http://www.tevis.net/index.php?/home/story/massacre-by-crocodiles-on-ramree-island/
I found a reference to this fascinating event yesterday and have collated as much about it as I could find online:
The crocodile attack to claim the most human lives took place on February 19, 1945, when an Imperial Japanese Army unit guarding a stronghold on the Burmese island of Ramree was outflanked by a British naval force. The soldiers were forced to cross 16 km (10 miles) of mangrove swamps to rejoin a larger battalion of the Japanese infantry. The swamps were home to thousands of 4.6-m (15-ft) saltwater crocodiles.
The naturalist Bruce Wright was a member of the British forces who had trapped the Japanese on Ramree. He was sitting on a marine launch grounded on the slimy mire of a channel running through the labyrinth of the swamp and his account of the night of the 19 February 1945 outlines the grisly scene.
ââ¬ÅThat night was the most horrible that any member of the M.L. [marine launch] crews ever experienced. The scattered rifle shots in the pitch black swamp punctured by the screams of wounded men crushed in the jaws of huge reptiles, and the blurred worrying sound of spinning crocodiles made a cacophony of hell that has rarely been duplicated on earth. At dawn the vultures arrived to clean up what the crocodiles had left...Of about 1,000 Japanese soldiers that entered the swamps of Ramree, only about 20 were found alive.ââ¬Â
However, there is some doubt based on historical accounts that this event actually occurred. A number of older Ramree Island residents were interviewed and they discounted any suggestion that large numbers of soldiers fell prey to crocodiles. One informant who conducts regular tours for visiting Japanese veterans stated his clients often recount their experiences, but have never mentioned crocodile attacks
