burma railway prisoners of war list

IWM collections, This media is not currently available. Prisoners were made to work around the clock, with individual shifts lasting as long as 18 hours. Used with permission of the author, Lilian Sluyter. Burma Railway, also called Burma-Siam Railway, railway built during World War II connecting Bangkok and Moulmein (now Mawlamyine ), Burma ( Myanmar ). Dancing Along the Deadline : The Andersonville Memoir of a Prisoner of the Confederacy. Two forces, one based in Thailand and one in Burma, worked from opposite ends' of the line towards the centre.When the first of the prisoners arrived their initial task was the construction of camps at Kanchanaburi and Ban Pong in Thailand and Thanbyuzayat in Burma. On 26 October 1942, British prisoners of war arrived at Tamarkan to construct the bridge. [39] More prisoners of war were imported from Singapore and the Dutch East Indies as construction advanced. The Burma Railway, also known as the Death Railway, the Siam-Burma Railway, the Thai-Burma Railway and similar names, was a railway between Ban Pong, Thailand, and Thanbyuzayat, Burma, built by the Empire of Japan in 1943 to support its forces in the Burma campaign of World War II. [59], Several museums are dedicated to those who perished building the railway. Conditions were significantly worse than at Changi, with forced hard labour and severely inadequate supplies of food and medicines. The decision to complete the railway connecting Moulmein with Bangkok, which had been commenced before the war but abandoned by the two countries concerned, was taken in June 1942. This is a list of notable prisoners of war (POW) whose imprisonment attracted notable attention or influence, or who became famous afterwards. [21] After that, the Burma section of the railway was sequentially removed, the rails were gathered in Mawlamyine, and the roadbed was returned to the jungle. From late 1942 more than 13 000 Australians were sent from Singapore, Java and Timor to work on the ThaiBurma railway. His account of the conditions and suffering endured by his fellow prisoners and himself makes for the most extraordinary and disturbing reading. Except for the worst months of the construction period, known as the "Speedo" (mid-spring to mid-October 1943),[51][52] one of the ways the Allied POWs kept their spirits up was to ask one of the musicians in their midst to play his guitar or accordion, or lead them in a group sing-along, or request their camp comedians to tell some jokes or put on a skit. Kanchanaburi War Cemetery, in the city of Kanchanaburi, contains the graves of 6,982 personnel comprising: A memorial at the Kanchanaburi cemetery lists 11 other members of the Indian Army, who are buried in nearby Muslim cemeteries.[94]. He was one of Dunlop's 1,000 the men under commanding . Thus, ferries were needed as an alternative connecting system. On 24 June 1949, the portion from Kanchanaburi to Nong Pla Duk (Thai ) was finished; on the first of April 1952, the next section up to Wang Pho (Wangpo) was done. In 1939 the age limits for enlistment in the AIF were 19 to 35 years of age (higher for officers and some NCOs). The largest of these is at Hellfire Pass (north of the current terminus at Nam Tok), a cutting where the greatest number of people died. Two hundred men were housed in each barracks, giving each man a two-foot wide space in which to live and sleep. Elsewhere in the Pacific some 10 000 British, Canadian and Indian troops were captured when Hong Kong fell in December 1941 and further 5000 in the Netherlands East Indies (now Indonesia) in early 1942. The graves of those who died during the construction and maintenance of the Burma-Siam railway (except Americans, who were repatriated) have been transferred from the camp burial grounds and solitary sites along the railway into three war cemeteries. The Japanese would not allow the prisoners to construct a symbol (a white triangle on a blue base) indicating the presence of a prisoner of war camp, and these raids added their quota to the deaths on the line. From British mathematician Arthur Thomas Doodson's Tide-prediction machine, and PLUTO (short for 'pipeline under the ocean' - supplied petrol from Britain to Europe), to the German's 'Rommel's Asparagus', discover 7 clever innovations used on D-Day. Memorial sites along the route of the railway include the Kanchanaburi War Cemetery, where nearly 7,000 Allied dead are interred, and . After the Japanese were defeated in the Battles of the Coral Sea (May 48, 1942) and Midway (June 36, 1942), the sea-lanes between the Japanese home islands and Burma were no longer secure. Since the 1990s various proposals have been made to rebuild the complete railway, but as of 2021[update] these plans had not been realised. Our editors will review what youve submitted and determine whether to revise the article. They were some of 42 000 Dutch military and naval personnel and 100 000 Dutch civilians who were captured when the Japanese conquered the Netherlands East Indies in early 1942. The total length of miles, the total number of bridges over 600, including six to eight long-span bridges the total number of people who were involved (one-quarter of a million), the very short time in which they managed to accomplish it, and the extreme conditions they accomplished it under. Some 30 000 of these prisoners of war later worked on the Thai-Burma railway. Notebook kept by Captain Harold Lord, regular officer in the Royal Army Service Corps (RASC), whilst a Japanese prisoner of war working on the Burma-Thailand railway in 1943, listing neatly and chronologically the names of the British prisoners of war who worked on the railway, May - December 1943, together with the following information about each: rank, serial number, regiment, date of birth, home address, next-of-kin, religion, date on which arrived at the camp, and date of leaving because of illness (the type of illness is stated in each case) or, as in many cases, death. In the years that followed the military units to which the Australians belonged were broken up into work forces to meet the Japanese need for labour. A large number of the British and Australian captives were sent to Burma (Myanmar). Gradually more forces were sent to Burma and Thailand; in total more than 60,000 prisoners of war were transported to the railway project during 1942-3. In addition, approximately 130,000 civiliansincluding some 40,000 childrenwere captured by the Japanese. All nationalities listed by camp and/or party. ARTICLE 29. Vegetables and other perishables long in transit arrived rotten. ARTICLE 30. Since the upper part of the Khwae valley is now flooded by the Vajiralongkorn Dam,[19] and the surrounding terrain is mountainous, it would take extensive tunnelling to reconnect Thailand with Burma by rail. [9] Much of the construction materials, including tracks and sleepers, were brought from dismantled branches of Malaya's Federated Malay States Railway network and the East Indies' various rail networks. Spoorweg Mij", "----198111", "Historical Fact on the