By Shey Dimon
My grandfather Tom (Tomo) was a larrikin; the self confessed black sheep of the family. He liked to ‘stir the pot’ and his deep belly laugh would erupt whenever he sensed some kind of family controversy. (Photo: Tomo Omaye)
I called him Pop. He was strong-willed, bullish, hard-working, but also very charismatic and well liked. The bullish trait he seemed to have inherited from his Australian mother Annie rather than his Japanese father Shojiro, who Pop said was a polite, softly spoken man.
Just for fun, my Pop left his fiancee Mary, my Nan, waiting for him to arrive on their wedding day at St Andrew’s Cathedral in Sydney ‘FOR A LONG TIME’, she says. She wanted to throttle him. He just laughed. (Photo: Nan and Pop’s wedding)
Pop and I had three things in common: our interest in our family history, travelling, and blackberry as our favourite flavour of jam!
During my university days, I would regularly visit my grandparents’ modest, family home near Parramatta where my mother and her siblings grew up. We’d chat at the kitchen table sitting on retro, purple swivel chairs while my Nan fussed around.
Pop was very good at telling me the facts. What I desperately wanted to know though were the soft stories – stories of moments, conversations, people. Sometimes I would get a glimpse of this, but rarely.
Before he died, he left me with what I view as the most precious of gifts. His old photos, birth and death certificates, contracts, newspaper clippings, and much more from his years and years of research on our family tree.
So here I am, trying to piece together a Japanese-Australian family history starting in Hikata, Wakayama, Japan in 1880, moving to Australia and going full circle right back to where we began, with me, four generations on, an Australian with Japanese ancestry moving to Japan in just a few months.
To Pop,
I wish I could tell you, about all the generous people helping me. I wish I could tell you, I now understand how hard it was for you and your family in Australia during WWII and post-war. I wish I had that insight before you died. There is so much I want to ask you.
I know this is why you left all your research to me. You knew I would continue to explore our history and treat all this knowledge with care. So here I go, trying to tell your story as best as I can.
I hope you like it Pop.
Shey
Shojiro Omaye, Pop’s father – from sugar plantations to laundries
Shojiro Omaye was born in Kainan, Wakayama in 1880. When he was 22 years old, he boarded the Kumano Maru at Yokohama with 76 other Japanese workers bound for Townsville, Australia. He was contracted to the Drysdale Brothers to work on the Pioneer Plantation sugar cane field for four years.
I read that the conditions for the Japanese on the cane fields were quite good. However, this does not explain why my great-grandfather Shojiro absconded from the plantation only a few months in, along with someone called Josaburo.
There was a warrant for their arrests and Shojiro was either fined 3 pounds and 4 shillings or three months imprisonment, I don’t know which punishment he chose, or if he had a choice. However, I do know for comparison, he earned 27 shillings per month on the cane fields.
Maybe Shojiro was quite bullish in his younger days!
I know nothing about Shojiro from 1902 until 1914, where I finally found a record of him working in a laundry on Stanley Street in Brisbane. Maybe this is where he learned everything to do with laundries as he ended up owning two in Sydney by the 1930s, one in Parramatta and one in Homebush.
At some stage he met my great-grandmother, Annie. She was a school teacher and he was apparently the gardener at the school. Shojiro’s father Seyomon was also a gardener as listed on their marriage certificate.
Shojiro and Annie were married in 1918 and they had five children – Aya, Yuki, Kazu, Tomo, and Kiyo. I love that each child was given a Japanese first name, although this would prove difficult for them later on. My grandfather Tomo is the grumpy looking boy at the front of this picture.
I asked Pop many times to tell me about his father Shojiro. He told me his father was a gentleman. He always tipped his hat to the ladies. He worked hard and liked to gamble on the weekends.
Sometimes he cooked Japanese food and Pop said he learnt to wash and cook rice from him. He made a fusion fried rice which became a family tradition and included tinned tuna.
Shojiro didn’t drive. He had tried a few times but after some mishaps he gave it up. His wife Annie drove instead. She even drove an ambulance during the war and in her later years chauffeured a wealthy man across the Nullabor, only to have him die of a heart attack half way. She kept driving with him dead in the car until she reached the next town.
Shojiro returned to Japan only once (that I know of) in 1919 for just a few days. I wonder if he went to visit his mother as his father had already passed away.
