Hiroshi ‘Hershey’ Miyamura was drafted into the US Army in January 1945, in the final months of the Second World War. The young Japanese-American eagerly joined the war effort – proving that he was just as patriotic as everyone else during a time when Americans with Japanese heritage were being placed in internment camps, and their loyalty was under question by US government policy.
During the war Miyamura would briefly serve with the 442nd Infantry Regiment, a Japanese-American unit, in which he received training as a machine gunner before returning to the United States due to ill health. He was later discharged after Japan surrendered, leaving him to enlist in the US Army Reserve. Miyamura, when asked why he joined the Reserve, replied: “I thought that with my training that I would be ready to serve again if my country