Burma Death Railroad Thailand Hellfire pass Prisoners conditions", "Hellfire Pass Interpretive Centre and Memorial Walking Trail", "Stories of Death Railway heroes to be kept alive", "Cast into oblivion: Malayan Tamils of the Death Railway", "The forgotten Malayan labourers of Burma Railway during WWII", "Notes on the Thai-Burma Railway. Presidio Pr; ISBN: 0891415777. [64] Hiroshi Abe, a first lieutenant who supervised construction of the railway at Sonkrai where 600 British prisoners out of 1,600 died of cholera and other diseases,[65] was sentenced to death, later commuted to life in prison, as a B/C class war criminal. These were men from the 7th Division who had been brought back from the Middle East to help defend the Netherlands East Indies (now Indonesia) from the Japanese attack in early 1942. More than 12,000 Allied prisoners of war (POWs) and tens of thousands of forced labourers perished during its construction. WAR Graves - Burma - Siam Railway On 6th December 1948 an expedition consisting of an officer, one Siamese interpreter, two police guards, one cook and one general duties coolie, left Kanburi for Takanun by motor boat. Contact our Media sales & Licensing team about access. 493.8 Records of the Peiping headquarters Group 1946-47 493.1 Administrative History Related Records: Records of U.S. Army Service Forces (World War II), RG 160. The name Changi is synonymous with the suffering of Australian prisoners of the Japanese during the Second World War. In 1941 these were adjusted to 19 and 40 years. In his book Last Man Out, H. Robert Charles, an American Marine survivor of the sinking of the USS Houston, writes in depth about a Dutch doctor, Henri Hekking, a fellow POW who probably saved the lives of many who worked on the railway. [3][4] Thailand was forced to accept an alliance,[5] and was used as a staging point for the attack on Singapore. Work began at both ends of the rail line in June 1942. When that failed to attract sufficient workers, they resorted to more coercive methods, rounding up workers and impressing them, especially in Malaya. Burma Railway, also called Burma-Siam Railway, railway built during World War II connecting Bangkok and Moulmein (now Mawlamyine), Burma (Myanmar). [45], The prisoners of war "found themselves at the bottom of a social system that was harsh, punitive, fanatical, and often deadly. Its route was through Three Pagodas Pass on the border of Thailand and Burma. Red Cross parcels helped, but these were invariably held up by the Japanese. Brought up by barge on the Kwai Noi river, or by lorry on a road which was merely a converted jungle track, a consistent service could not be maintained by either method, and rations were nearly always below even the Japanese official scales. They were outnumbered by the British, the Dutch and large cohorts of Asian labourers (rmusha), particularly Burmese and Tamils from Malaya. From the inmates of Colditz to the men who took part in the 'Great Escape . An estimated 80,000 to 100,000 civilians also . The map shows the significance of the building of the Thai-Burma railway by the Australian prisoners of war to Australia because it shows where the POWs were located whilst being prisoners. (Supplied: Andrew Glynn) Families find long-lost answers When you got back to your sleeping platform you only had a tin of water to wash your feet. Download Ground News for free here: https://ground.news/megaprojectsSimo. Burma-Siam Railway 1942-1945, Second World War. When Britainwent to waron 3 September 1939 there was none of the 'flag-waving patriotism' of August 1914. When Britainwent to waron 3 September 1939 there was none of the 'flag-waving patriotism' of August 1914. This was the same time at which Australians in A Force left Changi for Burma. Alternatively, search more than 1 million objects from This is ironic, since for most of the war in the Pacific Changi was, in reality, one of the most benign of the Japanese prisoner-of-war camps; its privations were relatively minor compared to those of others, particularly those on the Burma-Thailand railway. The Death Railway is only one of the names describing the Japanese project built in 1943 to provide support to its forces during World War II. https://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Burma_Railway&oldid=1133973618, Iron bridge across Kwae Yai River at Tha Makham, Arch Flanagan (19152013), Australian soldier and father of novelist, This page was last edited on 16 January 2023, at 11:22. At both camp and base hospitals, for the greater part of the time, the doctors had only such drugs and equipment as they had been able to carry with them. Stolen banknotes and jewelry along with Holocaust victims' dental gold, wedding rings, and even scrap gold melted down from spectacles-frames flooded into the Max Heiliger accounts, completely filling several bank vaults by 1942. One factor was that many European and US doctors had little experience with tropical diseases. A lower death rate among Dutch POWs and internees, relative to those from the UK and Australia, has been linked to the fact that many personnel and civilians taken prisoner in the Dutch East Indies had been born there, were long-term residents and/or had Eurasian ancestry; they tended thus to be more resistant to tropical diseases and to be better acclimatized than other Western Allied personnel. On 16 January 1946, the British ordered Japanese POWs to remove a four kilometre stretch of rail between Nikki (Ni Thea) and Sonkrai. Organization of the Labor. Thailand - Burma Railway. [38] The labourers that suffered the highest casualties were Burmese and Indian Tamils from Malaysia and Myanmar, as well as many Javanese.[30]. If you are joining after August, please choose the month you are joining in below. Under Australian legislation prior to 1943 conscripts could be used only for the defence of Australian territories. Please refer to the appropriate style manual or other sources if you have any questions. [62], Workers in more isolated areas suffered a much higher death rate than did others. The first contingent of British to work on the ThaiBurma railway was sent to Burma (now Myanmar) from Sumatra in May 1942, as part of the 500-strong Medan Force. Thanbyuzayat War Cemetery, at Thanbyuzayat, 65 kilometres south of Moulmein, Myanmar (Burma) has the graves of 3,617 POWs who died on the Burmese portion of the line. The greater part of the Thai section of the river's route followed the valley of the Khwae Noi River (khwae, 'stream, river' or 'tributary'; noi, 'small'. The 'Death Railway' was very well named. While every effort has been made to follow citation style rules, there may be some discrepancies. Donate to COFEPOW instantly - simply click on the button below. During World War II, the Japanese forced more than 60,000 allied prisoners of war and nearly 300,000 Southeast Asian laborers to build a 415km railway across the mountains and jungles between Thailand and Myanmar (then Burma). Highlights. Jayma April 17, 2022. Part II: Asian Romusha: The Silenced Voices of History", "Distances between