Description
Title: Into the Smother – A Journal of the Burma-Siam Railway
Author: Parkin, Ray
Condition: Very Good – Ex library copy with the usual library stamps.
Edition: 1st Edition
Publication Date: 1963
ISBN: N/A
Cover: Hard Cover with Dust Jacket – 291 pages
Comments: The classic account Of Ray Parkin’s experiences in captivity as a prisoner of war of the Japanese following the sinking of HMAS Perth in the Sunda Strait in World War 2.
The Burma Railway, also known as the Death Railway, the Thailand–Burma Railway and similar names, was a 415 kilometres railway between Bangkok, Thailand, and Rangoon, Burma (now Yangon, Myanmar), built by the Empire of Japan during World War II, to support its forces in the Burma campaign.
Forced labour was used in its construction. About 180,000 Asian labourers and 60,000 Allied prisoners of war (POWs) worked on the railway. Of these, around 90,000 Asian labourers (mainly romusha) and 16,000 Allied POWs died as a direct result of the project. The dead POWs included 6,318 British personnel, 2,815 Australians, 2,490 Dutch, about 356 Americans and a smaller number of Canadians and New Zealanders.
