[JAN 2025 Update: the information immediately below is a bit dated. I’ve added additional sections a & b below]
The available rosters provide differing pieces of information. One set tells us which POWs were in a particular place, but these are often not dated so can present some confusion. There are those that tell us only what their causes of death were. Still others identify the men who were assigned to a particular work party or group. There are rare sets that provide more than one of these pieces of information. Only by painstakingly recording each tidbit of this information can we piece together a clearer picture. I liken it to assembling a jigsaw puzzle.
Once again it must be noted that the records that have survived were largely kept by the UK officers and data for any other nationality is purely serendipitous.
I must say, however, that in completing my initial task of telling the story of the US POWs, the records they kept tell us the most complete story of any of the many groups. The surviving UK records are weighted heavily to the members of H & F Forces. These comprised about one-third of the 35,000 UK and AUS POWs who worked in the Thai Sector. Except for the US contingent which comprised only 1% of the total POWs, we have very little information about those who worked the Burma Sector. It is possible to intuit some information in that those who went to Burma from Java (via Singapore) arrived there early in the construction period and they tended to be sent as military units. We also know that very few UK POWs worked in Burma. Thus we can assign men to work groups based on dates of death (early in 42 & 43) and the military unit they were in. Yet for the Burma workers we have very little COD data.
The situation becomes somewhat more complicated in that these Burma Sector POWs tended to leap-frog each other moving closer to the Thai border then finally crossing into Thailand as construction was nearing its end. These groups then overlapped into the camp areas that F Force moved to starting about May 43.
I have made inquiries but to date I have found no rosters that identify the military units – if not the actual individual POWs – who were assigned to the various work groups. We know that LtCol Toosey was the commander of the 135 (The Hertfordshire Yeomanry) artillery regiment and that they were initially sent to NongPlaDuk as part of Grp 1 before many if not all were transferred to build the two bridges. Compiling available records, we have place and cause of death on about 60% of these men. We have data showing that a few (<10) men from this unit found their way into H or F Forces and a few into Group IV. Given the sparse COD and place death information we have (only on 32) we could come to the conclusion that they died while building the bridges. This would be incorrect. The most quoted numbers suggest that LtCol Toosey’s efforts to protect his men were quite successful and that less than a dozen died during those month of bridge building. This is borne out in the available data in that 21 are recorded as having died at follow-on camps during the post-construction period. I related this rather complicated and somewhat unsatisfying sub-saga only to suggest that the paths that these men took is varied enough that it is easy to be led astray if we try to infer too much from the available data. All we can truly say about the members of the 135 (The Hertfordshire Yeomanry) artillery regiment is that 103 are buried in Thailand and that about one-third of those from whom there is a recorded COD died of malaria. That is another way of saying that we cannot confirm the figure of a dozen or fewer deaths during bridge construction; nor can we identify the exact POWs who died during that period. Although sifting down into data I would suggest that a dozen is just about the figure I’d arrive at given the sparse data available on these artillerymen. It makes me wonder if there wasn’t a more complete roster kept by Toosey’s staff that would better address their places and causes of death much in the same way that LTC Tharp’s staff kept records for the US POWs. Sadly, no such roster seems to have survived.
Unfortunately, I can find no easy way to summarize the data as to who died where of what. The Table is just too enormous to display or even to understand easily. It is possible to make some generalized statements. For example, of the 1688 POW burials at ChungKai cemetery about 1000 are recorded as having died there. But there is only data on COD for 685 of those. But since we know that ChungKai was a major place of consolidation of sick POWs, knowing that they died there adds little to their individual story as far as what work groups they belonged to. Another 127 who are buried in Don Rak are said to have died at ChungKai.
For completeness, I include the following TABLE in which I present the locations of recorded deaths by their Kilo number beginning at NongPlaDuk. I have also labelled the more significant locations to the right.
