Ban Song Karia
( th, บ้านซองกาเรีย), also spelled Songkalia () and alternatively known as Songkurai (from ja, ソンクライ), is a village in the
Sangkhla Buri District of the
Kanchanaburi Province, Thailand near the border with
Myanmar
Myanmar, ; UK pronunciations: US pronunciations incl. . Note: Wikipedia's IPA conventions require indicating /r/ even in British English although only some British English speakers pronounce r at the end of syllables. As John C. Wells, Joh ...
at the
Three Pagodas Pass
Three Pagodas Pass ( Phlone ; my, ဘုရားသုံးဆူ တောင်ကြားလမ်း, ''Paya Thon Zu Taung Za Lang'', ; th, ด่านเจดีย์สามองค์, , ) is a pass in the Tenasserim Hills on the ...
. It was the location of three World War II
Japanese Prisoner of War Camps located about south of the Thai/Burma border.
Camp Songkurai
Songkurai was the location of three work camps. The first 393 Australian prisoners arrived on 25 May 1943.
In August 1943,
the British 'F' Force consisting of 670 British and 1,020 Australian prisoners was concentrated at Songkurai.
The prisoners were tasked to create a 15 kilometre stretch of railroad including a wooden bridge over the
Songkalia River
Songkalia River ( th, แม่น้ำซองกาเลีย) is a river in Kanchanaburi Province, Thailand. It joins with two other rivers, the Beak River and the Rantee River, at a point called Sam Sop or Sam Phrab in Sangkhlaburi Dist ...
(Huai Ro Khi).
The prisoners were
forced to work, under harsh conditions, on the construction of the
Burma Railway
The Burma Railway, also known as the Siam–Burma Railway, Thai–Burma Railway and similar names, or as the Death Railway, is a railway between Ban Pong, Thailand and Thanbyuzayat, Burma (now called Myanmar). It was built from 1940 to 1943 ...
. They suffered extreme hardship from poor rations, disease and brutal treatment. The bridge over the Songkalia River became known as the Bridge of 600, because 600 prisoners died during its construction.
When the first POWs arrived, there was already a
cholera
Cholera is an infection of the small intestine by some strains of the bacterium ''Vibrio cholerae''. Symptoms may range from none, to mild, to severe. The classic symptom is large amounts of watery diarrhea that lasts a few days. Vomiting and ...
outbreak at the Asian forced labourers camp. The outbreak was finally beaten in mid-June. On 10 August, cholera returned.
On 17 November 1943, the last prisoners left the camps
which have now been taken over by the jungle.
Later history
After
Japan's capitulation, the British Army removed about four kilometres of rail road track between Nikki (Ni Thea) and Songkurai because it was deemed unsafe.
First lieutenant
Hiroshi Abe, the construction supervisor, was later convicted as a B/C class war criminal and sentenced to death. His sentence was later commuted to life imprisonment. He served 11 years.
[{{cite web, url=https://publications.parliament.uk/pa/cm199697/cmhansrd/vo961204/debtext/61204-05.htm , title=Bound Volume Hansard - Debate , author=]Tony Lloyd
Sir Anthony Joseph Lloyd (born 25 February 1950) is a British Labour Party politician who has discontinuously served as a Member of Parliament (MP) since 1983, currently as the MP for Rochdale since 2017. He was MP for Stretford from 1983 to 1 ...
, website=House of Parliament - Commons Debate, date=4 December 1996, access-date=29 January 2022
A school has been built on a former camp site, and the river is now crossed by Highway 323 towards the border.
The village is currently known as Ban Song Karia.
References
External links
* http://www.pows-of-japan.net/articles/36.htm
* http://www.wartimememories.co.uk/pow/songkurai.html
* http://www.britain-at-war.org.uk/WW2/Death_Railway/html/body_songkurai.htm
Populated places in Kanchanaburi province
Burma Railway
World War II sites in Burma
Japanese prisoner of war and internment camps