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Thanbyuzayat
The name of the town is taken from a not-too-long rest house roofed with galvanized iron standing near the marketplace. A war memorial here holds the graves of 3,770 British, Australian, Dutch and Gurkha prisoners-of-war who died while constructing the infamous "death railway" under supervision of Japanese forces during the Second World War. Bronze grave makers are inscribed with the personal number, rank, name and age.
Work on the memorial began right after the end of the war and completed at a cost of one million Kyat. It was formally inaugurated on 10th December 1946 by General Aung San and then Governor Sir Hubert Rance.
The Death Railway
A railway line 175 miles long starting from Thanbyuzayat to eventually link up with Bangkok was begun during 1943 while the Second World War was at its height. A total of 331,000 including 270,000 civilians and 61,000 Allied prisoners-of-war were impressed into service by Japanese authorities to toil under inhuman conditions in difficult terrain and malarial environment resulting in the deaths of thousands and the application of this gruesome epithet to the project.
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