"Unknown to others": Prisoners of War detained in Taiwan
Allied Prisoners of War in Taiwan Endure Brutal Conditions During World War II
During World War II, more than 4,300 Allied servicemen captured across Southeast Asia were sent to Japanese-run prisoner of war (PoW) camps in Taiwan, including the infamous Kinkaseki camp near Taipei. These camps, which operated under Japanese rule from 1895 until 1945, were part of over a dozen on the island.
The conditions in these camps were harsh, with malnutrition, disease, overwork, and mistreatment leading to the deaths of approximately 430 men by the war's end in Taiwan alone.
Malnutrition and starvation were common, as prisoners received minimal food rations, often only small amounts of poorly prepared rice. Medical care was rudimentary at best, with basic tools like razor blades being used for surgeries such as appendectomies. Forced labor was grueling and dangerous, contributing to high mortality rates among POWs and local civilians used as laborers.
Before arriving in Taiwan, many POWs endured horrific journeys aboard Japanese "hell ships," such as the Arisan Maru, where they were packed so tightly below decks that disease spread rapidly and starvation was severe. The sinking of the Arisan Maru in 1944 resulted in nearly total loss of the 1,782 POWs aboard.
The systemic dehumanization by Imperial Japan treated POWs as expendable laborers rather than prisoners of war. Memorials such as one at the former Kinkaseki camp site now honor thousands of Allied servicemen who suffered and died in these camps.
Canadian filmmaker Anne Wheeler, whose father was among the more than 1,100 prisoners of war held in Kinkaseki, discovered her father's diaries after his death in 1963 and turned them into a documentary titled "A War Story." Michael Hurst, a Canadian amateur military historian in Taipei, has spent years researching these PoW camps and is still trying to keep the stories of the POWs held in Taiwan alive through the Taiwan PoW Camps Memorial Society and private tours.
Eighty years after Japan's surrender, little physical evidence remains of the PoW camps in Taiwan. A memorial in a park in northern Taiwan honors more than 4,000 British and US servicemen who were prisoners of war during World War II. Kinkaseki, now known as one of the worst PoW camps in Asia, is one of over a dozen PoW camps run by Japan in Taiwan.
Taiwan was a key staging ground for Japan's operations during World War II, and the harsh conditions of its PoW camps were long overshadowed by Japan's Death Railway between Myanmar and Thailand. A Taiwanese woman taking a tour with Hurst had never studied this part of World War II history at school.
Despite the passage of time, the stories of the men who endured these brutal conditions continue to be remembered and honored.
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