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{ "url_title": "John DeWitt", "title_sort": "dewittjohn", "links": { "json": "http://encyclopedia.densho.org/api/0.1/articles/John%20DeWitt/?format=api", "html": "http://encyclopedia.densho.org/John%20DeWitt?format=api" }, "modified": "2023-12-19T18:51:28", "title": "John DeWitt", "body": "<div class=\"mw-parser-output\">\n <div id=\"databox-PeopleDisplay\">\n <table class=\"infobox\" width=\"200px;\">\n <tbody>\n <tr>\n <th scope=\"row\" style=\"text-align:left;\">\n Name\n </th>\n <td style=\"text-align:left;\">\n John L. DeWitt\n </td>\n </tr>\n <tr>\n <th scope=\"row\" style=\"text-align:left;\">\n Born\n </th>\n <td style=\"text-align:left;\">\n January 9 1880\n </td>\n </tr>\n <tr>\n <th scope=\"row\" style=\"text-align:left;\">\n Died\n </th>\n <td style=\"text-align:left;\">\n June 20 1962\n </td>\n </tr>\n <tr>\n <th scope=\"row\" style=\"text-align:left;\">\n Birth Location\n </th>\n <td style=\"text-align:left;\">\n Fort Sidney, NE\n </td>\n </tr>\n </tbody>\n </table>\n </div>\n <div id=\"databox-People\" style=\"display:none;\">\n <p>\n FirstName:John;\nLastName:DeWitt;\nDisplayName:John L. DeWitt;\nBirthDate:1880-01-09;\nDeathDate:1962-06-20;\nBirthLocation:Fort Sidney, NE;\nGender:Male;\nEthnicity:White;\nGenerationIdentifier:;\nNationality:US;\nExternalResourceLink:;\nPrimaryGeography:;\nReligion:;\n </p>\n </div>\n <div class=\"floatright\">\n </div>\n <div class=\"floatright\">\n </div>\n <p>\n Wartime commanding general of the\n <a class=\"encyc notrg\" href=\"/Western_Defense_Command/\" title=\"Western Defense Command\">\n Western Defense Command\n </a>\n and the Fourth Army. As head of the Western Defense Command, John L. DeWitt (1880–1962) has often been cast as one the primary villains in the drama leading up to the mass forced removal and detention of Japanese Americans from the West Coast.\n </p>\n <div aria-labelledby=\"mw-toc-heading\" class=\"toc\" id=\"toc\" role=\"navigation\">\n <input class=\"toctogglecheckbox\" id=\"toctogglecheckbox\" role=\"button\" style=\"display:none\" type=\"checkbox\"/>\n <div class=\"toctitle\" dir=\"ltr\" lang=\"en\">\n <h2 id=\"mw-toc-heading\">\n Contents\n </h2>\n <span class=\"toctogglespan\">\n <label class=\"toctogglelabel\" for=\"toctogglecheckbox\">\n </label>\n </span>\n </div>\n <ul>\n <li class=\"toclevel-1 tocsection-1\">\n <a class=\"\" href=\"#Career_to_World_War_II\">\n <span class=\"tocnumber\">\n 1\n </span>\n <span class=\"toctext\">\n Career to World War II\n </span>\n </a>\n </li>\n <li class=\"toclevel-1 tocsection-2\">\n <a class=\"\" href=\"#The_Road_to_Executive_Order_9066\">\n <span class=\"tocnumber\">\n 2\n </span>\n <span class=\"toctext\">\n The Road to Executive Order 9066\n </span>\n </a>\n </li>\n <li class=\"toclevel-1 tocsection-3\">\n <a class=\"\" href=\"#Leaving_the_Western_Defense_Command_and_Postwar_Life\">\n <span class=\"tocnumber\">\n 3\n </span>\n <span class=\"toctext\">\n Leaving the Western Defense Command and Postwar Life\n </span>\n </a>\n </li>\n <li class=\"toclevel-1 tocsection-4\">\n <a class=\"\" href=\"#For_More_Information\">\n <span class=\"tocnumber\">\n 4\n </span>\n <span class=\"toctext\">\n For More Information\n </span>\n </a>\n </li>\n <li class=\"toclevel-1 tocsection-5\">\n <a class=\"\" href=\"#Footnotes\">\n <span class=\"tocnumber\">\n 5\n </span>\n <span class=\"toctext\">\n Footnotes\n </span>\n </a>\n </li>\n </ul>\n </div>\n <div class=\"section\" id=\"Career_to_World_War_II\">\n <h2>\n <span class=\"mw-headline\" id=\"Career_to_World_War_II\">\n Career to World War II\n </span>\n </h2>\n <div class=\"section_content\">\n <p>\n John Lesesne DeWitt was born at Fort Sidney, Nebraska, to a military family and raised at various army posts. His father, Calvin DeWitt, was a former Civil War infantry captain and a Princeton graduate, and his brothers Calvin, Jr. and Wallace were also generals. He left Princeton in 1898 to enlist in the Spanish-American War and followed it with the first of four tours of duty in the Philippines in 1899. He became a supply officer and rose up the ranks, working in the office of the quartermaster general in Washington from 1914–17 and as assistant chief of staff for the army's War Plans Division in the early 1920s. He became quartermaster general in 1930 and was granted command of the Fourth Army and Western Defense Command in 1939 at the age of 59.\n </p>\n <p>\n His pre-World War II career holds a couple of clues as to the source of his apparent enmity towards ethnic Japanese. While with the War Plans Division, he led a team in the creation of a \"Joint Defense Plan\" for Hawai'i in the event of war with Japan that called for the institution of\n <a class=\"encyc notrg\" href=\"/Martial_law_in_Hawaii/\" title=\"Martial law in Hawaii\">\n martial law\n </a>\n and the selective detention of Japanese enemy aliens. A variation of this basic plan was in fact carried out in Hawai'i in contrast to the action DeWitt led against Japanese Americans on the West Coast. His four tours of duty in the Philippines no doubt shaped his views of Japanese as well, particularly his 1904–05 tour during and after Japan's victory in the Sino-Japanese War and in 1935–37 during the Japanese war with China.\n </p>\n </div>\n </div>\n <div class=\"section\" id=\"The_Road_to_Executive_Order_9066\">\n <h2>\n <span class=\"mw-headline\" id=\"The_Road_to_Executive_Order_9066\">\n The Road to Executive Order 9066\n </span>\n </h2>\n <div class=\"section_content\">\n <p>\n Over the two-and-a-half months between the attack on Pearl Harbor and the issuing of\n <a class=\"encyc notrg\" href=\"/Executive_Order_9066/\" title=\"Executive Order 9066\">\n Executive Order 9066\n </a>\n , DeWitt, made a range of conflicting pronouncements and proposals regarding the issue of Japanese Americans on the West Coast that seem to reflect some level of panic and confusion mixed with a strong self-preservation instinct. As historian Roger Daniels writes, \"no one who read the transcripts of De Witt's telephone conversations with Washington or examines his staff correspondence can avoid the conclusion that his was a headquarters at which confusion rather than calm reigned, and that the confusion was greatest at the very top.\"\n <sup class=\"reference\" id=\"cite_ref-ftnt_ref1_1-0\">\n <a class=\"\" href=\"#cite_note-ftnt_ref1-1\">\n [1]\n </a>\n </sup>\n </p>\n <p>\n Amid fears of further Japanese attacks and unsubstantiated reports of signaling of Japanese submarines from the coast—along with the news that the army and navy commanders in Hawai'i had been relived of their duties—DeWitt's first proposal regarding enemy aliens on December 19 advocated the removal of \"all alien subjects fourteen years of age and over.