The Mystery of Bukit Timah Tomb and Hungry Ghost
Howls
What are the secrets of the
caves in Bukit Timah Hill?
1. First cave; 2. Second cave; 3. Third cave; 4. SPI discovered a mysterious tomb in Bukit Timah
Written by John Kwok, PhD candidate, History
researcher
The
Mystery
A thick mystery has canopied SPI for
some years. It all started from a posting made at SPI forum in
year 2004. Further speculations related to hungry ghost
haunting, by other postings added on to the thickness of the
mystery. It goes by the original post that tells a personal
experience of a forum user that he supposes in Bukit Timah
Nature Park there are two caves (actually there are three)
which were used as torture chambers by the Japanese, hence
spooky and haunted.
First cave, second cave, third
cave, they are about 50 meters apart
Here is the original post:
UserHK
Posted: Wed May 26, 2004 3:36 pm
I went
to Bt Timah hill at last Saturday with some small primary
school boys. (I had to accompany them and lead the way)
During their rest time, I went to explore the cave path with
a teacher and i found two caves. The teacher said that it
was one of the torture chambers used by the Japanese during
the world war II. I tried to look inside and i saw water
dripping there. It was quite spooky inside there
too Based on the gruesome concept of
"torture chambers" which implies horrendous death took place,
the caves became reputably haunted. Following up this idea of
killing place, some vivid details of haunting were toted up in
our forum and public writing into SPI mailbox.
1 & 2. Torture cave in Baigonguan, China. The cave was used to be air-raid shelter.
Later it was converted to a prison that used to torture political prisoners. More info here.
3 & 4. Artist impressions of people being tortured during the war
To sum
up, hearsay has it that during hungry ghost month every year,
one can surely encounter paranormal at Bukit Timah Nature
Reserve (BTNR). The descriptions of haunting go like this:
"when walk near the caves, you can hear ghost howling. They
are the cries from the souls of the victims wronged to die
during the Japanese cruel torture. Not only you can hear the
howl, you can see their faint apparitions flashing around when
you peep deep enough into the dark cave like an endless
pitch."
Scary as it sounds. There is more of it. The
rumour says near the caves, there is a mass burial grave that
belongs to the victims killed in the tortures. Many dead
bodies were conveniently dumped into such a big hole, and
covered with thin soil at each round of killing. This is said
to be a military secret during the WW2 which not many people
know. No offering was given because it wasn't known by many.
So the poor souls howl and cry, most fiercely especially
during Lunar Seventh Month. That is the only period of time
hell gates open and they can come out to mourn for their
return of justice.
Photos of the first cave, taken at three different angles
When zoomed into the very end of the cave, a ghostly face appeared in the pitch darkness.
Is the face just a manifestation of random rock patterns or a supernatural sign? You'd be the judge
If you look carefully, you'd see the left eye is weeping, and the expression is bearing in grief
The four photos are again taken at different angles.
Another related paranormal incident
to the caves and mass burial is at the Bukit Timah quarry. In
the 70's and earlier, the quarry was still filled with water
collected from the hill, ideal for swimming. It was known as a
popular public swimming place as some elders might still
remember.
It served as a swimming pool until several
drowning cases happened. Lately the quarry was sealed off from
entry for safety reasons, let alone swimming in it. The deaths
were attributed to the water ghosts in the water who so-called
"looking for substitutes of their death" for their chance of
reincarnation.
During Hungry Ghost month, it was such
an Old Wives' Tales that swimming is tabooed especially in the
Bukit Timah Quarry. Well, the ghosts were also rumoured to be
those victims murdered during WW2 at BTNR. The ghosts would
pull the legs of the swimmers and made them drown at the water
quarry.
So in summary, the haunting by the hearsay is
listed as below:
- Caves were used as torture chambers by the Japanese
soldiers
- Many killings occurred but the dead were not given a
proper burial
- A mass burial grave was made somewhere near the cave,
but was forgotten
- Ghosts did not receive proper offerings; the unrest
souls are out to haunt the living
- One haunting is at the cave proximity, where vengeful
ghost crying can be heard and dark apparitions can be
seen
- The other haunting is connected to the Bukit Timah
Quarry that is a stone throw away; the forgotten ghosts
since cannot receive proper care of religious rituals they
pulled the legs of the swimmers, each man killed the ghosts
receive a chance to reincarnation.
- The ghost of the drown swimmer in turn, would have to
kill another swimmer to reincarnate. Such is a vicious
cycle.
In order to solve this thick mystery, we untangle it by
breaking down the research tasks:
What are those caves? What were they used for? Was it
really being used as torture chambers? Are ghosts really in
there? What actually caused the swimmers to die? What are
those crying moans and what are those flashing dark
apparitions in the cave? (Assume that the cries and sightings
were really perceived by the story tellers, and they were not
exaggerating).
