Pete Luna|Leader-News
In a go to to the Uvalde Leader-News workplace, Werner Ulrich Jr., who’s working with St. Mary’s University historical past professor Teresa VanHoy to acknowledge World War II internees, stands for a photograph subsequent to VanHoy’s scholar and former Leader-News assistant editor Kimberly Rubio, who interviewed him about his childhood, a part of which was spent on the Crystal City internment camp.
Last month, when New York-born Werner Ulrich Jr. visited the stays of the Crystal City internment camp, house to 1000’s of German, Japanese, and Italian immigrants between 1942 and 1947, he vividly described the 10-foot barbed wire fencing that enclosed the 100-acre compound, the backdrop to a few of his earliest childhood reminiscences.
Located 40 miles south of Uvalde, the stays of the camp not embody the fence, however foundations of a number of administrative buildings, a stone monument and 7 plaques are stark reminders of the trauma that shattered Ulrich’s German dad and mom.
Ulrich, 80, of New York City, visited San Antonio lately to fulfill with St. Mary’s University historical past professor Teresa VanHoy. Together, they’re advocating for federal recognition of the German Americans and German Latin Americans interned in U.S. camps throughout World War II.
On his technique to go to Crystal City, Ulrich handed by way of Uvalde in hopes of assembly with the employees of U.S. Congressman Tony Gonzales. Unable to safe a go to, Ulrich stopped by the Uvalde Leader-News.
Ulrich was born in September of 1941, in New York, to German immigrants Erna and Werner Ulrich Sr. After the bombing of Pearl Harbor on Dec. 7, 1941, the United States authorities started imprisoning German, Japanese and Italian immigrants in camps operated by the Immigration and Naturalization Service.
Werner Ulrich Sr. was apprehended in June of 1943 following a 2 a.m. raid of the household’s residence. The Federal Bureau of Investigation relocated Werner Ulrich Sr. to Ellis Island. Erna, with none revenue, was pressured to maneuver and depend on welfare to look after her younger son, Werner Ulrich Jr.
“She kept begging Ellis Island to release him so that… he could go back to work to help his family,” Werner Jr. mentioned. “The FBI came to her with a form to fill out. They said all she had to do was fill the form out and they would reunite her with her husband. So she signed the papers.”
The type was a repatriation settlement and, by signing, Erna agreed, alongside together with her son, to affix Werner Ulrich Sr. on Ellis Island. There, Erna realized the settlement required the household to be repatriated to Germany through the peak of World War II.
“Many mothers, with their American born children, all imprisoned on Ellis Island, united and refused to take their children to Germany in the midst of World War II. The intent was to keep the children out of harms way,” Ulrich mentioned, noting that his mom additionally declined to be relocated to Germany.
Instead, the household was relocated to Crystal City, Texas, greater than 1,900 miles from house.
“As far as I’m concerned, it was good because I was a child,” Werner Jr. said of his time on the camp, but it surely had devastating results on his household within the years after their launch.
When repatriation strain started, Erna agreed to honor her signed dedication to return however refused to expatriate her American youngsters.
According to Ulrich, Erna mentioned that she would quite give her youngsters – Werner Jr., in addition to a daughter, who was born within the internment camp – up for adoption than topic them to struggling in war-torn Germany.
Her persistence paid off as the federal government finally allowed the household to stay in America.
“Many times I wonder what would have happened to me if my mother wasn’t so strong, so persistent,” he mentioned.
Though his father wished to return to Germany, his mom refused. The dispute brought on a rift of their marriage. Werner Sr. turned an alcoholic and abused his spouse and son, whom he noticed because the supply of her refusal to go away America.
“He hated this country because of what they did. The humility he suffered,” he mentioned.
The household finally discovered their method again to New York, although they by no means spoke of their expertise.
Not even Werner Jr.’s spouse was aware of his childhood in Crystal City till their youngest son found the household’s historical past whereas conducting analysis at a Manhattan public library.
“He came home with a stack of paperwork showing that my father was arrested…,” Ulrich mentioned. “He was rattled, and he was afraid of what my reaction would be. In the meantime, my wife is standing there, with her mouth falling open. She was furious with me because I never told her about my childhood.”
The unintentional discovery sparked renewed curiosity in his household historical past, and Ulrich reached out to different Crystal City internees. At their suggestion and with archival sources they helped him safe, he started re-mapping the camp. He reconstructed the camp buildings, utilizing blueprints to specify the precise format of every housing unit and customary constructing, in addition to the distances between the buildings.
He hopes this venture, together with a federal invoice formally recognizing German American and German Latin American internment, will educate Americans about this darkish interval of American historical past.