\"\n <sup class=\"reference\" id=\"cite_ref-ftnt_ref2_2-0\">\n <a class=\"\" href=\"#cite_note-ftnt_ref2-2\">\n [2]\n </a>\n </sup>\n But a week later, he resisted the entreaties of army provost marshal general and longtime friend\n <a class=\"encyc notrg\" href=\"/Allen_Gullion/\" title=\"Allen Gullion\">\n Allen Gullion\n </a>\n for arresting all West Coast Japanese Americans. \"...we are going to have an awful job on our hands and are very liable to alienate the local Japanese,\" he told Gullion. \"An American citizen, after all, is an American citizen.\"\n <sup class=\"reference\" id=\"cite_ref-ftnt_ref3_3-0\">\n <a class=\"\" href=\"#cite_note-ftnt_ref3-3\">\n [3]\n </a>\n </sup>\n </p>\n <p>\n The arrival of Gullion's young assistant\n <a class=\"encyc notrg\" href=\"/Karl_Bendetsen/\" title=\"Karl Bendetsen\">\n Karl Bendetsen\n </a>\n in San Francisco to assist DeWitt was a turning point. At a January 4 meeting that included Justice Department officials, the idea of establishing Category A zones around sensitive areas was hatched, where everyone could be excluded, with some given passes to be allowed back. At that meeting, he stated, \"I have little confidence that the enemy aliens are law-abiding or loyal.... Particularly the Japanese. I have no confidence in their loyalty whatsoever. I am speaking now of the native born Japanese.\"\n <sup class=\"reference\" id=\"cite_ref-ftnt_ref4_4-0\">\n <a class=\"\" href=\"#cite_note-ftnt_ref4-4\">\n [4]\n </a>\n </sup>\n The idea that even\n <a class=\"encyc notrg\" href=\"/Nisei/\" title=\"Nisei\">\n Nisei\n </a>\n were now irredeemably \"Japanese\" would remain consistent for him henceforth.\n </p>\n <p>\n On January 21, DeWitt produced a list of 86 such zones from which all enemy aliens would be removed, a total of 7,000 of which 40% were Japanese. But over the next week, the continuing pressure for mass removal of all West Coast Japanese Americans by Gullion and Bendetsen, the release of the\n <a class=\"encyc notrg\" href=\"/Roberts_Commission_report/\" title=\"Roberts Commission report\">\n Roberts Commission Report\n </a>\n on January 25, and the alarming rise in public calls for mass removal reinforced by meetings with California governor\n <a class=\"encyc notrg\" href=\"/Culbert_Olson/\" title=\"Culbert Olson\">\n Culbert Olson\n </a>\n and attorney general\n <a class=\"encyc notrg\" href=\"/Earl_Warren/\" title=\"Earl Warren\">\n Earl Warren\n </a>\n pushed DeWitt to toughen his stance. By the end of January, he had agreed that Japanese American citizens as well as immigrants would be moved out.\n </p>\n <p>\n But in early February, he had yet another plan. After a conference with Governor Olson and\n <a class=\"encyc notrg\" href=\"/Tom_C._Clark/\" title=\"Tom C. Clark\">\n Tom C. Clark\n </a>\n , the coordinator of the Alien Enemy Control Program in the Western Defense Command, DeWitt advocated a plan to have Japanese American men work as volunteer laborers on \"resettlement projects\" within California. Informed of this, Gullion went directly to Assistant Secretary of War\n <a class=\"encyc notrg\" href=\"/John_McCloy/\" title=\"John McCloy\">\n John McCloy\n </a>\n and convinced him of the necessity of mass removal. McCloy in turn obtained the approval of Secretary of War\n <a class=\"encyc notrg\" href=\"/Henry_Stimson/\" title=\"Henry Stimson\">\n Henry Stimson\n </a>\n and of the president on February 11, sealing the fate of Japanese Americans. Executive Order 9066 was issued on February 19.