| GI | cholera | MAL | INF | INJ | dietary | nat cau | war | ||
| 41 | 3 | 32 | 20 | 3 | 65 | 8 | 98 | NongPlaDuk | 394 |
| 123 | 5 | 61 | 37 | 1 | 188 | 6 | F&H hosp | 656 | |
| 106 | 3 | 48 | 26 | 2 | 95 | 8 | 3 | Kanchanaburi | 820 |
| 284 | 22 | 79 | 63 | 4 | 399 | 25 | 7 | ChungKai | 1499 |
| 351 | 26 | 112 | 60 | 2 | 105 | 18 | 2 | Tarsao | 761 |
| 74 | 136 | 22 | 10 | 2 | 23 | 6 | 1 | Tonchan | 282 |
| 150 | 75 | 29 | 7 | 17 | 8 | HellFire Pass | 299 | ||
| 34 | 123 | 6 | 2 | 11 | Malay Hamlet | 188 | |||
| 110 | 149 | 7 | 5 | 1 | 35 | 3 | 1 | Hintok area | 316 |
| 162 | 41 | 24 | 10 | 25 | 7 | 5 | Kin SaiYok | 410 | |
| 129 | 5 | 1 | 4 | 2 | 2 | Lin Tin | 155 | ||
| 178 | 2 | 73 | 2 | 2 | 76 | 2 | 9 | Kui Yae | 387 |
| 29 | 5 | 10 | 1 | 0 | 5 | 1 | 56 | Prang Kasi | 126 |
| 22 | 63 | 12 | 11 | 3 | 91 | 9 | 12 | Tha Khanun | 486 |
| 7 | 23 | 4 | 4 | Nam Chon Yai | 157 | ||||
| 39 | 34 | 15 | 8 | 4 | 1 | 2 | Nike | 112 | |
| 17 | 123 | 13 | 1 | 8 | Shimo Songkurai | 165 | |||
| 257 | 225 | 46 | 45 | 2 | 79 | SongKurai | 695 | ||
| 138 | 80 | 30 | 41 | 122 | 1 | Kami SongKurai | 564 | ||
| 43 | 160 | 1 | 3 | 1 | 11 | Chaunggahla | 250 | ||
| 54 | 6 | 33 | 20 | 2 | 20 | 4 | 2 | Aungganaung | 161 |
| 64 | 3 | 10 | 32 | 24 | 42 | 5 | Regue | 214 | |
| 37 | 1 | 18 | 24 | 16 | 10 | 4 | 1 | Apalon | 138 |
| 128 | 3 | 56 | 39 | 3 | 65 | 3 | Khon Khan hosp | 330 | |
| 240 | 5 | 56 | 118 | 1 | 213 | Thambaya hosp (F) | 763 | ||
| 89 | 8 | 6 | 1 | 6 | 7 | 41 | Thanbuzayat | 182 | |
| 35 | 3 | 14 | 1 | 1 | 4 | 3 | 1 | other-TH | 130 |
| 3411 | 1495 | 1163 | 713 | 97 | 1986 | 185 | 285 | 11802 | |
| GI | cholera | MAL | INF | INJ | dietary | nat cau | war |
The numbers in this Table do not sum properly because I have truncated it for simplicity. Many of the deaths at these camps have no recorded cause. I have deleted those columns from this Table as well.
The war-related deaths noted above demand special explanation. All but 17 who were executed are due to errant bombs that struck the POW housing areas. In a few instances, men were simply recorded as KIA/MIA with no identifiable remains found. Most of the US deaths are recorded as having occurred at the K80 hospital camp at Apalaine as well as the camps at K100 and 105 in Burma. I have highlighted those cells where >100 deaths occurred simply for emphasis.
What is also significant in the lack of reports from the close-in Thai camps (< Kilo100). The conditions in these camps where construction was taking place early were much better than those later and deeper in the the build area. Likely, most sick men were evacuated to either ChungKai or Kanchanaburi hospitals and did not die at the camp per se.
Aside from ChungKai, another place that was obviously used as a hospital camp by is rarely mentioned in any accounts is Toncha (aka Tonchan at Kilo 140; between Tampi and Tarsao). There are deaths recorded as occurring there as early as Nov 42 among members assigned to Work Groups 1 and 4. Later it became a point of hospitalization for both H & F Forces as the IJA struggled to deal with the massive numbers of sick men in these two groups. It is said to have been one of the first camps that early arriving members of H Force were assigned to.
One final comment about the WHEN of these deaths. Sorting the dataset by date of death reveals that 30-31 May and into early June, were particularly bad days fro the POWs. Across many locations and from many causes — especially cholera — dozens of men died on these dates.
==================
24.6b missing puzzle pieces
Some of the largest missing puzzle pieces in this complicated saga involve determining where these men worked –Burma or Thailand. Some were quite easy, if you died in Burma you almost certainly had worked in Burma[1]. But the inverse is not universal. In the latter weeks of construction, men who had spent the bulk of their time in Burma crossed over into Thailand, although they were still within the Burma Sector. Some of these The US Fitzsimmons Group, for example, were among the first POWs to be consolidated to the KAN area. For some 500 men who were lost at sea en route to Japan, it is nearly impossible to reliably place their work sector. The CWGC provides reliable unit affiliation data but this does not equate to work sector. Many men were separated from their military unit and remained in Singapore as their comrades departed. Many of these were later swept up into the F H K or L Groups, as individuals rather than unit members.
Unit rosters published as memorials on the internet were helpful in identifying the work sector of their members. From these we can identify 48 members of F or H Forces that died soon after their return to Singapore as a result of maladies contracted in Thailand. I do not doubt that this the minimum count of such deaths. The CWGC data for burial at Kranji cemetery does not include any references to TBR presence.
