CHUNGKAI WAR CEMETERY

Chungkai Camp does not appear on any map, but will be well remembered by those who stayed there as prisoners of the Japanese for many long months from the middle of 1942 onwards. It is a hamlet on the River Kwai Noi about 5 kilometres south of the town of Kanchanaburi. Chungkai War Cemetery is approximately 5 kilometres south of Kanchanaburi War Cemetery and can be reached by road over the Ratanakan Bridge. The location of the war cemetery is indicated on Kanchanaburi city maps available at the tourist office or in every room at the larger hotels. The cemetery, designed by Colin St Clair Oakes, is nearly 200 metres from the river bank, and is approached from the landing stage. The entrance pavilion is built of local materials, and roofed with coloured Siamese tiles which blend with the surroundings. A long central avenue runs from the altar-like Stone of Remembrance, just inside the cemetery, to the Cross of Sacrifice. On the Stone, designed by Sir Edwin Lutyens, are carved the words THEIR NAME LIVETH FOR EVERMORE, taken from the Book of Ecclesiasticus. The Cross which, like the Stone of Remembrance, is common to most Commonwealth war cemeteries, was designed by Sir Reginald Blomfield. It is set upon an octagonal base and bears a bronze sword upon its shaft. Chungkai was one of the base camps on the Burma-Siam railway, and contained a hospital and church built by Allied prisoners of war. The war cemetery is the original burial ground started by the prisoners themselves, and those who rest there are mostly men who died in the hospital. There are over 1,700 burials, and each grave is marked by a bronze plaque mounted on a concrete pedestal. A register of the graves is available in the cemetery and may be requested from one of the gardening staff. The Commissions Group Supervisor responsible for this cemetery can be contacted at Kanchanaburi War Cemetery.

Commonwealth War Graves Commission

Information Sheet

THE BURMA-SIAM RAILWAY AND ITS CEMETERIES

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. During its construction approximately 13,000 prisoners of war died - mainly of sickness, malnutrition and exhaustion - and were buried along the railway. It is estimated that between 80,000 and 100,000, also civilians, died in the course of the project, though it is impossible to reach a precise figure since no records were kept. The Japanese aimed at completing the railway in 14 months, or at least by the end of 1943. They utilised a labour force composed of prisoners of war taken in the campaigns in South-East Asia and the Pacific, and forced labour brought from Malaya and the Dutch East Indies or conscripted in Siam (Thailand) and Burma (Myanmar). From June 1942 onwards large groups of prisoners were transferred periodically to Siam and Burma from Java, Sumatra and Singapore. Two forces, one based in Siam 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 Siam, and Thanbyuzayat in Burma. Accommodation for the Japanese guards had to be built first, and at all the staging camps built subsequently along the railway this rule applied. The cook-house and huts for the working parties came next and accommodation for the sick last of all. Frequently men were sent to work on the line long before their accommodation was completed. Throughout the building of the railway, food supplies were irregular and totally inadequate. Red Cross parcels helped, but these were invariably held up by the Japanese. Malaria, dysentery and pellagra (a vitamin deficiency disease) attacked the prisoners, and the number of sick in the camps was always high. Work on the railway started at Thanbyuzayat on 1 October 1942 and somewhat later at Ban Pong. The two parties met at Konkuita in October 1943, and the line - 424 kilometres long - was completed by December. Thereafter work on the railway consisted of maintenance, and repairs to damage caused by Allied bombing. 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. Those recovered from the southern part of the line, from Ban Pong to Nieke, about half its length, now rest in Chungkai War Cemetery and Kanchanaburi War Cemetery in Thailand. Those from the northern half of the line lie in the War Cemetery at Thanbyuzayat in Myanmar.

The Commonwealth War Graves Commission is responsible for marking and maintaining the graves of members of the forces of Commonwealth countries who died in the two world wars, for building and maintaining memorials to the dead whose graves are unknown and for providing records and registers of these burials and commemorations, totalling 1.7 million and found in most countries throughout the world.

Published by the Commonwealth War Graves Commission, 2 Marlow Road, Maidenhead, Berkshire, SL6 7DX, England. Tel: 01628 634221 Fax: 01628 771208 Web Site: www.cwgc.org E-Mail: General Enquiries: general.enq@cwgc.org E-Mail: Casualty & Enquiries: casualty.enq@cwgc.org

ISA 15 07/00