\n </p>\n <p>\n DeWitt appointed Bendetsen to head the newly formed Civil Affairs Division and the\n <a class=\"encyc notrg\" href=\"/Wartime_Civil_Control_Administration/\" title=\"Wartime Civil Control Administration\">\n Wartime Civil Control Administration\n </a>\n on March 12, putting him charge of the logistics of removing 110,000 people from their homes and communities. For the rest of his tenure, DeWitt continued to take positions that reinforced his original contention that Japanese Americans could not be trusted and that their loyalty could not be determined, opposing allowing Nisei into the army as combat troops and opposing Japanese American resettlement on the West Coast. As plans for the\n <a class=\"encyc notrg\" href=\"/442nd_Regimental_Combat_Team/\" title=\"442nd Regimental Combat Team\">\n 442nd Regimental Combat Team\n </a>\n crystalized in early 1943, DeWitt told Gullion \"[t]here isn't such a thing as a loyal Japanese and it is just impossible to determine their loyalty by investigation—it just can't be done.\"\n <sup class=\"reference\" id=\"cite_ref-ftnt_ref5_5-0\">\n <a class=\"\" href=\"#cite_note-ftnt_ref5-5\">\n [5]\n </a>\n </sup>\n In front of a House Committee on April 15, 1943, he stated: \"There is a feeling developing, I think, in certain sections of the country, that the Japanese should be allowed to return. I am opposing it with every proper means at my disposal.\"\n <sup class=\"reference\" id=\"cite_ref-ftnt_ref6_6-0\">\n <a class=\"\" href=\"#cite_note-ftnt_ref6-6\">\n [6]\n </a>\n </sup>\n This general contention was reflected in his\n <a class=\"mw-redirect encyc notrg\" href=\"/Final_Report,_Japanese_Evacuation_From_the_West_Coast,_1942_(book)/\" title=\"Final Report, Japanese Evacuation From the West Coast, 1942 (book)\">\n Final Report, Japanese Evacuation From the West Coast, 1942\n </a>\n , first issued in April of 1943. McCloy's objection to DeWitt's claim that it was \"impossible\" to determine the loyalty of Japanese Americans led to the report's being rewritten to edit that passage.\n </p>\n </div>\n </div>\n <div class=\"section\" id=\"Leaving_the_Western_Defense_Command_and_Postwar_Life\">\n <h2>\n <span class=\"mw-headline\" id=\"Leaving_the_Western_Defense_Command_and_Postwar_Life\">\n Leaving the Western Defense Command and Postwar Life\n </span>\n </h2>\n <div class=\"section_content\">\n <p>\n At an off the record news conference on April 16, 1943, DeWitt uttered his infamous \"A Jap is a Jap\" statement in reiterating his opposition to allowing Nisei soldiers on the West Coast, a pronouncement that was widely reported and that widened the rift with the War Department. Though federal officials tried to downplay it, it is generally accepted that DeWitt was transferred to become commander of the Army and Navy Staff College in Washington, DC in September 1943 in large part because of his handling of Japanese American exclusion and its aftermath.\n <sup class=\"reference\" id=\"cite_ref-ftnt_ref7_7-0\">\n <a class=\"\" href=\"#cite_note-ftnt_ref7-7\">\n [7]\n </a>\n </sup>\n Ironically, he was replaced by\n <a class=\"encyc notrg\" href=\"/Delos_Emmons/\" title=\"Delos Emmons\">\n Delos Emmons\n </a>\n , who as military commander of Hawai'i, had pursued a very different strategy towards Japanese Americans there. DeWitt retired in 1947.\n </p>\n <p>\n He lived out his last years in Washington, DC., where he is reported to have joined the Japan-American Society of Washington.