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Port of Humanity Tsuruga Museum

Port of HumanityChiune SugiharaPolish orphansTsurugarefugees

Fukui · Tsuruga

35.6660°N, 136.0664°E

Tsuruga was the Japanese end of a shipping route from Vladivostok, and twice in the twentieth century that made it a place where refugees came ashore. In 1920 and 1922 several hundred Polish orphans, stranded in Siberia, were brought through here on their way to Poland. In 1940 and 1941 Jewish refugees carrying transit visas issued in Lithuania by the Japanese consul Chiune Sugihara — issued against his instructions — arrived at this quay.

The museum reconstructs the port buildings of the period and tells both stories through the documents, the visas and the recollections of Tsuruga residents, who by several accounts fed and bathed people arriving with nothing. It is a small museum about a very specific thing: what a town did when people turned up. It costs ¥500 and is next to the red brick warehouses on the waterfront.

Essential Information

Opening Hours

9:00 AM – 5:00 PM | Last entry 4:30 PM

Closed: Closed Wednesdays, or the following day when the Wednesday is a holiday | New Year

Entrance Fee

¥500 general | ¥300 elementary school age and under | Free for children under 4 | Group rates for 20 or more

Best Season

Year-round | Indoor museum

Visit Duration

60 minutes | 2 hours with the red brick warehouses

Getting There

Access Information

23-1 Kanegasaki-cho, Tsuruga. About 11 minutes by the Gurutto Tsuruga loop bus from JR Tsuruga Station, or 9 minutes by taxi. Open 9:00 AM – 5:00 PM with last entry at 4:30 PM. Closed Wednesdays, or the following day when the Wednesday is a holiday, and over the New Year. Admission ¥500 general and ¥300 for elementary school age and under; free for children under 4 and for visitors with a disability certificate plus one companion. Group rates for 20 or more.

Insider Guide

Premium

**Two separate stories, twenty years apart.** The Polish orphans of 1920–22 and the Sugihara visa holders of 1940–41. The museum treats them together because the same quay and in part the same townspeople were involved. **Look at the visas.** Sugihara issued transit documents in Kaunas in defiance of his ministry, and reproductions are displayed here. The scale of what a signature meant is the exhibit. **Closed Wednesdays.** With a holiday shift. Tsuruga's other waterfront attractions are open, so a Wednesday is not a wasted trip to the area. **It is next to the brick warehouses.** The 1905 Tsuruga Red Brick Warehouse, now a diorama museum and restaurants, is a couple of minutes away and makes a natural pairing on the waterfront. **Allow an hour and expect it to be sober.** This is a small museum about displaced people. It is not long, and it is not light.

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