camps on the Burma-Thailand Railway", "Last Man Out: A Memoir of the Burma-Thailand Death Railway", "Stolen Years: Australian prisoners of war The BurmaThailand Railway", "The Thailand-Burma Railway, 19421946: documents and selected writings", "Tamarkan, Tha Makham 56.20km - Thailand", "Forgotten Sikhs of the Siam -Burma Death Railway", "The lies that built The Bridge on the River Kwai", "Old China Hands, Tales & Stories The Azon Bomb", "Aerial photograph of Kanchanaburi, Thailand during a raid by Allied aircraft including", "Thanlwin Bridge (Mawlamyine), longest and largest in Myanmar, emerges to serve interests of State and region", "Railway of Death: Images of the construction of the BurmaThailand Railway 19421943", "Birma-Siam Spoorweg en de Pakan Baroe Spoorweg. Rivers and canyons had to be bridged and sections of mountains had to be cut away to create a bed that was straight and level enough to accommodate the narrow-gauge track. Williams Force was based at Tanyin and Black Force at Beke Taung camp at Kilo 40. In October 1942 a similar-sized group of British POWs left Singapore for Thailand and were employed around Kanchanaburi and on building the steel bridge at Tha Markam which would later become known as The Bridge on the River Kwai. Lieutenant General Eiguma Ishida, overall commander of the Burma Railway, was sentenced to 10 years imprisonment. At Chungkai War Cemetery and Kanchanaburi War Cemetery in Thailand now rest those recovered from the southern part of the line, from Ban Pong to Nieke - about half its length. A former British Army officer, who was tortured as a prisoner of war at a Japanese labor camp during World War II, discovers that the man responsible for much of his treatment is still alive and sets out to confront him. The British POWs suffered the highest number of dead of any Allied group on the ThaiBurma railway. Theatres of bamboo and attap (palm fronds) were built, sets, lighting, costumes and makeup devised, and an array of entertainment produced that included music halls, variety shows, cabarets, plays, and musical comedies even pantomimes. [23][24] The money was used to compensate neighbouring countries and colonies for material stolen by Japan during the construction of the railway. The 75th anniversary of the infamous Thai-Burma Railway built by World War II prisoners of war will be marked today. [2], Thailand was a neutral country at the onset of World War II. In all, over 8000 of these men and women around 35 per cent would die during captivity, more than 2800 of them working on the ThaiBurma railway. Listed under D-Day - The Normandy Invasion. Australians were not the largest national group on the railway. Jun 9, 2015 - Explore Samm Blake's board "Burma Thai Railway Prisoners of War - Historical Footage / Photos", followed by 2,370 people on Pinterest. It is also the case that Australians distinctive national characteristics did not give them a greater chance of survival, as is sometimes assumed. These pages are dedicated to my father Ken Heyes (Lance Corporal, 1st Aust Corps Troop Supply Column AIF, POW), his good friend, Ernie Badham and all the other brave soldiers who spent so many years in the hell-holes that were the Japanese P.O.W camps during World War II. [53], The construction of the Burma Railway is counted as a war crime committed by Japan in Asia. The railway has been purchased by the Thai Government from its starting point at Ban Pong to the Burmese border, and it is now part of the Royal State railways. Though medical consequences of war attract attention, the health consequences of the prisoner-of-war (POW) experience are poorly researched and apprec . [74] Repairs were carried out by forced labour of POWs shortly after and by April the wooden railroad trestle bridge was back in operation. Four prisoners of war with beri-beri, Nam Tok, 1943 Life and death on the railway The railway took 12 months to build, with final completion on 16 October 1943. Sixty-nine men were beaten to death by Japanese guards in the twelve weeks it took to build the cutting, and many more died from cholera, dysentery, starvation, and exhaustion. At the same time the 'Sweat Army' of labourers from Burma, ostensibly volunteers but many conscripted by the puppet Burmese government, toiled on the construction work. The British people were now resigned to the fact that Hitler had to be stopped by force. First, the Burmese city of Lashio was the southern terminus of the Burma Road, the main resupply route for Chinese during the Sino-Japanese War. [60] However, authorities agree that the percentage of deaths among the rmusha was much higher than among the Allied military personnel. List of Australian Army Medical Corp Officers on the Burma-Thailand Railway A FORCE To Burma May 1942 D FORCE To Southern end of line March 1943 DUNLOP FORCE To Southern end of line January 1943 F FORCE To Northern Thailand April 1943 H FORCE To Southern end of line 1943 L FORCE Deployed in medical support of natives August 1943 These became more and more frequent when, towards the end of October 1943, trains full of Japanese troops and supplies began to go through from Thailand to Burma. Throughout the building of the railway, food supplies were irregular and totally inadequate. [54][55], After the completion of the railroad, over 10,000 POWs were then transported to Japan. The 'Market Garden' plan employed all three divisions of First Allied Airborne Army. Now they find themselves dumped in these charnel houses, driven and brutally knocked about by the Jap and Korean guards, unable to buy extra food, bewildered, sick, frightened. The larger number of British deaths overall reflects the fact that there were simply more British working on the railway than Australians or Dutch POWs. Most of the camps were right alongside the railway track and some were near bridges and other vulnerable points. [69] An unknown number of Malayan workers were housed in a nearby camp. Much of the excavation was carried out with inadequate hand tools, and, because work on the railway had fallen behind schedule, the pace of work was increased. The Japanese stopped all work on . Get a Britannica Premium subscription and gain access to exclusive content. However, the film and book contain many historical inaccuracies, and should be considered works of fiction. The notorious Burma-Siam railway, built by British, Australian, Dutch and American prisoners of war, was a Japanese project inspired by the need for improved communications to maintain the large Japanese Armv in Burma. Fifty-nine were women from the Australian Army Nursing Service. "[46] The living and working conditions on the Burma Railway were often described as "horrific", with maltreatment, sickness, and starvation. [12][13] The projected completion date was December 1943. [33] Other documents suggest that more than 100,000 Malayan Tamils were brought into the project and around 60,000 perished.