WWII veteran of the 442nd wrote battle memoir

An Army veteran who wrote a memoir about how eight soldiers in his Japanese-American company survived while rescuing a battalion of Texans in World War II has died.

Edward Yamasaki, author of “And Then There Were Eight,” a story about Japanese-Americans rescuing 211 Texas soldiers surrounded by Germans, died April 27 in a hospital in Nagasaki, Japan, after suffering a stroke. He was 92.

Yamasaki had been living with a daughter in Japan.

Yamasaki, born in Honolulu on May 15, 1924, served as chapter president of the 442nd Regimental Combat Team Foundation and was book chairman for the memoirs about I Company.

He volunteered to join the Army during World War II after graduating from Punahou School. After the war he attended graduate school at Harvard University.

In his book, published in 2003, Yamasaki said he volunteered to join the Army to show his loyalty to his country, as did many of his fellow soldiers, including those whose Japanese-American families were confined in internment camps.

“There is … a common thread underlying the stories — an uncommon loyalty to country and to their comrades and families — which, after the war, turned into an uncommon bond of friendship and emotion to one another that survives the passage of time and the separation of distance,” he said.

Yamasaki recalled being overwhelmed with sadness as he carried out the bodies of at least 20 of his I Company comrades daily during the battle to rescue the Texas “Lost Battalion.”

Of the 141 soldiers in I Company, only eight survived.

The 442nd Regimental Combat Team suffered more than 800 combat casualties, according to the Department of Defense.

The department said the rescue of the Texas battalion, which involved hand-to-hand combat, “is recorded in U.S. military annals as one of the great ground battles of World War II.”

For his role in liberating France, Yamasaki received the Legion of Honor, that country’s highest decoration.

Yamasaki’s story was included in a 2012 manga/graphic novel “Journey of Heroes,” by Stacey Hayashi, who also is producing the feature film “Go for Broke,” about the 442nd Regimental Combat Team.

She said Yamasaki was instrumental in bringing the film to life.

A service was held by family and friends in Japan.

A service is pending in Honolulu. Before his death, Yamasaki requested to be interred at the National Memorial Cemetery of the Pacific at Punchbowl, friends said.