The JEATH War Museum ( Thai : พิพิธภัณฑ์อักษะเชลยศึก ) are two war museums in Kanchanaburi , Thailand about the Death Railway , which was built from 1942 to 1943 by Allied POWs under the direction of the Japanese as part of the Thai-Burma railways. The older JEATH museum is located in the CBD area of Kanchanaburi, while the other is located near the Bridge over the River Kwai.
7-446: The acronym JEATH stands for the primary nationalities involved in the construction of the railway: Japanese, English, Australian, American, Thai and Dutch, whereas the Thai name is Phíphítháphan Songkhram Wát Tâi (Wat Tai War Museum). The museum was founded in 1977 by the chief abbot of Wat Chaichumpol Venerable Phra Theppanyasuthee. It is located on the grounds of a temple at the junction of
14-622: Is an embankment dam for river regulation and hydroelectric power generation. The famous bridge of the Burma Railway crosses the river at Tha Makham Subdistrict of the Mueang District. However, this is not the same bridge as depicted in The Bridge over the River Kwai by Pierre Boulle and in its film adaptation . A bridge was built of wood approximately 100 metres (330 ft) upriver from
21-827: The Khwae Noi to form the Mae Klong River at Pak Phraek. This river used to be the upper section (before the confluence with the Khwae Noi River ) of the Mae Klong River , however, in the 1960s, this river was named the Khwae Yai River, meaning 'Big River.' In 1980, the Srinagarind Dam (Thai: เขื่อนศรีนครินทร์; rtgs: Khuean Sinakharin) on the Khwae Yai was completed in Si Sawat District of Kanchanaburi Province . It
28-708: The Khwae Yai and Khwae Noi rivers in Kanchanaburi and it is a part of the famous The Bridge over the River Kwai saga. The museum is divided into two sections, one depicting the construction of the Death Railway which is meant to recreate the quarters used by Allied POWs, and the other consisting of reconstructed bamboo huts containing such items as paintings, drawings and photos of and by former prisoners, weapons, tools, and maps. Tourist photos are not permitted in Section I of
35-506: The current bridge, during the construction of the iron and concrete bridge (which runs in a NNE-SSW direction) and also rebuilt in 1945 when the iron bridge was bombed. No remnants of the wooden bridge remain. That wooden bridge was also not the bridge depicted in the film as the river was not called the Kwai Yai at that time. A wooden trestle bridge was built over the Kwai Noi many miles upstream in
42-459: The jungle and it would more closely resemble the bridge in the film. However, the film is really a fictional depiction of the events with many inaccuracies and neither bridge can really be said to be that depicted in the film. Up until the 1960s, the river was considered part of the Mae Klong itself, but this part of the Mae Klong was then renamed Khwae Yai to bring geographical fact more in line with
49-606: The museum. Khwae Yai River The Khwae Yai River ( Thai : แม่น้ำแควใหญ่ , RTGS : Maenam Khwae Yai , IPA: [mɛ̂ːnáːm kʰwɛː jàj] ), also known as the Si Sawat ( แม่น้ำศรีสวัสดิ์ [mɛ̂ː náːm sǐː sa.wàt] ), is a river in western Thailand . It has its source in the Tenasserim Hills and flows for about 380 kilometres (240 mi) through Sangkhla Buri , Si Sawat , and Mueang Districts of Kanchanaburi Province , where it merges with
#153846