Faith in the Desert

In 1944, Dr. Agnes Bartlett left Hanover to serve as a medical officer at the Poston Internment Camp in southwestern Arizona, one of the largest concentration camps for Japanese-Americans that was run by the United States during World War II. Bartlett was the granddaughter of Samuel Colcord Bartlett, eighth president of Dartmouth, and the daughter of missionaries to Japan. Her parents, Samuel Colcord Bartlett Jr. and Fanny G. Bartlett, were living there when Agnes was born in Kyoto on March 18, 1911. We have a small collection of papers that belonged to Dr. Bartlett, including manuscript stories, personal correspondence, and publications related to Poston as well as Manzanar, another of the internment camps where Bartlett volunteered to serve as a physician.

While preparing for a class on Asian American history earlier this year, one document in particular caught our eye: a bulletin from the Poston-1 Christian Church. The Poston Internment Camp was so large that it was subdivided into three separate camps, Poston-1, Poston-2, and Poston-3, which were known by the inhabitants as "Roastin'", "Toastin'" and "Dustin'." The bulletin for the first camp's church is for the Sunday night service on February 25th, 1945; its simple and matter-of-fact contents provide a vivid picture of a community of faith that is committed to its members and to its beliefs despite the suffering that it is currently experiencing. The last page contains a poem written by Dr. Toyohiko Kagawa titled, "The Burden". Kagawa was a Japanese Christian and pacifist was incarcerated in Japan at the time for his opposition to Japanese militarism.

Interestingly enough, on the same page, there is an excerpt from a letter written to the Poston community from a Private Minoru Ito who says that "Life really isn't as bad as I expected here at Ft. Douglas." Fort Douglas, Utah, was a critical processing center for Nisei soldiers, or second-generation Japanese Americans who were born in the US and had enlisted or were drafted to serve in the army.

To explore the rest of the many pamphlets, correspondence, and publications related to the War Relocation Authority, request Box 1 of the Agnes Bartlett papers (ML-43) online and then come to Rauner.