Taukkyan Memorial
- Country Myanmar
- Total identified casualties 46 Find these casualties
- Identified casualties from First & Second World War
- GPS Coordinates Latitude: 17.03583, Longitude: 96.13141
gardens of the death railway
Thanbyuzayat War Cemetery.
Pounding heat and flash floods – the weather in Myanmar poses the Commonwealth War Graves Commission its fair share of difficulties.
Our team here is responsible for maintaining nearly 12,000 graves, but the graves look a little different to those familiar with our work in Europe. Each one is marked by a bronze plaque set into the ground on a pedestal of stone.
In Myanmar bronze plaques take the place of Portland headstones to better withstand the climate.
These plaques weather better than Portland headstones in the intense heat and the rain of South East Asia.
In Yangon – known to the British during the Second World War as Rangoon – we face opposing problems from the weather.
Rangoon War Cemetery, in the busy city centre, gets regularly submerged by flash floods. Our gardeners have to sweep away debris on a daily basis in the rainy season.
The iconic Rangoon Memorial at the heart of Taukkyan War Cemetery.
Yet just one hour away on the outskirts, at Taukkyan War Cemetery, we face a constant battle against the parched ground in the brutally hot and dry weather.
Taukkyan is a vast cemetery with almost 6,500 graves. They are carefully laid out in rows around the distinctive shape of the Rangoon Memorial, which lists almost 27,000 missing war dead.
The war memorial is beginning to show signs of its age and we are preparing to restore it.
In its shadow, lies a more recent row of bronze plaques. They sit in a special plot, naming the 16 men aboard Dakota KN584.
The plane crashed in September 1945 killing all aboard. Only recently was it found they had been buried deep in the jungle, making recovery impractical. Instead, their relatives now have somewhere accessible to pay their respects with a row of special memorials in our war cemetery.
The last of our three sites in Myanmar is Thanbyuzayat. The cemetery sits a stone’s throw from the end of the infamous death railway.
A cross at the entrance to Thanbyuzayat, made from wooden sleepers on the death railway.
This cross-country route was built by forced labour, including prisoners of war, during the Second World War, in often gruelling conditions. It has been said that a man died for every sleeper laid across the 415-kilometre (258 mi) route of the railway. Many of those who died, lie at rest in CWGC’s care.
And as a reminder of what they went through, visitors to Thanbyuzayat will see a handmade wooden cross in the cemetery’s entrance, assembled out of those infamous railway sleepers by prisoners.
Location information
Taukkyan War Cemetery is in Taukkyan town in the township of Mingaladon, Yangon greater area, on the main highway No 1 (Pyay Road). From the centre of the city of Yangon, it is 21 miles north and 11 miles from the International airport, 1 hour drive from the centre of Rangoon and 30 minutes from the International airport. Exact location of the cemetery is North (17º02'08.24") and East (96º07'55.28").
Visiting information
Taukkyan War Cemetery is open everyday from 07:00-17:00.
Accompanied wheelchair access is possible through the main entrance and unaccompanied through the side entrance adjacent to the office. For further information regarding wheelchair access please contact our Enquiries Section on +44 (0)1628 507200.
History information
The TAUKKYAN MEMORIAL commemorates 46 servicemen of both wars who died and were buried elsewhere in Burma (now Myanmar) but whose graves could not be maintained. It should not be confused with the much larger Rangoon Memorial which commemorates 27,000 men with no known graves and is also located within Taukkyan War Cemetery.
The 19 First World War casualties commemorated on this memorial served in garrisons and lie buried in the following cemeteries: Aungban Cemetery; Bassein Church of England Cemetery; Diamond Island Cof E Cemetery; Kungyangon Cemetery; Lwekaw Cemetery; Mangthone Military Grave; Prome Government Cemetery; Pyinmana Cemetery; Shwebo Cantonment Cemetery.
The memorial stands in TAUKKYAN WAR CEMETERY, which is the largest of the three war cemeteries in Burma. It was begun in 1951 for the reception of graves from four battlefield cemeteries at Akyab, Mandalay, Meiktila and Sahmaw which were difficult to access and could not be maintained. The last was an original 'Chindit' cemetery containing many of those who died in the battle for Myitkyina. The graves have been grouped together at Taukkyan to preserve the individuality of these battlefield cemeteries
Burials were also transferred from civil and cantonment cemeteries, and from a number of isolated jungle and roadside sites. Because of prolonged post-war unrest, considerable delay occurred before the Army Graves Service were able to complete their work, and in the meantime many such graves had disappeared. However, when the task was resumed, several hundred more graves were retrieved from scattered positions throughout the country and brought together here.
The cemetery now contains 6,374 Commonwealth burials of the Second World War, 867 of them unidentified.
In the 1950s, the graves of 52 Commonwealth servicemen of the First World War were brought into the cemetery from the following cemeteries where permanent maintenance was not possible: Henzada (1); Meiktila Cantonment (8); Thayetmyo New (5); Thamakan (4); Mandalay Military (12) and Maymyo Cantonment (22).
Taukkyan War Cemetery also contains:
The RANGOON MEMORIAL, which bears the names of almost 27,000 men of the Commonwealth land forces who died during the campaigns in Burma and who have no known grave.
The TAUKKYAN CREMATION MEMORIAL, which commemorates more than 1,000 Second World War casualties who died in campaigns in Burma whose remains were cremated in accordance with their faith.