Mount Pilok

Mount pilok is a 513 meters high mountain naer Sangkhla Buri. In the area were tin and wolfram mines on the Tanao Si Range, a natural boundary between Thailand and Myanmar. The Japanese plan to build the Siam-Burma railway got a bad start when the commander of the 9th Railway Regiment, Lt-Gen Shimada Nobuo, and his senior officers were killed in a plane crash in January 1943, while surveying the proposed route. The plane developed engine trouble and crashed in the virgin jungle near Mount Pilok. Twelve of the 13 officers on board died in the crash. The consequences were tragic for both the Japanese and the allied prisoners of war who were to pay with their lives for miscalculations made by Junior Japanese engineers using a 19th century map. The lone Japanese survivor sparked speculation that he had buried a fortune in gold bullion in the jungle before seeking help from Thai villagers. According to a newspaper story dated 6 February 1984, the Japanese Embassy in Bangkok sent two diplomats to investigate the crash site after receiving a report from a villager he found a coin in the area. Yukinori Sato, counsellor and defence attaché, and an embassy official, hiked an exhausting nine hours through impenetrable jungle to find the wreckage and retrieve war relics including the general's sword, several sub-machineguns and another coin. [Notes on the Thai-Burma Railway]

Ayutthaya Historical Research