The
investigation
SPI team recently checked out the caves, as well as
interviewed a passerby at BTNR. Starting from the Cave path,
follows a winding forest path Tiup Tiup Hut trail, one of the
longer and less popular routes to the summit. We found three
caves, at about 50 meters apart. The caves run very deep,
man-built, about 2 meters wide and 2 meters tall.
SPI set out to investigate Bukit Timah Hill
After trekking for half an hour, we found the caves but locked up with heavy metal gates
Close up views of the metal gates
Graffiti on the wall. What are these words? (Close up here) Vendalism or clues to the reasons of the metal gates?
He said here is haunted by many
spirits?
On that day when we investigated the caves, we crossed path
with a roughly 50's years man who was wearing a plain vest and
shorts. This man told us that the place is very haunted, full
of spirits. But to him, the spirits are pitiful entities by
his Buddhist religion. He told us he frequently went there for
the purpose of reciting prayers to them. We tried to ask
further about what spirits and where the spirits are. He gave
us a short reply "they are everywhere here" and left
swiftly.
A religious man was chanting mantras aloud in the midst of the forest, to the so-called wandering souls around the area
SPI agent had a short conversion with him
SPI bumped into a religious man who believes many spirits are in the forest. At the same time, he also mentioned that this place is called " " which literately means a small bridge over moving water. It is said to be a sacred place with strong and ubiquitous energies. The running water that forms a little stream is claimed to have healing power. We saw a couple came moments ago with water pals to carry away the water. They immersed their bodies under the stream, getting wet head over heels. Cooling as it surely is, how real might the healing power be?
To run an instant experiment, Kenny soaked his fresh wound on the arm that was accidently sratched during the forest exploration just now. Besides it washed the dirts away from the wound, no miraculous healing effect was observed yet. In order to have a more objective assessment, we collected a bottle of water sample to be sent for laboratory water quality tests. Is it really a supernatural elixir of life or just plain H2O with may be some extra mineral contents? SPI rationally verifies.
A holy place in the forest as perceived by some people, filled with spiritual energy.
It is however just a part of the old water catchment facility;
In the first photo, did you notice there is an orb some distance off from the bridge?
A scary face can be seen when it is enlarged.
Collected a bottle of water sample for analysis
Ghost
pull your legs at Bukit Timah Quarry
On another occasion, we investigated the Bukit Timah
quarry. The water level was about waist deep; but the rock
formation on the sea bed filled with many pits. In other
words, the bottom of the water quarry was not flat. One may
accidentally step on the deep pits, either sink straight in or
trapped in the soft mud. The mud is like a big suction to the
swimmer's foot. With panic and acute fear set in, the more the
swimmer struggled the more he sank with the quick-sand
effect.
Bukit Timah Water Quarry - rumours said ghost will pull legs of swimmers
View of the quarry from atop
Anyway, this is not verified
as we can never take a risk of putting a human experiment at
the water quarry. But from the photo records of Bukit Timah
quarry in the early days, we got to know that the rock
formation on the bottom is full of very ragged granites.
SPI discovered a strange solitary tomb
SPI team is climbing up a slope just before they discovered the tomb.
Along the way, in three consecutive photos, an orb is observed.
It is not known whether it is the same orb all the way. Close up shots are here: orb 1, orb 2, orb 3
A solitary Chinese tomb is discovered by surprise. It is facing East direction.
1. This is the Empresses stone tablet behind the main tomb, kind of coarsely built;
2. Some plastic bag debris remained there - possibly somebody came before long time ago;
3 & 4. Is this tomb the landmark to the treasure cave? We continued the search around the proximity
SPI found several other stone markers nearby too, with red paint on
There is an
incredible discovery when we were investigating the caves.
From the direction where the wind howls into the cave, we
observed a steep slope. A strange impulse motivated us to risk
climbing down the slope.
After a challenging
climb, we were stunned of what we saw - a Chinese tomb was
standing at the alcove of the slope. It was never known in any
written document that BTNP ever was used to be a cemetery. It
is an enigma why there was such a tomb.
The analysis and the
debunks
Pertaining to the mysteries listed below, we analysed our
findings by rationally reasoning:
Debunking Mystery 1: Ghosts haunting at the caves
and the quarry?
As for the haunting of the quarry, SPI by an on-site
investigation, found that the bottom of quarry was not made
flat, but full of ditches and lose sands. Quarries are so
dangerous to swim in because there are different layers in the
bottom. There could be boulders in places, or drop off sharply
in other places. The pitfalls plus the fear by the hungry
ghosts are the culprits responsible for many
deaths.