We could ‘force’ some of the 2000 who died at sea with no firm knowledge of their sector. We know that there were very few UK POWs who worked the Burma Sector. It does not appear as if any of that British Sumatra Group died en route to Japan. That would mean that almost all of the UK POWs who were lost at sea had worked the Thai Sector.
| 14845 | ||
| Burma | 1920 | 12.9% |
| Thailand | 7265 | 48.9% |
| F-K | 4654 | 31.4% |
| not TBR | 333 | 2.2% |
| undetermined | 587 | 4.0% |
| post TBR | 86 | 0.6% |
This would mean that between 80% of all deaths occurred among Thai Sector veterans with only 13% occurring among the Burma workers. In addition, 31% of the Thai Sector deaths occurred in the F – L Forces! We are still left with just over 500 POWs who were lost at sea for which it is difficult to reliably assign a sector[2]. This is mainly due to the fact that we can document many men from Australian units who are known to have worked in Burma but many of their comrades were included in the F & H Forces. That leaves those unit members for whom no actual sector assignment has been determined without a reliable way to ‘force’ a sector assignment.
To round out the other deaths, 333 (2%) were not directly TBR and 86 more died on the Mergui Road project but without a reliable link to where they had worked previously; most of these were Dutch[3].
I suppose that whenever (if ever) the data tabulators at the TBRCtr get around to releasing their compilation of the 61K TBR-associated POWs we might be able to more accurately determine where each of these 14K men worked and died. That data may also shed more light on the post-TBR deaths in Singapore.
[1] The exception being the F Force member who died at the Thambaya camp.
[2] Many of these are Dutch
[3] For the Dutch POWs, the CWGC provides not actual Unit data; all are simply listed as KNIL
============================
24.6c over 100 deaths
| >100 deaths | ||||
| dcd | 14935 | F Force | ||
| sub-total | 13151 | 88.1% | 4456 | 33.9% |
| LAS | 2254 | 15.1% | ||
| Kanchanaburi | 1647 | 11.0% | 338 | |
| CngKai | 1499 | 10.0% | ||
| K50-Thambaya hosp | 763 | 5.1% | 763 | |
| Tarsao | 761 | 5.1% | ||
| SongKurai | 673 | 4.5% | 673 | |
| Kami SgKuRai | 521 | 3.5% | 521 | |
| Tha Kanun | 486 | 3.3% | 486 | |
| Kin SaiYok | 410 | 2.7% | 410 | |
| NgPlaDuk | 394 | 2.6% | ||
| Kui Yae | 386 | 2.6% | 386 | |
| K55-KhonKhan | 329 | 2.2% | ||
| Hintok area | 316 | 2.1% | ||
| Tonchan | 282 | 1.9% | ||
| Changaraya | 250 | 1.7% | 250 | |
| K100-Regue | 212 | 1.4% | ||
| Malay Hamlet | 188 | 1.3% | ||
| K0-Thanbyuzayat | 182 | 1.2% | ||
| Rangoon | 176 | 1.2% | transit | |
| Shimo SgKuRai | 165 | 1.1% | 165 | |
| Lin Tin | 158 | 1.1% | 158 | |
| K105-Aungg | 157 | 1.1% | ||
| Nam Chon Yai | 157 | 1.1% | 157 | |
| Nike | 149 | 1.0% | 149 | |
| K83-Apalon | 138 | 0.9% | ||
| HellFire | 128 | 0.9% | ||
| Th-PrachuapKirKahn | 148 | 1.0% | ||
| N K P | 121 | 0.8% | ||
| Saigon | 101 | 0.7% |
Of 14935 total TBR-related deaths, those locations that experienced 100 or more deaths accounted for 88%. Of those, 34% were in camps belonging to F Force. The Thambaya hospital in Burma belonging to F Force saw the most F Force deaths (763) or 5% of the larger group.
The largest single group (15%) were those en route to Japan. The camps at Kanchanaburi and ChungKai accounted for 21% of the deaths. These operated for the longest time and saw deaths as men arrived, worked then departed. Another long-standing hospital camp, Tarsao, saw 5% of these deaths (761). Likewise, NongPlaDuk’s 2% of the deaths were due to its longevity and a friendly fire bombing raid which took many lives.
Most of the men who died in Rangoon were inbound to the TBR on the Hellship MAEBASHI MARU which was swept by a dysentery outbreak so hundreds of men ceased their journey there and 176 died without ever actually working the TBR.
Those who died in the Burma Sector did so at locations which served as death camps (‘hospitals’).
HellFire Pass adds a surprisingly few 128 documented deaths, but I suspect that this is just under-reporting due to a lack of records. The reports few men dying of beatings or torture compared to the accounts of survivors.
Even with the real medical and surgical care that was finally available at the Nakorn Pathom hospital, 121 men died there. It is reported that most of the men who died at Prachuap while working the Mergui Road had been recently discharged from the Nakorn Pathom hospital before being sent south.
At least 50 of the men who died in Saigon did so in a friendly fire bombing incident in 1945.