JEATH War Museum

The JEATH War Museum in Kanchanaburi, Thailand, commemorates the construction of the Death Railway during World War II, highlighting the experiences of Allied POWs.

Planning your visit

JEATH takes its name from the nationalities involved — Japan, England, America and Australia, Thailand and Holland — and it was founded in 1977 by the abbot of a local temple, built as a reconstruction of the bamboo huts in which Allied prisoners of war were housed while building the Thai-Burma railway.

That railway, driven through jungle and rock in 1942 and 1943, killed somewhere over 12,000 Allied prisoners and a far larger number of conscripted Asian labourers, whose deaths went largely unrecorded. The bridge over the Khwae Yai, made famous by the film, stands a short distance away.

The museum is deliberately unsophisticated: photographs, drawings made by prisoners, tools, personal effects and newspaper cuttings displayed in the reconstructed huts, without modern interpretation. Some visitors find that directness effective; others prefer the more curated Thailand-Burma Railway Centre nearby, which is better organised historically. Both are worth distinguishing before choosing.

Kanchanaburi is around three hours from Bangkok. Bookable options combine the museum with the bridge and Erawan waterfall. Current availability is shown below.