The bottom of a quarry which is full of dangerous ragged rocks before water filled in
The
ghostly cry and apparition sightings at the caves could be due
to the echo of the wind blowing into the cave and the
appearance of the wild animals in the nature reserve
respectively.
Quoting from Npark, BTNR indeed has a
variety of wild animals not very commonly known to the
public:
Bukit Timah Nature Reserve has been untouched
for almost the past 180 years. The 163-hectare reserve retains
one of the largest tracts of primary rainforest left in
Singapore.
"The forest is also home to more than
500 species of animals, including butterflies. Keen
observers may spot the Common Treeshrew (Tupaia glis), the
Flying Lemur (Cynocephalus variegatus) and with just a bit
of luck, the nocturnal Pangolin or Ant-eater Manis
javanica)."
Other animals that are common there
includes:
- Long-tailed Macaque (Macaca
fascicularis)
- Plantain Squirrel (Callosciurus
notatus)
- mildly venomous Oriental Whip Snake (Ahaetulla
prasina)
- Greater Racket-tailed Drongo (Dicrurus
paradiseus)
- Crimson Sunbird (Aethopyga sipahaja)
-
etc...
Yes, they like to howl
Their squeaking screams can be very scary when they are out of sight
For example, as an experiment here, can you see what the dark apparition is in the photo?
If you click on the thumb image above you will see a dark shadow;
But if the photo is brightened up, clearly the apparition is not a spook.
So lighting condition plays a large part in those so-called ghost sightings.
Furthermore the section of path along the Path Trail and
the Tiup Tiup Trail is densely forested. The canopy of tall
trees shades off most of the sunlight making the area eerily
dark even during daytime. So it is very likely that those dark
apparitions being spotted are merely birds and wild animals in
the jungle. Bats could have lived inside the caves
too.
Debunking Mystery 2: What are the caves
used for, torture chambers?
No record ever found in Singapore, caves were used as
torture chambers. It was just rumoured from hearsay at SPI
forum. Common sense can tell that it is not justifiable to
built three caves with deep tunnels, just for torturing
people. The sizes of the tunnel that measures no larger than 2
x 2 meters wouldn’t make a good space for torturing. Also, why
not just conveniently tied up the victims on a tree for
tortures in an open space? Many places in a jungle can be used
for torturing, such as those jungles at Burma when many POWs
were tortured in the Death of Railway.
The effort for
digging into solid granite for three cave tunnels seems to
serve a better purpose. A brief search on the internet yields
some preliminary results of mentioning that the caves were
used for storing supplies and ammunitions during the Japanese
occupation by the Japanese army. The same was told to SPI by
making inquiries to the information help desk at BTNR
too.
Lets examine the structure of the cave, especially the flooring.
There seem to be some broken fragements of slates on the ground.
Does this imply it used to have a solid ground over which heavy items (on wheels) can easily be transported?
1. The cave is somehow shaped like a funnel with a wide space at the front;
You can see that the side walls are almost vertically flat;
2. In one of the cave, there is a strange light somewhere in the middle; See enlarged;
Does it mean there may be an opening somewhere over the top of the cave tunnel?
3 & 4. To verify this, SPI climbed up over the cave and did some carpet search.
This makes sense because an underground shelter
provided by the cave tunnel is an ideal shock-resistant
storage place for ammunition. The usage of these cave tunnels
were generally believed in this way, although a bunker would a
preferred choice. However, upon consultation of Dr John Kwok,
a lecturer from an Australian University, as well as our SPI
Advisor, John found some records of oral interview (accession
number 002849) at Singapore National Archive that indicate
otherwise. The caves were not likely built for storing supply
and ammunition, but TREASURES by referencing to the records.
And the tomb discovered by SPI is the "key" to the secret
treasures!
According to a Japanese WW2 veteran, whose
name was HIGASHIURA Yoshifumi, there were 3 caves that were
dug by the Japanese soldiers in the forest of Singapore,
believed to safe-keep Singapore's artifacts and treasures. The
interviewee was one of them who dug the caves.
He also
said that near the caves would be "a stone marker with red
words" when being asked on how to find the caves. We suppose
there was no prominent landmark or special feature that can
identify the location of the caves, so that the Chinese "tomb"
that has a front stone slab with red words was taken as the
key position marker.
Here is the synopsis of the oral
interview record by Higashiura Yoshifumi at National
Archive:
Interviewee ordered to dig three
caves in forest of Singapore. Believed caves were meant to
safe-keep Singapore's artifacts and treasures. Described the
structure of the tunnels. Interviewee believed that
treasures were kept within. Described the location of the
tunnels.