My Pop, Tomo, at age 12, decided to get a job instead of changing schools when his family was moving house (typical Tom, he just always did what he wanted). Soon he was a ‘Page Boy’ at the Hoyts Century Theatre on George Street in Sydney. This led to a passionate life-long cinema pioneer career with Hoyts.
Pop was very tech savvy considering his lack of formal education. I’m sure he was one of the first people to have a personal video camera back in the day. He even made sure in his later years he had all his reels and cassettes put on DVD so they could live on.
War and internment
Then Pearl Harbor was attacked on 7 December 1941. John Curtin, the prime minister at the time declared war with Japan the next day and almost all Japanese were rounded up.
Shojiro was taken by police this very day. He was aged 61 and he had lived in Australia for 39 years. Family members told me the police pulled apart photo frames and even ripped the wallpaper off the walls that day, and this broke Shojiro’s heart.
His only property listed on the report were a pocket watch (which I have half the chain as an heirloom), 10 shillings, and a razor. I wonder if he knew what was coming, because he had all his property – including his two laundry businesses – transferred into his wife Annie’s name.
Shojiro’s eldest daughter Aya was also interned at age 24, but not until May 1942. Aya worked as a typist for a Japanese company. The final national security report about her declared she posed no danger despite her ‘very Japanese appearance’. Apparently she stated under interrogation, ‘I was born in Australia, unfortunately, but consider myself Japanese’. The report said she denied making this statement, but it did say she declared the officer was brusque with her and made her angry.
Shojiro was initially transferred to the Hay internment camp, until he was informed that his daughter Aya was being interned too. Then he requested to move to Tatura camp to be with her. His wish was granted. His wife Annie continued to run both laundries in his absence and continued to advocate for his and her daughter’s release.
On 15 May 1942, Shojiro was brought before the Aliens Tribunal. He was asked, can you understand English? He said no. I don’t know why he said no, as Pop told me he only spoke English at home.
Shojiro spoke through a translator. They asked if he felt he had been wrongly interned and should be released. He said no. They asked if he understood this was his last chance of leaving before the end of the war. He said, ‘yes I have quite made up my mind, so I am quite prepared to stay here until the war ends.’ He then agreed to have the application for appeal withdrawn.
Aya was however released early, and Shojiro was taken back to the Hay internment camp.
I read in Nikkei Australia founding member Dr Yuriko Nagata’s book, Unwanted Aliens, that over half the Japanese who had appealed to be released withdrew the applications for fear of public reaction.
Shojiro became very ill in the camp and was transferred a few times to hospital. He was released in June 1943 due to his illness. By now Shojiro was 63 and he died from tuberculosis and myocarditis just seven months later at home with his family in Sydney.
Pop gave me a wooden box that belonged to his father Shojiro. He said Shojiro’s friend made it for him in the internment camp at Hay.
My grandfather Tomo (he referred to himself as Tom from around this time) at age 18, enlisted in the Australian Army just two weeks prior to his father’s death. His older brother Kazu had already been in the Army for a year.
My Pop
Pop said he had tried to enlist once in the Air Force but was rejected. He then enlisted in the Army. I asked Pop how he was treated by his comrades as someone of Japanese descent. He said he told them he was Maori and that was acceptable.
The Australian Army however, was very aware of my grandfather’s heritage. Security reports detailed his father and sister’s internment and concluded the family posed no risk. They also noted that he was ‘typically Japanese in appearance’, and thus shouldn’t be given ‘duty of a secret nature’, lest he fall into the hands of the enemy.
Pop was determined to be sent on active duty. Knowing he wasn’t allowed to go north because his father was Japanese, he wrote a letter to the relevant minister, pleading his case. ‘My mother is a British subject (Australian born) like the rest of the family, all of which are loyal to Australia,’ he wrote. ‘I feel it is my duty to do my bit for King and Country so I hope you can rectify my problem.’
The letter must have worked, for Pop was sent on active duty to what is now Papua New Guinea, as part of the army’s cinema unit. He was given a projectionist set to entertain troops. At one point he severed his finger in a projection reel and required surgery. It didn’t stop his love for cinema, though!
During his time in the army, Pop was tasked with marching the Japanese back to Hay after the Cowra breakout. I can’t imagine how difficult this would have been for him. Or perhaps he had decided to detach himself from his Japanese identity?
