Kiyoshi Katsumoto was a seven-year-old child in Topaz when Mr. James Hatsuaki Wakasa was shot and killed by a Topaz guard while walking his dog near the camp fence. Mr. Wakasa was an elderly bachelor and known to be devoted to the dog. He could be seen walking with it most nights. One evening near the perimeter of the camp the dog evidently scampered away from him. Mr. Wakasa was shot by the guard in the watchtower while trying to retrieve his dog.
The guard who killed Mr. Wakasa claimed that he shouted out four warnings to Mr. Wakasa and shot him as he was trying to crawl out; however, the autopsy showed that he died of a bullet wound to the front of his chest and not to his back. The guard was court-martialed but found not guilty.
It was shortly after Mr. Wakasa was shot that incarcerees started to see the hinotama (fireball)—a luminous white ball 200-300 feet in the air in what appeared to be the general direction of where Mr. Wakasa had died. Small crowds would gather to watch this small ball of white light dance and bounce eerily across the desert for several minutes. It happened long ago, but Kiyoshi remembers it so clearly because it sent chills up his spine. The hinotama came out for several evenings after sunset; then it stopped.
Kiyoshi recalls people talking about several possible explanations for the phenomenon. Was it luminous gases arising from the dead body? But Mr. Wakasa had already had a funeral and been cremated.
Though many Topaz internees knew of Mr. Wakasa’s death, this strange appearance of the nightly fireball was not widely known. Kiyoshi and his Block 36 neighbors witnessed it because they lived on the corner of the camp near the barbed wire fence where Mr. Wakasa, who also lived in Block 36, had been shot. Some of the neighbors wondered if the fireball might have been a reflection of his tamashii (spirit).
Kiyoshi remembers being quite awed by this sight; it would forever be seared in his memory. As with many things in life, this phenomenon could not be fully explained. Could it have been the spirit of Mr. Wakasa’s lamenting and powerless cry of injustice?
It remains an unsolved mystery that lives on in Topaz lore.
About the contributor: Emiko Endo Katsumoto was born in Salt Lake City in 1944, and grew up in Oakland. She graduated from UC Berkeley in 1965 in Public Health Microbiology. She has been affiliated with Daruma no Gakko for many years and has been co-leading sing sessions at J-SEI. She and Kiyoshi live in El Cerrito and celebrated their 50th in 2018; they have two children and one granddaughter.
Kiyoshi Katsumoto was born in Decoto in 1936 and returned there after the War ended. After graduating from Washington High in 1953 he helped oversee his family’s farm, eventually enrolling in San Jose State University and receiving his PhD. in chemistry from UC Berkeley. He retired from Chevron in 1997. He led a memorable family pilgrimage to Topaz in 2018.
Copyright 2021, Emiko Katsumoto. All rights reserved.