This is John's observation. The National Archive
interviewer was asking him where the caves are. He replied
vaguely... like "100 meters further deeper in the jungle and
go around the hill. Go to your right, when you find the marker
with red words, the caves are there."
Each cave was
described to be at least seven to eight meters deep. They were
dug sometime in 1944. The tone of the interviewer was like
pressing him for information. On one hand it sounds like the
ramblings of an old man. On the other hand, he sounded very
sure about those tunnels.
So quite clearly, if the
Japanese veteran was telling the truth - the caves are built
by the Japanese to hide the treasures and artifacts of
Singapore. Those treasures probably were looted during the
Japanese occupation time. How true and believable this account
can be? By referring to the legend of Yamashita Gold in
Philippines, many similar caves were dug for storing loots of
treasures.
Illustrative photos that resemble how treasure caves look like
Why then the Japanese
needed those cave tunnels to store the treasures? Wouldn't it
be better if can get them transported directly back to Japan
during the occupation? Well, by 1943 the Japanese were no
longer in control of the seas... It doesn't make sense to
bring in something that valuable here when you know it's going
to be lost to the Americans anyway. It however could be a good
contingency plan that they temporarily hide the treasure in a
very secret place (like the three caves with relative
unnoticeable entrances in a thick jungle) with only the tomb
being the marker "key".
And coincidentally, the caves
were dug in year 1944 that was about a year later when the
Japanese realized that they no longer can take the sea route
safely to send home the treasure. Hence the contingency plan
of burring the treasures in a secret location took place, in
the hope of recovering them when the war was over in the
future.
Chronologically it goes like this:
End of 1941, the Chinese tomb was
erected
1942, Japan invaded
Singapore, probably looted certain amount of
treasures
1943, Japan started to
lose power in sea to the Americans, sea transportation of
treasure may not be feasible anymore
1944, Japanese army dug the caves for
hiding the treasures
Subsequently, by the old Japanese
soldier's account, the tomb was the "key" to the
caves.
Debunking Mystery 3: Why a Chinese tomb was
found at BTNR?
It seems like the tomb fits the description of a marker
with red words in the account of oral interview at National
Archive. In this case, the tomb may be established with a
significant reason - as a marker to the treasure cave, if it
is not a coincidence that it happened to be
there.
Observing around, there are no other tombs
around implying that the area was not meant to be a cemetery.
Compared to the famous "Water Tomb" at McRitchie Reservoir
which was believed to be built because of the Feng Shui
environment facing the water, the tomb at BTNR is just a
simple tomb without any Feng Shui
resemblance.
Furthermore, the tomb at BTNR looks quite
"make-shift" as if it was built in a hurry. You can see the
inscription of the BTNR tomb tablet was quite sketchy too, but
the words are in red-paint.
Perhaps this solitary tomb
was deliberately erected there as a marker telling the
position of the secret caves. If so, this must be a clever
idea as tombs are common objects which people would not pay
much attention about (except may be SPI : ) and to the
traditional Chinese concept, people would leave tombs alone
out of respect.
This is just a speculation anyway.
However, the year when the tomb was established might give
some clue: 30th year of Taiwan national calendar, 29 December.
Converting to western calendar, that was the end of year 1941.
That was the year even before the Japanese aggression army set
foot in Singapore.
Therefore, the tomb shouldn't be
erected by the Japanese as a disguise of a position marker. It
is nevertheless possible that the Japanese might have
discovered this tomb in 1944, and conveniently used it as a
position marker to dig the caves. The tomb, as well as the
caves, are facing direct East as found by SPI.
So why
the tomb was located there which later made use by the
Japanese army to dig caves and hid treasures?
It is still a mystery.
Perhaps you can help us to unlock the mystery...
Inscription that dictates the details
Close-up of the words which are clearly shown on the tomb - Do you know who this Madam Hsu is? Please send us an email. We would like to hear from you to complete this mystery.
Bukit
Timah is known to be very haunted, as it was famous for its
battle-fields. Some facts about Bukit Timah hill had many
killings is as below:
http://warstudy.com/history/world_war/jp_singapore/006.xml#a10
Also
during Hungry Ghost Month, the dead in the forest (the caves)
and the quarry seek out to haunt us because they were ignored
and had not received sufficient offerings.
As the
historical records indicate, the caves were dug by the
Japanese for storing treasures. There is no known record of
killings at the cave. The quarry was simply dangerous and some
careless swimmers met some mishaps there. The fear created in
the swimmers’ minds made the drowning as a vicious viral
cycle.
The tomb however may simply be a tomb so
happened to be chosen there. In other countries, it is common
to have graves scattered over mountains and hills. It has
nothing paranormal about that.
What
view is yours in this case? Welcome to share you opinion
here.
Case to be Closed |