Pop said joining the army was the best thing he ever did. He had so much pride marching on ANZAC Day. He had a strong connection to Australia despite his Japanese roots and identified with being Australian.
I still remember as small children, my brothers and I crowding around the TV waiting to see Pop march down George Street behind the Cinema Unit flag with its large projection screen on it.
I clearly remember each year less and less of Pop’s friends marching with him until one year it was only him. After that, he said he couldn’t walk that far. He had emphysema and got puffed too easily. I told him to ride in the car behind the flag. He said, ‘never’!
Pop and his brother Kaz both returned from the war. However, Kaz died young at only 50 years old from an aneurysm. My mum described Kaz as a wonderful uncle, always happy with a beaming smile.
Pop spent many years travelling all over the world, including Japan. In 1982 he went to Japan to visit a family friend Shiu Nishimura and his wife Harume or Mrs Nish (as mum called her). Shiu lived ‘out the back’ of Pop’s family home in Burwood in a small cottage. My mum said Shiu would teach her Japanese writing when she visited and Mrs Nish always cooked Japanese food.
Shiu’s father Yozo was a pearl diver on Thursday Island. Although he was born in Cairns, Shiu spent most of his childhood in Japan, as his mother would fly in to see her husband with their growing brood of children, and return to Japan again to raise the children. Shiu did return to Australia as an adult to start a laundry business with his brother Takeshi, but ended up in internment too. After Shojiro died, Shiu lived with his wife in Burwood with Annie. Then they returned to Japan in their retirement years.
My Pop, Tom/Tomo Omaye died in 2018, aged 93 years old. My Nan Mary followed him shortly after. Pop was ready to go, his years of struggling with emphysema exhausted him. This gave us all time to say our proper goodbyes, but even with the option of proper goodbyes, it still didn’t prepare me for everything I wished I could ask him. Especially now after my newfound knowledge and understanding of the difficulties he must have faced in his life.
All photos supplied by author.
This story was updated on 8 March 2023 by the author and includes additional details, facts, and comments.
Read the next chapter of this story, as Shey finally meets her family in Japan.
This a wonderful family story that is familiar to those of us with Japanese heritage that predates WW2. Interment, running laundries, army service and fusion food.
I Loved this Story, can relate to all this experience, Grandparents migration to Australia in the 1880.
This was so wonderful reading about our family history. You have done so well Shey
Thanks Shey, I love you voice in this piece and feel like I know your family and Tomo because of it. Such an interesting emigration story and unlike so many others that arrived from the commonwealth.
Great story! I came across Aya (Nancy) Omaye in my research at the NAA and she intrigued me.
Really well written Shey. Great piece of your family history to be proud of and to share with following generations. We take so much granted nowadays. These stories remind us of who we are and the respect we owe to those gone before us.
Hi Shey. That was such interesting reading. I learnt so much about my grandfather. ( I am Yuki’s sixth daughter, Barbara )
Your grandfather was a real character and used to keep our family informed of what was going on with everything. Thanks for a great story
Hi Barbara,
Thank you for reading the story and commenting. I’m glad you learnt some things about the family. I now live in Japan and plan to continue researching the family and learning everything I can. I will update when I learn something new.
Many thanks,
Shey
Dear Shey,
I just read your family story now. Thank you so much for sharing it. I knew your family name when I did my research, but was not able to obtain enough information to include in my book, Unwanted Aliens. I didn’t know one of Shojiro’s daughters was taken into custody too!! Thank you once again. Yuriko
Great to read this story Shey..There are so many parallels to my family history. My grandfather was from Wakayama and came Australia around the same time. He ended up in Sydney and married my nana around 1920 where they had laundry shops and five children. My uncle also enlisted and went to Papua during WW2. My mum and some of her siblings were also married at St Andrews.
Dear Peter, interesting story. What was the Japanese family name. There are probably some records at the archives about him. Was he interned>
Regards
Andrew Hasegawa
Hi Andrew, our family name is Nakata. My grandfather Sanzo died just before Japan’s involvement in WW2. My grandmother who had English and Irish parents had to re apply as a British subject because she was considered to have taken on the nationality of her husband. This possibly avoided my mother and siblings from being interned.
