Tule Lake Segregation Center

Tule Lake, in the high desert of northeastern California, opened in 1942 and grew to hold more than 18,000 people - the largest of the ten War Relocation Authority camps.

In 1943 the government required every incarceree over seventeen to answer a loyalty questionnaire, including a question asking them to forswear allegiance to the Japanese emperor - which implied they had held it - and another asking whether they would serve in the armed forces of the country that had imprisoned them. Thousands answered no, qualified their answers, or refused. Tule Lake was designated the segregation centre for them and their families, and for people who asked to be repatriated to Japan.

It was run as a penal institution. A tank and additional troops were brought in after a strike in November 1943; the army imposed martial law for months; a stockade was built to hold men without charge or hearing. Under that pressure, and under a 1944 law written for the purpose, more than 5,000 American citizens at Tule Lake renounced their United States citizenship - renunciations that lawyers spent decades getting restored. The camp was the last to close, in March 1946.