City - State - KARNJABURI PROVINCE Country - Thailand
About
The picture of Karnjanaburi War Cemetery was taken b 4 I can find my favorite angle of the River Kway Bridge (History shadow). Let's go back to its history, after entering 2nd world war in 1941, Japanese forces quickly overran most of south east asia. 1 year after that, in order to find a detour and secure line of supply between Myanma/Thailand, the Jap decided to use prisoners of war and civilian labors to build a single line railway to link existing railheads at Thanbyuzayat in the west and Ban Pong in the east. Two forces, one in Thailand and one in Myanma, worked from opposite ends of line, meeting at Konkuita in Oct 1943. The project cost the lives of appox. 15k prisoners as well as sickness, malnutrition, exhaustion and mistreatment of 100k civilians. More than 5k Commonwealth and 1.8k Dutch casualties are commemorated in the cemetery including 300 who died of sickness at Nieke and Changaraya and who were cremated. Their ashes are buried in 2 graves in the cemetery and their names appear on the panel in the shelter building. The names of 11 soldiers of Indian army whose graves elsewhere in Thailand couldn't be maintained are commerated by name on a tablet in the entrance building. The Commonwealth War Grave Commission is responsible for the maintenance of graves and memorial in some of 150 countries which commemorate around 1.7mn members of Commonwealth forces who died in the two world wars. Those commemorate here and elsewhere including servicemen and women of different faiths and of none.
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{K:27715} 9/6/2011