Peter
very interesting, many Australian women married to Japanese reapplied for citizenship, as a rule they were not interned though there is one or maybe a couple of cases where they chose to be with their husbands while they were interned. Does anyone still carry the family name?
Thank you so much for writing this Shey. I will read this to Georgia and Teddy when they are older so they can know the generations before them. I loved reading about the family, alot of the personality traits I can see in Hunter and I can see the family resemblance in the photos! People always ask where my last name is from and it’s lovely to know more about how the Omayes came to be in Australia!
Hi Lucy,
It’s great to get in touch with you. I keep learning more and more all the time. I will keep you and Hunter updated on anything else I find out about the family history.
Shey
As a child, I remember visiting the Omaye household in Burwood NSW. Mrs Omaye was a member of the Ladies Guild at St Paul’s Church that we also attended. My brother and I played with Eleanor, Mrs Omaye’s grand daughter. The Nishimura’s lived at the rear of the house. Shu Nishimura spoke English with no accent and Mrs Nish. Spoke mainly in Japanese. Her norimaki sushi was delicious.
Additional comment: I believe the Mrs. Omaye that I knew was Mrs Annie Omaye and our playmate Eleanor was Aya’s daughter. Sometimes my brother and I also played with Kiyo’s two sons, although the eldest was a few years older than us. Our family lived in Melbourne, so our visits to Sydney were sporadic. This took place in the 1960’s.
Shiu Nishimura was an Australian nissei who was a friend of my father Kiyoshi Suzuki, also a nissei. Shiu and Kiyoshi were both internees. Shiu travelled back to Japan to bring his wife to Australia after their son married and moved to Tokyo. They lived in Burwood NSW until he retired and then returned to Japan to live in Kushimoto, Wakayama-ken.
Thank you for posting the Omaye Family History. It answered some questions that were never asked.
Hi Mari,
Thank you so much for commenting on my story! It’s amazing to think you spent time with our family. I will ask Douglas, Kiyo’s son if he remembers you.
I did find out Shiu was born in Australia on Thursday Island as his father was a pearl diver so he did in fact speak English perfectly.
I appreciate your comments. Thanks so very much.
Shey
Hi Mari,
Do you know at all how Shiu met our family and ended up living at my great grandmother’s? I assumed they may have been interned together or possibly met because of laundry connections.
Thanks,
Shey
Aya’s daughter was Helena, now married and living in America with 3 children. Unfortunately I don’t recall playing with Mari. Shiu and Mrs Nish lived in an enclosed verandah, although their kitchen was in the house in a back room. I recall Mrs Nish using a ripple board for her washing.
Thanks Douglas for commenting! I look forward to finding out more and sharing with you and the rest of the family.
Shey
Can I have a copy of this please
I lived next door to Tommy and Mary for 18years
1956-1974. Best friends with Carol Omaye.
They were like second Parents to me, I loved them
Shey I have been to Wakayama the Omaayes or Omi were Buddhist originally Kanin is a little fishing village. My sone Brendan is married to a Japanese girl Satoko and she may be able to get some more information about the family’s origins there as they live not far in Kyoto. You can Skype brendan@smilejv.com.
Shey I have been to Wakayama the Omaayes or Omi were Buddhist originally Kanin is a little fishing village. My sone Brendan is married to a Japanese girl Satoko and she may be able to get some more information about the family’s origins there as they live not far in Kyoto. You can Skype brendan@smilejv.com.
Shey
Can I have a copy of this please
I lived next door to Tommy and Mary for 18years
1956-1974. Best friends with Carol Omaye.
They were like second Parents to me, I loved them
Hi Rhonda,
My mum said she called you Rhondy and you spent your whole childhood together. How wonderful to reconnect.
Sure you can have a copy of the story, I also wrote an updated version for this website http://www.discovernikkei.org/en/journal/2021/9/29/interned-and-enlisted/ This one is a little more accurate as I learnt some new information from the archives after writing this one.
Thank you for offering to connect me with Brendan and Satoko, I will follow up with them.
Many thanks for reading my story and reaching out.
Shey
Hi Shey,
Thank you for putting this up. This is my family too.
My Nan was Yuki Omaye and my dad would tell me stories of his Nans house is Burwood.
The family called Yuki, Billie as far as my dad told me it was because she didn’t want to use the Japanese name.