[35][36]. A second air-raid by the RAF on 24 June finally severely damaged and destroyed the railroad bridges, and put the entire railway line out of commission for the rest of the war. As well as these deaths, Japanese civilians were nearly 10,000 lost at sea in this attack and Australia lost about 2800 soldiers to American operations. From British mathematician Arthur Thomas Doodson's Tide-prediction machine, and PLUTO (short for 'pipeline under the ocean' - supplied petrol from Britain to Europe), to the German's 'Rommel's Asparagus', discover 7 clever innovations used on D-Day. In Saigon, the Brits accused Aussies of exaggerating conditions on the Railway. Let us know if you have suggestions to improve this article (requires login). The Death Railway. [61], Weight loss among Allied officers who worked on construction was, on average, 914kg (2030lb) less than that of enlisted personnel. The construction of the railway is a heartbreaking story of forced labor, with more than 60,000 Allied prisoners of war . Taff suffered from dysentery, malaria, beri beri and cholera but, unlike so many, he survived. After the war ended some Australian POWs remembered their captivity as a time in which the typical qualities of the Australian soldier came to the fore. by Howard Margolian. More than 11 percent of civilian internees and 27 percent of Allied POWs died or were killed while in Japanese custody; by contrast, the death rate for Allied POWs in German camps was around 4 percent. The Burma Railway, also known as the Siam-Burma Railway, Thai-Burma Railway and similar names, or as the Death Railway, is a 415 km (258 mi) railway between Ban Pong, Thailand and Thanbyuzayat, Burma (now called Myanmar).It was built from 1940 to 1943 by civilian laborers impressed or recruited by the Japanese and prisoners of war taken by the Japanese, to supply troops and weapons in the . The Burma Railway, also known as the Death Railway, the Siam-Burma Railway, the Thai-Burma Railway and similar names, is a 415km (258miles) railway between Ban Pong, Thailand and Thanbyuzayat, Burma (now called Myanmar).It was built from 1940 to 1943 by civilian labourers impressed or recruited by the Japanese and prisoners of war taken by the Japanese, to supply troops and weapons in the . Lt Col Coates the greatest doctor on the Burma Thailand Railway. The first cut at Konyu was approximately 1,500 feet (450 metres) long and 23 feet (7 metres) deep, and the second was approximately 250 feet (75 metres) long and 80 feet (25 metres) deep. [66][67] No compensation or reparations have been provided to Southeast Asian victims. In October 1943, the railway station was finished. The second largest group of prisoners more than 2700 were captured on Java. The barracks were about 60m (66yd) long with sleeping platforms raised above the ground on each side of an earthen floor. The Prisoner List. Includes Changi, the Burma-Thailand Railway, Sandakan, Timor, Ambon, Rabaul and Japan, and the prisoners who died . The overwhelming majority of Allied POWs were from Commonwealth countries; they included approximately 22,000 Australians (of whom 21,000 were from the Australian Army, 354 from the Royal Australian Navy, and 373 from the Royal Australian Air Force), more than 50,000 British troops, and at least 25,000 Indian troops. Since the Netherlands East Indies had been under Dutch control for centuries, the Dutch POWs included not only Europeans but Eurasians, who had acquired full civil rights, and indigenous soldiers, including Sundanese, Javanese, Menadonese, Ambonese and Timorese. The living and working conditions on the railway were horrific. In contrast, only 4000 Australians were captured by the Germans and Ottomans in World War I. Java was the place where the second largest group of Australians was captured. [78][79], In 1946,[89] the remains of most of the war dead were moved from former POW camps, burial grounds and lone graves along the rail line to official war cemeteries. He was taken to Ambon and apparently died in 1944 on board ship returning from Ambon to Java, After the war he was officially reported to have died on 6th September 1944 and buried at sea. Some of their works were used as evidence in the trials of Japanese war criminals. During its construction, approximately 13,000 prisoners of war died and were buried along the railway. Thirty-two of them were sentenced to death. The only cover for the prisoners was that afforded by the flimsy bamboo and thatch huts, where they were made to shelter while the raids were in progress, and the inevitable casualties were heavy. Those who stayed behind were accommodated in camp "hospitals" which were simply one or more crude jungle huts. Another cohort of 450 US personnel suffered 100 deaths. POWs and Asian workers were also used to build the Kra Isthmus Railway from Chumphon to Kra Buri, and the Sumatra or Palembang Railway from Pekanbaru to Muaro. [32], One of the most notable portions of the entire railway line is Bridge 277, the so-called "Bridge on the River Kwai", which was built over a stretch of the river that was then known as part of the Mae Klong River. [76], The new railway line did not fully connect with the Burmese railroad network as no railroad bridges were built which crossed the river between Moulmein and Martaban (the former on the river's southern bank and the latter to the opposite on the northern bank). During this time, most of the POWs were moved to hospital and relocation camps where they could be available for maintenance crews or sent to Japan to alleviate the manpower shortage there. [17] A holiday was declared for 25 October which was chosen as the ceremonial opening of the line. Approximately 13,000 prisoners of war died and were buried along the railway. Prisoners of War 330,000 people worked on building the railway, including 250,000 Asian laborers and 61,000 prisoners of war (POWs). Click Here To See Liberation Questionnaires. The two sections of the line met at kilometre 263, about 18km (11mi) south of the Three Pagodas Pass at Konkoita (nowadays: Kaeng Khoi Tha, Sangkhla Buri District, Kanchanaburi Province). No prisoner of war may be employed at labors for which he is physically unfit. [30] Other nationalities and ethnic groups working on the railway were Tamils, Chinese, Karen, Javanese, and Singaporean Chinese. The two parties met at Nieke in November 1943, and the line - 263 miles long - was completed by December. Most of the prisoners of the Japanese were Australian Army about 21 000. But this phase soon passed and from May 1944 until the capitulation of Japan in August 1945 parties of prisoners were sent from the various base camps to work on railway maintenance, cut fuel for the locomotives, and handle stores at dumps along the line. Many are now held by the Australian War Memorial, State Library of Victoria, and the Imperial War Museum in London. The Burma- Death Railway. It gives a narrative and pictorial account of life in POW camps north of Australia during World War II. In 1943 Japan's high command decided to build a railway linking Thailand and Burma, to supply its campaign against the Allies in Burma. Japanese soldiers, 12,000 of them, including 800 Koreans, were employed on the railway as engineers, guards, and