diary, 330. On recreation facilities etc., see also Ginn, Sugamo Prison, Tokyo, 7–11.

²⁰Utsumi, Sugamo Purizun, 76–78.

²¹Barrette, ‘Art and Exchange in Sugamo’; Utsumi, Sugamo Purizun, 79.

²²Utsumi, Sugamo Purizun, 127, 160, 179.

²³Ueda Haruo, writing in Mainichi, 12 September 1953, as reported in FJ 1661/261, in Japanese Request for HMG's Interpretation of ‘Jurisdiction’. See also Satō, Sasakawa Ryōichi, 137.

²⁴Ueda, in Japanese Request for HMG's Interpretation of ‘Jurisdiction’.

²⁵See New Year list in Sugamo 5 (1 January 1953), 5 [176]. In references to Sugamo, page numbers in the facsimile edition are given in square brackets. On war criminals' testaments and reminiscences, see also Dower, Embracing Defeat, 515–520.

²⁶Chaen, ‘Kaisetsu’, 7–8. On Sugamo shinbun see Utsumi, Sugamo Purizun, 81–98.

²⁷Article 11, Treaty of Peace with Japan, in Maki, Conflict and Tension in the Far East, 136–137.

²⁸Tanaka, BC kyū senpan, 206–207.

²⁹‘Treaty of Peace with Italy’.

³⁰Irie, ‘Heiwa jōyaku sōan no kaisetsu’, 197.

³¹Ibid., 196–197.

³²Ibid., 197; Utsumi, Sugamo Purizun, 107–113.

³³Yamamoto, ‘Japan's “Unsettling” Past’, 3–8. See also Pritchard, ‘The Gift of Clemency Following British War Crimes Trials in the Far East, 1946–1948’, 37–38.

³⁴Record of Lord Henderson's verbal response to Lord Hankey during Hankey's visit to Henderson on 25 July 1951 to discuss Article 11, FJ1664/1, in Discussion and Consideration of the Problem of War Criminals; Yamamoto, ‘Japan's “Unsettling” Past’, 6–7.

³⁵Secretary of State to Hankey, 8 October 1951, FJ1664/3, in Discussion and Consideration of the Problem of War Criminals; record of Lord Henderson's verbal response to Lord Hankey, 25 July 1951.

³⁶See the various records in Discussion and Consideration of the Problem of War Criminals.

³⁷ The Times, 6 August 1951, included in FJ1664/2 in Discussion and Consideration of the Problem of War Criminals. See also Hankey, Politics, Trials and Errors.

³⁸Record of Hankey's visit to Henderson on 25 July 1951, FJ1664/1, in Discussion and Consideration of the Problem of War Criminals.

³⁹Yamamoto, ‘Japan's “Unsettling” Past’, 7–8.

⁴⁰Utsumi, Sugamo Purizun, 114, 125; Chaen, ‘Kaisetsu’, 8.

⁴¹Ohama, no title, 172.

⁴²Katō Takahisa, ‘Kōwa jōyaku to senpan no shamen’.

⁴³Dower, Embracing Defeat, 514.

⁴⁴Miyagi, Sengo, sensō no eigashi, 147. According to Dower, these figures apply to the single year of 1952 (Dower, Embracing Defeat, 514), but neither Miyagi nor Dower cites a source.

⁴⁵Among many examples see, for instance, Sugamo 2 (15 November 1952), 5, 8 [154, 157].

⁴⁶ Sugamo 9 (1 March 1953), 3 [204].

⁴⁷ Sugamo 7 (1 February 1953), 6 [196]; 10 (15 March 1953), 3 [208].

⁴⁸ Sugamo 5 (1 January 1953), 9 [180]; 6 (15 January 1953), 7 [188]; 7 (1 February 1953), 2–3 [191–192]. On Watanabe Hamako, see Beatrice Trefalt's essay in this volume.

⁴⁹Utsumi, Sugamo Purizun, 146.

⁵⁰ Sugamo 7 (1 February 1953), 7 [196]; Partner, Assembled in Japan, 71.

⁵¹Adachi (director), Sugamo no haha.

⁵²Anderson and Richie, The Japanese Film, 221.

⁵³ Sugamo 1 (1 November 1952), 6 [147].

⁵⁴ Sugamo 2 (15 November 1952), 7 [156].

⁵⁵Satō, Sasakawa Ryōichi, 132–135.

⁵⁶On the Kenseikai see Morris, Nationalism and the Right Wing in Japan, 314–315, 323–325.

⁵⁷ Sugamo 4 (15 December 1952), 4 [169].

⁵⁸ Sugamo 3 (1 December 1952), 5 [162].