She married a man from Norway with the last name Rohrt. We are still quite Japanese looking, we call the grandpas in our family “Pop” too and there are quite a few in the family that have read up on our family history.
My Dad was an extremely hard worker, quiet, with a huge belly laugh. He died from smoking, as did his mother Yuki.
They lived around the Nowra, Hussikson area and Yuki had a good life there with her husband John (Jack) Rohrt.
They had 11 children between 1942 and 1960. My dad being born in 1945.
Was really lovely to read your article. Thanks for the information.
Hi Emma,
Thank you so very much for reading this story and leaving me a note.
My mum has fond memories of playing at Yuki’s farm at the south coast as a child. My mother was even bitten by a red belly black snake playing hide and seek and she remembers Yuki sucking the venom and spitting and tying up her leg. Must have helped as she obviously survived!
I knew never she also went by Billie and I had John Rohrt written down as her husband but wasn’t sure of his heritage. Great to know! It would be great to keep in touch as I will continue researching and would love to let all the family know if I find out anything more.
I am now located in Tokyo! So hopefully this helps!
Thanks again,
Shey
Shey , did Carol tell you both of us worked at the Plaza theatre in George St in the Refreshment bar for a few years. It was great times
I thought Carol was bitten by a brown snake in Kalgoorlie W.A
Shey I just found a message I sent Tommy in 2003 when I was in Japan.
Omaye is not the Japanese name version .
It is either Omae or Omi .
There may have been a brother Shonzaburo.
At the time I believed it may have been royal descent if it was true.
You have to go to Wakayama castle or Wakayama Prefecture Office as I did send Satako there and there was no Omayes.
Also Shojiro came in 1902
His father’s name was Seyomon and Mother’s name was Ume Tamoki
Look for her- marriages should be registered there at Wakayama Prefecture Office
These are Tommy’s notes
Would like to connect with Peter Eccleston who is related to me. My Grandfather is Jirokichi Nakata younger brother of Sanzo Nakata.
Dear Shey,
I was given the greatest gift of spending many years with your Pop and Nan at Telopia.
I arrived one day with their son Tim and they took me under their wings and transformed me from a nervous wreck into a much more carefree girl who could travel the globe with an inner confidence I could never have possessed without the endless love and advice they both shared with me.
Their devotion to each other was beautiful and I cried reading that Mary and Tommy passed over into their next adventure quite close together. Mary would have been lost without her Tommy and I’m positive they are still very much together as they always were. Side by side.
I hope each and every member of their family are all happy, healthy and achieving everything they put their hearts into.
Please pass on my love and eternal gratitude to them all for allowing me to share the many years of love, warmth and laughs with them.
Much love Jo x
(Jo-Anne Behrens)
Thanks Jo,
It’s lovely to hear from you and hear that Pop and Nan had a positive influence in your life.
I am loving life here in Japan now and only wish my grandparents could visit and we could trace some family history together. I know Pop would have loved that. But I will try my best without him.
Many thanks!
Shey
Hi Shey
You have done some great research on Shojiro and I know Tom would be so proud of your work. I am Yuki’s eldest child Dawn and lived with your grandparents for some time around 1960 so I knew your grandparents very well. I assume you are Rhonda’s daughter. Tom and Mary used to pick you and Beau up after school and loved having that time with you both. Aya once told me that Shojiro actually came to Australia twice. Under the White Australia Policy he was sent back to Japan. However the Japanese government objected to their nationals being treated that way and so he was allowed to come a second time.
Best wishes with your research.
Dawn May
Hi Dawn,
Thanks so much for your message and the info. Maybe this explains why Shojiro left Australia and almost immediately returned again, but it only shows up in some records and not all. I am actually Carol’s daughter, not Rhonda’s. Rhonda has a daughter Beaux and a son Guy who now lives in the UK. I remember my mum talking about you and she has a photo from Pop of the family generations including your mum Yuki and you as a little girl with Annie and her mum also! I will ask mum to find it for me and I will share with you.
Thanks again!
Shey
Thanks Shey for your email. I think I might have those photos that you mention. Do you have any siblings?
Best wishes
Dawn
Hi Dawn,
Yes I have two older brothers, Brett and Todd.
You probably do have that photo.
Thanks again,
Shey