supervisors of the POW and rmusha labourers. In Burma, most of which had been reoccupied by British forces before the end of hostilities, 40 trials took place in Rangoon (now Yangon), Mandalay and Maymyo in 1946 and 1947. The newer steel and concrete bridge was made up of eleven curved-truss bridge spans which the Japanese builders brought from Java in the Dutch East Indies in 1942. The Japanese wanted the railway completed as quickly as possible, and working units were comprised of massive numbers of prisoners scattered over the entire length of the proposed route. One of the earliest and most respected accounts is ex-POW John Coast's Railroad of Death, first published in 1946 and republished in a new edition in 2014. In one raid alone on the Non Pladuk area, where the camp was located amongst sidings holding petrol, ammunition and store trains protected by an anti-aircraft post, and prisoners were not allowed to leave the huts.95 were killed and 300 wounded. Corrections? They were joined in captivity by three hundred survivors of the sinking of the HMAS Perth in the Battle of Java Sea in late February 1942. On 8 December 1941, Japan invaded Thailand which quickly surrendered. The list contains over 1700 names and is particularly interesting as a record of the decimation, by disease or untreated wounds, of prisoners working on the Burma-Thailand railway. It also describes the living and working conditions experienced by the POWs, together with the culture of the Thai towns and countryside that became many POWs' homes after leaving Singapore with the working parties sent to the railway. The remaining sailors and marines, including Marvin Sizemore, were captured by the Japanese and found themselves building the Burma - Thailand railway as prisoners of war. When the Japanese conquered much of South East Asia in late 1941 and early 1942 they captured more than 50 000 British military personnel. This is the bridge that still remains today. 37,583 prisoners from the United Kingdom, Commonwealth and Dominions, 28,500 from Netherlands and 14,473 from the United States were released after the surrender of Japan. Altogether, some 35,000 parachute and glider troops were involved in the operation. Education Zone | Developed By Rara Theme. Estimates vary but the number who worked on the railway was possibly as high as 18 000. [34] Approximately 90,000 Burmese and 75,000 Malayans worked on the railroad. Undoubtedly Australian POWs did display such qualities on the ThaiBurma railway and elsewhere. Yet in relative terms, Australian POW deaths were very significant, accounting for around 20 per cent of all Australian deaths in World War II. Map of Prisoner of War Camps. The notorious Burma-Siam railway, built by British, Australian, Dutch and American prisoners of war, was a Japanese project inspired by the need for improved communications to maintain the large Japanese Armv in Burma. Finally, on 1 July 1958, the rail line was completed to Nam Tok (Thai , 'waterfall', referring to the nearby Sai Yok Noi Waterfall) The portion in use today is some 130km (81mi) long. The higher deaths in F Force were probably attributable to the fact that British workers contained a high proportion of men who were already ill when they left Singapore. In these camps entertainment flourished as an essential part of their rehabilitation. He served 11 years. In mid-1942, large numbers of POWs began to be transported to Thailand and Burma for the construction of the Thai-Burma Railway. During this time, prisoners suffered from disease, malnutrition, and cruel forms of punishment and torture inflicted by the Japanese. [19], As an American engineer said after viewing the project, "What makes this an engineering feat is the totality of it, the accumulation of factors. The Burma Railway was also known as the "Death Railway" as 16,000 allied troops and 100,000 Asian labourers died during its construction. The only redeeming feature was the ease with which the sick could be evacuated to base hospitals in trains returning empty from Burma. George, from Coatbridge, Lanarkshire, Scotland, was a POW in Java in 1942. For much of its . The Prisoner of War Management Office (Furyo Kanribu) The Prisoner of War Management Office (Furyo Kanribu) was established by the Minister for the Army on 31 March 1942 as an additional office to deal with the treatment of POWs. Prisoners of war from Java (Williams Force, commanded by Lieutenant Colonel J. M. Williams, and Black Force, including 593 Australians commanded by Lieutenant Colonel C. M. Black) travelled via Singapore and thence to Moulmein, arriving in Burma on 29-30 October 1942. It was built from 1940 to 1943 by civilian laborers impressed or recruited by the Japanese and prisoners of war taken by the Japanese, to supply troops and weapons in the Burma campaign of World War II. [50] Charles died in December 2009. They were treated brutally by the Japanese, and struggled with tropical diseases and the effects of malnutrition. Photo taken on Aug. 19, 2020 shows the bridge over the River Kwai, the most notable part of the "Death Railway," in Kanchanaburi, Thailand. An Australian memorial is at Hellfire Pass. The Americans were called the Lost Battalion as their fate was unknown to the United States for more than two years after their capture. Privacy Policy. BBC News Bob Reynolds spent four years as a prisoner of war in Burma and Taiwan. Only the first 130 kilometres (81mi) of the line in Thailand remained, with trains still running as far north as Nam Tok. Sidi Barrani, on the Mediterranean coast in Egypt, had been occupied by the Italian 10th Army, during the Italian invasion of Egypt (9-16 September 1940) and was attacked by British, Commonwealth and imperial . Steve White-do-not-use. Australian POW Prisoners of War Books about Thai Burma Railway Hellfire Pass Military Books DVD Docos. The full year membership runs from August to the end of July the following year. As a result of war bombing on bridges repeatedly, the Japanese used it to supply their troops in Burma. Another thirteen letter parties, L to X, soon followed, taking the number of British working on the railway at the end of 1942 to around 20 000. Tens of thousands of POWs were packed onto vessels that came to be known as Hell ships; one in five prisoners did not survive the cramped, disease-ridden journey. 0 9 4 minutes read. [90], Three cemeteries maintained by the Commonwealth War Graves Commission (CWGC) contain the vast majority of Allied military personnel who died on the Burma Railway.