\n <sup class=\"reference\" id=\"cite_ref-ftnt_ref8_8-0\">\n <a class=\"\" href=\"#cite_note-ftnt_ref8-8\">\n [8]\n </a>\n </sup>\n John DeWitt died of a heart attack at age 82 on June 20, 1962. He is buried in Arlington National Cemetery.\n </p>\n <div id=\"authorByline\">\n <b>\n Authored by\n <a class=\"encyc notrg\" href=\"/Brian_Niiya/\" title=\"Brian Niiya\">\n Brian Niiya\n </a>\n , Densho\n </b>\n </div>\n <div id=\"citationAuthor\" style=\"display:none;\">\n Niiya, Brian\n </div>\n </div>\n </div>\n <div class=\"section\" id=\"For_More_Information\">\n <h2>\n <span class=\"mw-headline\" id=\"For_More_Information\">\n For More Information\n </span>\n </h2>\n <div class=\"section_content\">\n <p>\n Arlington National Cemetery.\n <a class=\"external text offsite\" href=\"http://www.arlingtoncemetery.net/jldewitt.htm\" rel=\"nofollow\">\n \"John Lesesne DeWitt, Lieutenant General, United States Army.\"\n </a>\n </p>\n <p>\n Commission on Wartime Relocation and Internment of Civilians.\n <i>\n Personal Justice Denied: Report of the Commission on Wartime Relocation and Internment of Civilians\n </i>\n . Washington, DC: Government Printing Office, 1982. Foreword by Tetsuden Kashima. Seattle: University of Washington Press, 1997.\n </p>\n <p>\n Daniels, Roger.\n <a class=\"external text offsite\" href=\"https://archive.org/details/concentrationcam00dani_0\" rel=\"nofollow\">\n <i>\n Concentration Camps, North America: Japanese in the United States and Canada during World War II\n </i>\n </a>\n . Malabar, Fla.: Robert E. Krieger Publishing Co., 1981.\n </p>\n <p>\n Irons, Peter.\n <a class=\"external text offsite\" href=\"https://archive.org/details/justiceatwar00iron\" rel=\"nofollow\">\n <i>\n Justice at War: The Story of the Japanese American Internment Cases\n </i>\n .\n </a>\n New York: Oxford University Press, 1983.\n </p>\n <p>\n Robinson, Greg.\n <a class=\"external text offsite\" href=\"https://archive.org/details/byorderofpreside00robi\" rel=\"nofollow\">\n <i>\n By Order of the President: FDR and the Internment of Japanese Americans\n </i>\n </a>\n . Cambridge: Harvard University Press, 2001.\n </p>\n </div>\n </div>\n <div class=\"section\" id=\"Footnotes\">\n <h2>\n <span class=\"mw-headline\" id=\"Footnotes\">\n Footnotes\n </span>\n </h2>\n <div class=\"section_content\">\n <div class=\"reflist\" style=\"list-style-type: decimal;\">\n <div class=\"mw-references-wrap\">\n <ol class=\"references\">\n <li id=\"cite_note-ftnt_ref1-1\">\n <span class=\"mw-cite-backlink\">\n <a class=\"\" href=\"#cite_ref-ftnt_ref1_1-0\">\n ↑\n </a>\n </span>\n <span class=\"reference-text\">\n Roger Daniels,\n <i>\n Concentration Camps, North America: Japanese in the United States and Canada during World War II\n </i>\n (Malabar, Fla.: Robert E. Krieger Publishing Co., 1981), 37–38.\n </span>\n </li>\n <li id=\"cite_note-ftnt_ref2-2\">\n <span class=\"mw-cite-backlink\">\n <a class=\"\" href=\"#cite_ref-ftnt_ref2_2-0\">\n ↑\n </a>\n </span>\n <span class=\"reference-text\">\n Peter Irons,\n <i>\n Justice at War: The Story of the Japanese American Internment Cases\n </i>\n (New York: Oxford University Press, 1983), 27.\n </span>\n </li>\n <li id=\"cite_note-ftnt_ref3-3\">\n <span class=\"mw-cite-backlink\">\n <a class=\"\" href=\"#cite_ref-ftnt_ref3_3-0\">\n ↑\n </a>\n </span>\n <span class=\"reference-text\">\n Irons,\n <i>\n Justice of War\n </i>\n , 29–30.