⁵⁹For one visit by Foreign Minister Okazaki Katsuo see Sugamo 1 (1 November 1952), 5 [146]. For the justice minister see 3 (1 December 1952), 5 [162]. For discussion of a visit by the foreign minister and others in July 1952, see Utsumi, Sugamo Purizun, 125.

⁶⁰See Utsumi, Sugamo Purizun, 150–183; Utsumi, ‘Kaisetsu’, 264–265.

⁶¹See, for example, Handa, ‘Tenki ni tatsu shakuhō undō’.

⁶²Wilson, ‘War, Soldier and Nation in 1950s Japan’, 190–196.

⁶³ Sugamo 2 (15 November 1952), 5 [154].

⁶⁴ Sugamo 3 (1 December 1952), 5 [162]. See, for example, the materials in FJ1661/96 in Japanese War Criminals (Folder 5) concerning the visit of the Japanese Ambassador to Great Britain to Sir William Strang, Permanent Under-Secretary of State for Foreign Affairs, on 6 November 1952. The Ambassador asked for clemency for Class A criminals as well as Classes B and C, and indicated that approaches were being made to other governments.

⁶⁵ Sugamo 2 (15 November 1952), 5 [154]; 3 (1 December 1952), 5 [162].

⁶⁶Katō Tetsutarō, ‘Watashitachi wa saigunbi no hikikae kippu de wa nai’, in Katō Tetsutarō, Watashi wa kai ni naritai, 68.

⁶⁷Utsumi, Sugamo Purizun, 126.

⁶⁸Katō Tetsutarō, ‘Watashitachi wa saigunbi no hikikae kippu de wa nai’, in Katō Tetsutarō, Watashi wa kai ni naritai, 68–69.

⁶⁹ Sugamo 5 (1 January 1953), 8 [179].

⁷⁰ Sugamo 8 (15 February 1953), 2 [199].

⁷¹Chōkai, ‘Nan no tame ni ikiru ka’, 1 [158].

⁷² Sugamo 3 (1 December 1952), 8 [165]. This may be the rally described by Utsumi, Sugamo Purizun, 144, but she gives no date. According to Utsumi, 70% of Sugamo's 927 inmates attended, that is, about 650 people.

⁷³Tanaka, BC kyū senpan, 210. See Horie, ‘Hitōsenpan no tegami!!’, 4 [193].

⁷⁴Reprinted as Sugamo hōmu iinkai, Senpan saiban no jissō. See also Chaen and Shigematsu, eds, Hokan Senpan saiban no jissō. In the latter volume see the essay by Shigematsu Kazuyoshi, ‘Fukkokuban Senpan saiban no jissō kaidai’. Utsumi, Sugamo Purizun, 114, 129.

⁷⁵Katō Tetsutarō, ‘Watashitachi wa saigunbi no hikikae kippu de wa nai’, in Katō Tetsutarō, Watashi wa kai ni naritai.

⁷⁶Utsumi, Sugamo Purizun, 115.

⁷⁷Iizuka, Are kara shichi nen; Kabe atsuki heya; Yamamura, review of Kabe atsuki heya; Utsumi, ‘Kaisetsu’, 265; Utsumi, Sugamo Purizun, 166–171. Kabe atsuki heya was made into a film directed by Kobayashi Masaki, with a screenplay by Abe Kōbō, and released in 1956. See Richie, Japanese Cinema, 134–135; Anderson and Richie, The Japanese Film, 220–221.

⁷⁸ Sugamo 3 (1 December 1952), 7 [164]. See also, for example, 1 (1 November 1952), 7 [148]; 3 (1 December 1952), 4 [161].

⁷⁹Sugamo isho hensankai, Seiki no isho; Utsumi, Sugamo Purizun, 128–129.

⁸⁰ Sugamo 3 (1 December 1952), 4 [161].

⁸¹ Sugamo 3 (1 December 1952), 5 [162]; 4 (15 December 1952), 4 [169].

⁸²Shin'ichi, ‘Inochi aru mono no sakebi!’, 1–2 [166–167].

⁸³Ibid.

⁸⁴Kamimoto, ‘Mushisareteiru “kokumin no koe”’, 1 [190].

⁸⁵Ka, ‘Shakuhō o habamu mono’, 1–2 [198–199].

⁸⁶See Trefalt, ‘A Peace Worth Having’.

⁸⁷Handa, ‘Tenki ni tatsu shakuhō undō’.

⁸⁸See Utsumi, Sugamo Purizun, 106.

⁸⁹Handa, ‘Tenki ni tatsu shakuhō undō’.

⁹⁰Dower, Embracing Defeat.