[90]. The Burmese had welcomed the invasion by Japan and cooperated with Japan in recruiting workers. [63] The most important trial was against the general staff. by Ezra Hoyt Ripple (Editor), Mark A. Snell (Editor) Hardcover - 168 pages. It was to be built by a captive labour force of about 60,000 Allied prisoners of war and 200,000 romusha, or Asian labourers. Between 180,000 and 250,000 Southeast Asian civilians and over 60,000 Allied prisoners of war were subjected to forced labour during its construction. Malaria, dysentery and pellagra (a vitamin deficiency disease) attacked the prisoners, and the number of sick in the camps was always high. Of the 668 US personnel forced to work on the railway, 133 died. Show more. [73] Bad weather forced the cancellation of the mission and the AZON was never deployed against the bridge. Burma was a key strategic objective for the Japanese for two reasons. See more ideas about prisoners of war, war, historical. While civilians were generally treated better than military prisoners, conditions in Japanese captivity were almost universally deplorable. A total of 50,000 troops were captured at one time there."He then got moved to Malai POW Camp 1 in Thailand, and transferred to Camp 2 to build the Burma Railway."He was liberated in 1945 . It is also known from a study of the Australians who joined the army in World War II that they were generally young and unmarried. The Prisoner List is a compelling account of the experiences of a prisoner of the Japanese in WWII - from the humiliating defeat at Singapore, to forced labour on the Saigon docks and the horrors of life on the infamous Burma Railway. They had very little transportation to get stuff to and from the workers, they had almost no medication, they couldnt get food let alone materials, they had no tools to work with except for basic things like spades and hammers, and they worked in extremely difficult conditions in the jungle with its heat and humidity. The Burma Railway, also called the Death Railway, was built between Ban Pong, Thailand and Thanbyuzayat in Burma, put together with a ready supply of labour in the form of. These coolies have been brought from Malaya under false pretenses 'easy work, good pay, good houses!' The estimated number of civilian labourers and POWs who died during construction varies considerably, but the Australian Government figures suggest that of the 330,000 people who worked on the line (including 250,000 Asian labourers and 61,000 Allied POWs) about 90,000 of the labourers and about 16,000 Allied prisoners died.[30]. A bridge was not built until the Thanlwin Bridge (carrying both regular road and railroad traffic) was constructed between 2000 and 2005. Khwae was frequently mispronounced by non-Thai speakers as kwai, or 'buffalo' in Thai). Elsewhere in the Pacific some 10 000 British, Canadian and Indian troops were captured when Hong Kong fell in December 1941 and further 5000 in the Netherlands East Indies (now Indonesia) in early 1942. Another group, numbering 190 US personnel, to whom Lieutenant Henri Hekking, a Dutch medical officer with experience in the tropics was assigned, suffered only nine deaths. 1, 5 - 9 Their experience under these extreme wartime conditions is examined to discover the likely contribution of malaria-associated mortality to the total number of deaths. Major Sotomatsu Chida was sentenced to 10 years imprisonment. Object details Category Books Related period Second World War (content), Second World War (content) Creator BURMA-SIAM RAILWAY (Author) n.pub. The remains of United States personnel were repatriated. The Japanese Army transported 500,000 tonnes of freight[citation needed] over the railway before it fell into Allied hands. The Australian commander Lieutenant-Colonel Charles Kappe attributed the lower Australian death rate to a more determined will to live, a higher sense of discipline, a particularly high appreciation of the importance of good sanitation, and a more natural adaptability to harsh conditions [and to] the splendid and unselfish services rendered by the medical personnel in the Force. Australian prisoners of war 1941-1945 (ANZAC Portal, 2007, March) This is a part of the series, Australians in the Pacific War. [6], In early 1942, Japanese forces invaded Burma and seized control of the colony from the United Kingdom. Life in the POW camps was recorded at great risk by artists such as Jack Bridger Chalker, Philip Meninsky, John Mennie, Ashley George Old, and Ronald Searle. Coordinates: .mw-parser-output .geo-default,.mw-parser-output .geo-dms,.mw-parser-output .geo-dec{display:inline}.mw-parser-output .geo-nondefault,.mw-parser-output .geo-multi-punct{display:none}.mw-parser-output .longitude,.mw-parser-output .latitude{white-space:nowrap}140227N 993011E / 14.04083N 99.50306E / 14.04083; 99.50306, This article is about the railway constructed by Japan during World War II. Javanese, Malayan Tamils of Indian origin, Burmese, Chinese, Thai, and other Southeast Asians, forcibly drafted by the Imperial Japanese Army to work on the railway, died in its construction. [23] On 1 February 1947, two people including Momluang Kri Dechatiwong[th], the Thai Minister of Transport, were killed on an inspection tour because the bridge near Konkoita had collapsed. 3:09pm Oct 16, 2018. Sort by: POW Thai Burma Death. Unbeknown to his captors, and at the risk of losing his life if discovered, he kept a diary documenting life. After the railway was completed, the POWs still had almost two years to survive before liberation. [70], The bridge was made famous by Pierre Boulle's novel The Bridge over the River Kwai and its film adaptation, The Bridge on the River Kwai. Aside from the classic British-American film in 1957, Bridge on the River Kwai, the struggles prisoners of war endured in Burma and the making of the "death railway" became a "forgotten war" - it got lost in the Western Front's heroics and the ugly truth about the horrifying gas chambers found in the Nazis' prison camps. The name used by the Japanese Government was TaiMen Rensetsu Tetsud (), which means Thailand-Burma-Link-Railway. Thinking back, she recalls the Australian man who made a great sacrifice to aid her and her fellow prisoners of war. The 'Market Garden' plan employed all three divisions of First Allied Airborne Army. Initially, 1,000 prisoners worked on the bridge and were commanded by Colonel Philip Toosey. On 17 October 1943, construction gangs originating in Burma working south met up with construction gangs originating in Thailand working north. "[38], The first prisoners of war, 3,000 Australians, to go to Burma left Changi Prison in Singapore on 14 May 1942 and journeyed by sea to near Thanbyuzayat ( in the Burmese language; in English 'Tin Shelter'), the northern terminus of the railway. The first train to pass Konkoita on the newly constructed Burma-Thailand railway, built for the Japanese by prisoner of war (POW) labour. [72] About 60,000 were sent to work on the railway; 13,000 of them were Australian. The rail line was built along the Khwae Noi (Kwai) River valley to support the Japanese armed forces during the Burma Campaign. The large population of local labourers, estimated to number around 100,000, had an even higher mortality rate. utilisation of prisoner of war labour in japanese prisoner of war camps. ", "Yamashita: the greatest Japanese general of World War II? Many men in the railway workforce bore the brunt of pitiless or uncaring guards. (Publisher) Abstract. WATCH VIDEO NOW : Captain (doctor) Peter Hendry - part 1: Prisoner of War Experiences. Navy and the auxiliary forces of the Royal