What Japan’s General Saw When He Surrendered 37,000 Men on Halmahera to a Black U.S. Division

In April 1945, a segregated Black division took over the island of Morotai. Across twelve miles of water sat Halmahera, held by an entire Japanese army division. For most of the war the Army had kept the 93rd Infantry Division guarding bases and unloading ships. By the end of August, the Japanese general on Halmahera was riding an American PT boat to their headquarters to surrender. The record shows what happened when he came aboard, what happened when he asked to keep his sword, and what the Japanese on Halmahera had done to their prisoners. Told from the U.S. Army and Navy official histories, the Australian War Memorial's film and photographs, and the 1945 wire report. SOURCES Ulysses Lee, The Employment of Negro Troops (U.S. Army Center of Military History, 1966), ch. XVIII: https://permanent.fdlp.gov/websites/w... Robert J. Bulkley Jr., At Close Quarters: PT Boats in the United States Navy (Naval History Division, 1962), pp. 441-442: https://www.ibiblio.org/hyperwar/USN/... Robert Ross Smith, The Approach to the Philippines (CMH, 1953), ch. XIX: https://www.ibiblio.org/hyperwar/USA/... Australian War Memorial, film F01249, "40,000 Japanese negotiate surrender: Halmahera Force": https://www.awm.gov.au/collection/C18... Australian War Memorial, Hugh Kennare photographs P02482.013-.019: https://awm.gov.au/collection/C326092 (and C326090 through C326096) Australian War Memorial C201723 (Flt Lt Mac Stevenson): https://www.awm.gov.au/collection/C20... Australian War Memorial C218981 and C376855 (HMAS Barcoo, Indian prisoners): https://www.awm.gov.au/collection/C37... AP wire, Daily Pacifician, 3 Sep 1945, "Jap Surrender Nets 41,000 for 93rd Division", as transcribed at Pacific Wrecks: https://pacificwrecks.com/unit/usa/93... National Diet Library authority record, Ishii Yoshiho: https://id.ndl.go.jp/auth/ndlna/00280309