Building the Burma-Siam Railway

Building the Burma-Siam Railway

In the memoir "Building the Burma-Siam RailwayTalk," a former prisoner recounts the brutal conditions endured while constructing the railway for the Japanese. The prisoners faced harsh working conditions, including being pelted with iron rivets by a Japanese engineer and working in non-stop downpours during the monsoon season. Cholera outbreaks, lack of proper clothing, and extreme exhaustion from long work shifts further compounded their suffering. Despite the high death rates and disease ravaging the crowded camps, the Japanese enforced a speedup of work, neglecting to address the epidemic. The prisoners endured meager rations and slept in leaky, overcrowded huts.

The Japanese told us that our job was to build a section of a new railway from Siam to Burma. i especially remember one jap engineer in charge of the working party. his favorite way of getting his orders quickly carried out was to chuck down iron rivets his bars from his perch from the top the of the bridge on to the head of our officers and men who were working below. when the monsoon broke out with a 72 hour non stop downpour most of us prisoners were very nearly at our last gasp. the rains which immdetialy turned the embankment into quagmires drenched us day and night. and sent the death rates soaring. Almost at the same time cholera broke out and decimated the crowded camps.. You'd have thought that the Japanese in their own interest might have taken some steps to stem the ravages of the disease. but they didnt, instead they actually started a speedup.. we had to work in shifts of 14, 20 and 36 hours at a stretch. we were practically naked by now for the japanese issued hardly any clothing. weary and worn out we used to lurch back to our huts to eat the rice and slush called stew. but often nothing infact but a radish or bamboo root in boiling water. lapsed into exhausted slumber wet and jammed on top of each other in leaky windswept huts.

0.0009606481481

1945-11-01

Malaysia

Thailand

Myanmar

Malaysia

Thailand

Myanmar

English

Frank Foster

Railroad

History

Feature

Spoken voice : narrative

Radio Programme

British Library

British Broadcasting Corporation (BBC)

British Library

British Broadcasting Corporation (BBC)

1CD0013823; 1LP0059076

BBC00056

Military Conflcit

Talk.

Sound Archive of BBC South East Asian Broadcasts

Sound Archive of BBC South East Asian Broadcasts (with sound)

Japanese railway Siam to Burma 2.m4a