Stranger on the Home Front: A Story of Indian Immigrants and World War I
mutiny and was sometimes spelled Gadar The Immigration Act of 1917 banned most imm-igration from Asia to the United States It was informally called the Barred Zone Act During World War I Germans and particularly German soldiers were called the Huns in the United States and other Allied countries The kaiser was the emperor of Germany U-boats were German submarines Prussia was the largest state in Germany and included the capital Berlin The Berlin-India Committee was an organization of Indian revolutionaries working with the German government during World War I
LAHORE PUNJAB November 16 1915 MUTINY FAILS ORGANIZERS EXECUTED After being sentenced to death in September nineteen year old Kartar Singh Sarabha was hanged along with six others in the city of Lahore in November Sarabha had been arrested in Punjab India for trying to incite mutiny among Indian soldiers and convince them to turn their weapons against Britain Sarabha had recently returned to India from the United States along with numerous other revolutionaries The revolutionaries were acting on behalf of the Ghadar Party a group based in California It is thought that the gurdwara in Stockton California may have provided them with financial support
Chapter 1 Autumn 1916 Margaret Singh and her family were late as usual They came to Stockton from San Francisco every year for the festival and every year they got lost somewhere between the train station and the gurdwara Margaret’s stomach rumbled but there wouldn’t be any food till they got there Father stopped a couple of passersby to ask for directions Excuse me do you know where the Sikh temple is One of the strangers looked like he was going to say something impatient but then he caught sight of Margaret and Mother He looked at them curiously as if putting two and two together Father the clean shaven East Indian wearing a hat rather than a turban Mother the white woman
and Margaret their daughter Margaret had watched people go through this process a thousand times A man from India with a white wife was an unusual sight in California She held her breath No one here in Stockton knew them and one never knew how strangers would react You want the building where all the Hindus are meeting he asked Just keep going straight then take a left and another left They thanked him but as they resumed walking Margaret heard him say to his companion These Hindus don’t even know where their own meeting is Father’s face fell and he and Mother exchanged a knowing look The man had given them the right directions though and soon they arrived at the familiar wooden building with tall stairs on either side leading to a second-floor landing and a massive sign over the gable reading Sikh