Netherlands East Indies Army. New options were needed to support the Japanese forces in the Burma Campaign, and an overland route offered the most direct alternative. The Japanese demanded from each camp a certain percentage of its strength for working parties, irrespective of the number of sick, and to make up the required quota the Japanese camp commandants insisted on men totally unfit for work being driven out and sometimes carried out. This video is sponsored by Ground News - The world's first news comparison platform. Little is known of why the men of the 2nd AIF volunteered to serve. The Australian, British, Dutch and other Allied prisoners of war, along with Chinese, Malay, and Tamil labourers, were required by the Japanese to complete the cutting. The final route was between Bangkok in Thailand and Rangoon, Myanmar (Burma). Over 22 000 Australians were captured by the Japanese when they conquered South East Asia in early 1942. [30][33], In early 1943, the Japanese advertised for workers in Malaya, Singapore, and the Dutch East Indies, promising good wages, short contracts, and housing for families. My Dad is not with us to tell his own story although he did keep a diary . https://www.britannica.com/topic/Burma-Railway, National Museum of Australia - BurmaThailand Railway, Government of South Australia - Veterans SA - The Completion of the Thai Burma Railway, Australian War Memorial - Stolen Years: Australian Prisoners of War. Death Railway . Altogether, some 35,000 parachute and glider troops were involved in the operation. [21][22] The railway link between Thailand and Burma was to be separated again for protecting British interests in Singapore. The line was abandoned beyond Nam Tok Sai Yok Noi;[27][22] the steel rails were salvaged for reuse in expanding the Bang Sue railway yard, reinforcing the BangkokBan Phachi Junction double track, rehabilitating the track from Thung Song Junction to Trang, and constructing both the Nong Pla DukSuphan Buri and Ban Thung PhoKhiri Rat Nikhom branch lines. Photocopy. Although it was often possible to supplement this diet by purchases from the local civilian population, men sometimes had to live for weeks on little more than a small daily ration of rice flavoured with salt. [75] Repair work soon commenced afterwards and continued again and both bridges were operational again by the end of May. The horrendous experiences endured by the thousands of POWs has made the Burma Railway a place of pilgrimage and commemoration. Max Heiliger did a lot more then just laundering money for the Nazis. To pursue those ends and to support their continued offensives in the Burma theatre, the Japanese began construction of what came to be known as the Burma Railway. IWM collections, This media is not currently available. [10][11] After preliminary work of airfields and infrastructure, construction of the railway began in Burma and Thailand on 16 September 1942. Part Two: Capture Examines the shock of capture for Australians, with first-hand accounts describing the physical circumstances of internment, and the feelin. To supply their forces in Burma, the Japanese depended upon the sea, bringing supplies and troops to Burma around the Malay peninsula and through the Strait of Malacca and the Andaman Sea. [100], A preserved section of line has been rebuilt at the National Memorial Arboretum in England.[101]. [71], A first wooden railroad bridge over the Khwae Yai was finished in February 1943, which was soon accompanied by a more modern ferro-concrete bridge in June 1943, with both bridges running in a NNESSW direction across the river. [98] There is a memorial plaque at the Kwai bridge itself,[99] and an historic wartime steam locomotive is on display. Published by Marsworth. Other parties were employed on cutting and building roads, some through virgin jungle, or in building defence positions. [56] Those left to maintain the line still suffered from appalling living conditions as well as increasing Allied air raids. [68] In February 1943, 1,000 Dutch prisoners of war were added to Tamarkan. Records of Allied Operational and Occupation Headquarters, World War II, RG 331. From Thai-Burma railway to Sandakan, WWII history buff unearths stories of Australian POWs. Among the Allied POWs were some 30,000 British, 13,000 Australians, 18,000 Dutch, and 700 Americans. The rice was of poor quality, frequently maggoty or in other ways contaminated, and fish, meat, oil, salt and sugar were on a minimum scale. It was built from 1940 to 1943 by civilian labourers impressed or recruited by the Japanese and prisoners of war taken by the Japanese, to supply troops and weapons in . Burma-Siam Railway list of prisoner of war work camps in Thailand during the construction of the death railway, with diagram. The longest and deepest cuttings in the railway occurred at Konyu, some 45 miles (72 km) northwest of Kanchanaburi, Thailand. "About a dozen on the Burma side and more again on the Thailand side of the railway, in camps like F-Force and D-Force, and about eight men who were with 'Weary' Dunlop at Hintok," he said. The notorious Burma-Siam railway, built by British, Australian, Dutch and American prisoners of war, was a Japanese project inspired by the need for improved communications to maintain the large Japanese army in Burma. [25][26] After the accident, it was decided to end the line at Nam Tok and reuse the remainder to rehabilitate the line. A great deal of equipment was improvised by the medical officers and orderlies, and food and medicines were clandestinely obtained. All of that makes this railway an extraordinary accomplishment."[20]. This included personnel from USS Houston and the 131st Field Artillery Regiment of the Texas Army National Guard. As before, their food and accommodation were minor considerations. The book Through the Valley of the Kwai and the 2001 film To End All Wars are an autobiography of British Army captain Ernest Gordon. The remains of the notorious F-Force camp in Thailand. Second, the occupation of Burma would also put Japanese armies on the doorstep of British India. The Japanese had been surprised by the reaction of world opinion against their treatment of prisoners of war, and there is evidence that they began to feel apprehensive about the heavy casualties of 1943, and made efforts to counteract their reputation for uncivilised treatment of prisoners. [28] One museum is in Myanmar side Thanbyuzayat,[95] and two other museums are in Kanchanaburi: the ThailandBurma Railway Centre,[96] opened in January 2003,[97] and the JEATH War Museum. A further 354 were from the Royal Australian Navy and 373 from the Royal Australian Air Force. June 27, 2022, 5:24 PM. It is open to general traffic from Ban Pong to Kanchanaburi, about 33 miles.Japanese communications depended upon a long and exposed sea route to Rangoon via Singapore and the Strait of Malacca, and a road (quite unfit for prolonged heavy traffic) from Raheng through Kowkarelk to Moulmein. Human hair was often used for brushes, plant juices and blood for paint, and toilet paper as the "canvas". In