\n </span>\n </li>\n <li id=\"cite_note-ftnt_ref4-4\">\n <span class=\"mw-cite-backlink\">\n <a class=\"\" href=\"#cite_ref-ftnt_ref4_4-0\">\n ↑\n </a>\n </span>\n <span class=\"reference-text\">\n Klancy Clark de Nevers,\n <i>\n The Colonel and the Pacifist: Karl Bendetsen, Perry Saito and the Incarceration of Japanese Americans during World War II\n </i>\n (Salt Lake City: University of Utah Press, 2004), 85.\n </span>\n </li>\n <li id=\"cite_note-ftnt_ref5-5\">\n <span class=\"mw-cite-backlink\">\n <a class=\"\" href=\"#cite_ref-ftnt_ref5_5-0\">\n ↑\n </a>\n </span>\n <span class=\"reference-text\">\n Commission on Wartime Relocation and Internment of Civilians,\n <i>\n Personal Justice Denied: Report of the Commission on Wartime Relocation and Internment of Civilians\n </i>\n (Washington, DC: Government Printing Office, 1982), 125.\n </span>\n </li>\n <li id=\"cite_note-ftnt_ref6-6\">\n <span class=\"mw-cite-backlink\">\n <a class=\"\" href=\"#cite_ref-ftnt_ref6_6-0\">\n ↑\n </a>\n </span>\n <span class=\"reference-text\">\n <i>\n Personal Justice Denied\n </i>\n , 221.\n </span>\n </li>\n <li id=\"cite_note-ftnt_ref7-7\">\n <span class=\"mw-cite-backlink\">\n <a class=\"\" href=\"#cite_ref-ftnt_ref7_7-0\">\n ↑\n </a>\n </span>\n <span class=\"reference-text\">\n See for instance,\n <i>\n Personal Justice Denied\n </i>\n , 222–24; Robinson,\n <i>\n By Order of the President\n </i>\n , 198–99.\n </span>\n </li>\n <li id=\"cite_note-ftnt_ref8-8\">\n <span class=\"mw-cite-backlink\">\n <a class=\"\" href=\"#cite_ref-ftnt_ref8_8-0\">\n ↑\n </a>\n </span>\n <span class=\"reference-text\">\n Allan R. Bosworth,\n <i>\n America's Concentration Camps\n </i>\n (New York: W. W. Norton, 1967), 247.\n </span>\n </li>\n </ol>\n </div>\n </div>\n <!-- \nNewPP limit report\nCached time: 20240418160701\nCache expiry: 86400\nDynamic content: false\nComplications: []\nCPU time usage: 0.023 seconds\nReal time usage: 0.102 seconds\nPreprocessor visited node count: 254/1000000\nPost‐expand include size: 1786/2097152 bytes\nTemplate argument size: 232/2097152 bytes\nHighest expansion depth: 6/40\nExpensive parser function count: 0/100\nUnstrip recursion depth: 0/20\nUnstrip post‐expand size: 3167/5000000 bytes\nExtLoops count: 0\n-->\n <!--\nTransclusion expansion time report (%,ms,calls,template)\n100.00% 18.092 1 -total\n 39.56% 7.158 1 Template:Databox-People\n 18.41% 3.330 1 Template:Reflist\n 7.85% 1.420 1 Template:AuthorByline\n 7.70% 1.393 1 Template:Published\n-->\n <!-- Saved in parser cache with key encycmw:pcache:idhash:172-0!canonical and timestamp 20240418160701 and revision id 35740\n -->\n </div>\n </div>\n</div>\n<div class=\"toplink\">\n <a href=\"#top\">\n <i class=\"icon-chevron-up\">\n </i>\n Top\n </a>\n</div>", "categories": [ "http://encyclopedia.densho.org/api/0.1/categories/People/?format=api" ], "sources": [ "http://encyclopedia.densho.org/api/0.1/sources/en-denshopd-i67-00081-1/?format=api", "http://encyclopedia.densho.org/api/0.1/sources/en-johndewitt-portrait-1/?format=api" ], "coordinates": {}, "authors": [ "http://encyclopedia.densho.org/api/0.1/authors/Brian%20Niiya/?format=api" ], "ddr_topic_terms": [ "https://ddr.densho.org/api/0.2/facet/topics/topics-188/objects/", "https://ddr.densho.org/api/0.2/facet/topics/topics-203/objects/", "https://ddr.densho.org/api/0.2/facet/topics/topics-425/objects/" ], "prev_page": "http://encyclopedia.densho.org/api/0.1/articles/John%20Collier/?format=api", "next_page": "http://encyclopedia.densho.org/api/0.1/articles/John%20E.%20Dahlquist/?format=api" }