Wartime Disruption: Migration, Internment, and Upheaval, 1914–1945

Not every population movement in Canadian history was about immigration at all. Between 1914 and 1945, the two world wars and the Depression sandwiched between them disrupted, redirected, and in some cases forcibly relocated Canadian populations in ways that left a very real mark on the historical record.

International immigration to Canada slowed dramatically during both world wars, as transatlantic travel became dangerous and countries turned their attention and resources toward the war effort rather than settlement campaigns. The interwar years brought their own smaller-scale movement, as the hardship of the Great Depression pushed some Canadians across the border into the United States in search of work, while economic conditions elsewhere pushed some American and European families the other way, a reminder that the Canada–U.S. border stayed considerably more porous through this era than it is today.

The most severe disruption of this period, however, was not economic but deliberate government policy. Beginning in early 1942, following Japan's entry into the war, the Canadian government forcibly relocated more than 22,000 Japanese Canadians, over 90 percent of the entire Japanese Canadian population, the large majority of whom were Canadian-born citizens or long-settled British subjects, away from the British Columbia coast. Families were split up, property and businesses were seized and sold off, often at a fraction of their value, and people were sent to internment camps and work projects across the British Columbia interior, Alberta, and Manitoba. Restrictions on where Japanese Canadians could live remained in place until 1949, nearly four years after the war itself had ended. It wasn't until 1988 that the Canadian government formally apologized and offered compensation to survivors.

For anyone with Japanese Canadian ancestry, this period is almost impossible to avoid when researching, as a grandparent's business, home, or fishing boat seized in 1942 is a documented event, and Library and Archives Canada, along with several dedicated Japanese Canadian historical organizations, hold substantial records of internment camp assignments, property claims, and postwar resettlement.

This era is a useful reminder that migration research isn't only about following people who moved by choice. Sometimes the most important discovery is understanding exactly why a family's location, occupation, or circumstances changed abruptly, and who made that decision for them.