reality, however, the death rates of British and Australians across all sites on the railway were scarcely any different 22 and 21 per cent respectively. The Prisoner List: The Film A short film about prisoners of the Japanese in WWII based on the book by Richard Kandler About the book The above film, made by Kate Owen and Danny Roberts, is based on Richard Kandler's book: The Prisoner List: A true story of defeat, captivity and salvation in the Far East 1941-45. [37] British doctor Robert Hardie wrote: "The conditions in the coolie camps down river are terrible," Basil says, "They are kept isolated from Japanese and British camps. This is particularly true on Anzac Day (April 25), when Australians pay tribute to those who served and lost their lives during war. Director Jonathan Teplitzky Writers Frank Cottrell Boyce (screenplay) Andy Paterson (screenplay) Eric Lomax (book) Stars The working conditions were appalling. Most recruits were in their twenties. Special British prisoner parties at Kinsaiyok bury about 20 coolies a day. More recently, the motion picture The Railway Man (based on the book of the same name) also gives insight into the barbaric conditions and suffering that were inflicted upon the workers who built the railway. Troops from the 7th Division embarked on the HMT Orcades arriving at Batavia from the Middle East in early 1942 in a last-minute effort to defend the Netherlands East Indies from Japanese attack. At the end of the war, the Japanese Armed Forces destroyed all documents related to the POW Camps. Powered by WordPress. To avoid a hazardous 2,000-mile (3,200km) sea journey around the Malay peninsula, a railway from Bangkok to Rangoon seemed a feasible alternative. What mattered in captivity was not so much a mans nationality but the particular circumstances and location of the places in which he worked, his access to food, medicines and medical care, his genetic inheritance, and even his luck and will to survive. These activities engaged numerous POWs as actors, singers, musicians, designers, technicians, and female impersonators. Many remember Japanese soldiers as being cruel and indifferent to the fate of Allied prisoners of war and the Asian rmusha. CHAPTER 2. A newly wealthy English woman returns to Malaya to build a well for the villagers who helped her during war. Most of the railway was dismantled shortly after the war. [47] Coast's work is noted for its detail on the brutality of some Japanese and Korean guards as well as the humanity of others. Little detailed research has been done on the background of Australian POWs and how this affected their chances of survival. The first contingent of around 3000 reached Thailand some months before the Australians in June 1942. Sir Edward "Weary" Dunlop an Australian surgeon and legend among prisoners of the Thai Burma Railway in World War II; [9] On 23 June 1942, 600 British soldiers arrived at Camp Nong Pladuk, Thailand to build a camp to serve as a transit camp for the work camps along the railway. Repeated reconnaissance flights over the Burma end of the railway started early in 1943, followed by bombings at intervals. At main camps such as Chungkai, Tamarkan, Non Pladuk and Thanbyuzayat were "base Hospitals" which were also huts of bamboo and thatch, staffed by such medical officers and orderlies as were allowed by the Japanese to care for the sick prisoners. The movement of POWs northward from Changi Prison in Singapore and other prison camps in Southeast Asia began in May 1942. Some workers were attracted by the relatively high wages, but the working conditions for the rmusha were deadly. On this end of the railway the workforce was largely Australian, Dutch and local rmusha. More than one in five of them died there. [48][49] In the foreword to Charles's book, James D. Hornfischer summarizes: "Dr. Henri Hekking was a tower of psychological and emotional strength, almost shamanic in his power to find and improvise medicines from the wild prison of the jungle". It completed the rail link between Bangkok, Thailand, and Rangoon, Burma. A copper spike was driven at the meeting point by commanding General Eiguma Ishida, and a memorial plaque was revealed. [18][19] The Japanese staff would travel by train C56 31 from Nong Pladuk, Thailand to Thanbyuzayat, Burma. The Dutch formed the second largest contingent of Allied prisoners of war on the ThaiBurma railway, after the British. Although working conditions were far better for the Japanese than the POWs and rmusha workers, about 1,000 (eight percent) of them died during construction. Since 1945 prisoners of war and the Burma-Thailand railway have come to occupy a central place in Australia's national memory of World War II. Surviving Australian veterans will attend a commemorative . Dutch chemist Van Boxtell. Thereafter work on the railway consisted of maintenance, and repairs to damage caused by Allied bombing. More than a third of these men and women died in captivity. When the Japanese were not satisfied with the pace of work, prisoners were forced to endure atrocious physical punishment, and some 700 Allied prisoners died or were killed at Hellfire Pass. Some have even brought wives and children. Extracts from a report on a search carried out by an officer of the Army Graves Service, 6th to 22nd December 1948. Articles on the Australian medical personnel working on the railway. Ron Arad Israeli fighter pilot, shot down over Lebanon in 1986. . In Burma. Japanese Medical Orderly. [14][15][16], The railway was completed ahead of schedule. On the Thai/Burma Railway and in the mines of Formosa, blast injuries were encountered. Also sketches by POWs. [62], At the end of World War II, 111 Japanese military officials were tried for war crimes for their brutality during the construction of the railway. $14.00 View Detail 321 relations. Updates? The first prisoners of war to work in Thailand, 3,000 British soldiers, left Changi by train in June 1942 to Ban Pong, the southern terminus of the railway. [73], The two bridges were successfully bombed and damaged on 13 February 1945 by bomber aircraft from the Royal Air Force (RAF). Some rosters show if living, dead or killed in action (KIA), cause of death and burial site. The Japanese kept no records and it was impossible for anyone else to do so, nor were the graves marked, but between 80,000 and 100,000 perished. seal team 8 location, did bodacious kill anyone, best scope for 30 06 elk hunting, bryan county planning and zoning, dr anderson michigan death, averill park school tax bills, ng model dynamic variable name, cours universitaire en ligne, loren heinle, traditional italian symbol for family, heald college courses catalog, gcse dance knowledge organiser a linha curva, hallbrook country club membership cost, carolina thunderbirds salary, springfield, maine tax maps,

Latitude Run Recliner Assembly Instructions, Off White Rubber Dunk Sizing, Pngjobseek Current Vacancies 2022, Love Horoscope 2022 Gemini, Radio Maisha Presenters Salary, Yellow Buses Fleet List, Tom Riley Assuredpartners Net Worth, Eric Hilton, Thievery Wife,