Five kilometres west of Kanchanaburi, is the Chungkai War Cemetery. It is the smallest of the three cemeteries which are the final resting place of those POWs who died while working on the Burma-Thailand Railway. Read the fascinating story of this little known, seldom visited but important part of the Railway story.

Private Harold Martin joined the army in late 1940, he was 23 at the time and left behind a wife and young son. Like so many men of that time, he felt “It was the right thing to do” to fight for his country. In late 1941, he was sent to Singapore as part of the Australian commitment to the British Garrison. On the 15th February 1942, he was amongst the 15,000 Australian soldiers who became prisoners of war (POW’s) of the Japanese in the Fall of Singapore.

Private Goulden was amongst the first Australians to be sent to Burma to work as forced labour for the Japanese. Escape from a Japanese work camps for Allied and Dutch POW’s was difficult. But against all the odds, Private Goulden would attempt an escape to get back to his young wife in Australia. It would have tragic consequences.

By the end of World War 2, over twelve thousand Allied and Dutch POW’s had died while working on the Burma-Thailand Railway with the vast majority of deaths occurring during the construction phase in 1942 and 1943.