All historic sites
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217 sites · page 3 of 10
Shinchiku Prefecture Office (now Hsinchu City Government)
新竹州庁（現・新竹市政府）
The former Shinchiku Prefecture Office (新竹州廳) is a two-story reinforced-brick building, begun in 1925 and brought into use after its ridge-raising ceremony in November 1927 (1926 is often given as the completion date), at the administrative heart of Hsinchu City, Taiwan. Constructed during the Japanese colonial period as the seat of Shinchiku Prefecture — one of five prefectures (州) governing Taiwan from 1920 — the building is a landmark example of Japanese-Western hybrid (和洋混合) colonial architecture, combining a Western neoclassical body with an Eastern-style sloped tile roof. Its U-shaped plan features a prominent double-columned portico entrance flanked by twin towers, interior Roman-arched corridors, and balconies on three sides designed for Taiwan's subtropical climate. The portico was extended in 1932. During the Pacific War, the building served as the nerve centre for Shinchiku Prefecture's wartime mobilization, civil defence, and resource allocation across a vast jurisdiction encompassing modern-day Hsinchu City, Hsinchu County, Taoyuan City, and Miaoli County. In 1944–45 Hsinchu suffered repeated Allied bombing raids targeting its airfield and railway facilities; the Prefecture Office survived. After Japan's surrender on 15 August 1945, the building was handed over to the Republic of China administration on 25 October 1945 and has since served alternately as the Hsinchu County and Hsinchu City government offices, housing the city government continuously since the county government moved to Zhubei in 1989. Designated a provincial monument in 1998 and later reclassified as a National Monument (國定古蹟), the building continues to house city government functions; the nearby former Hsinchu City Hall (新竹市役所), a separate building, has housed the Hsinchu City Art Gallery (新竹市美術館) since 2007.
Shirakawa POW Camp (Taiwan Camp No. 4)
白河捕虜収容所（臺灣俘虜収容所第四分所）
Shirakawa POW Camp (Taiwan POW Camp No. 4) was a Japanese prisoner-of-war camp established in June 1943 at the former Neijiao Army Exercise Ground (內角陸軍演習所) in Baihe District, Tainan, colonial Taiwan. Known as the "officers' camp," it held 300–500 Allied prisoners — predominantly senior military officers and colonial officials from the United States, United Kingdom, Netherlands, and Australia — although the very highest-ranking captives held at Karenko, the group of Lt-Gen Arthur Percival (the British commander who surrendered Singapore) and governors such as Sir Shenton Thomas (Straits Settlements), are recorded as having been sent to Taihoku Camp No. 5 rather than to Shirakawa. Transferred primarily from Karenko (Hualien) Camp, prisoners were forced to perform agricultural labour on starvation rations. The camp served as a de facto hospital camp from late 1944 after most of the senior officers were transferred to Manchuria in the autumn of 1944. The camp operated until August 1945 and was liberated following Japan's surrender. In November 2013, the Taiwan POW Camps Memorial Society dedicated a memorial stone at the site entrance. Today the former camp grounds remain under military control as the Neijiao Military Camp (內角營區), now the Army Southern Region Testing and Evaluation Center.
Shoushan Cave Fortification Complex
高雄寿山洞窟陣地群
An extensive network of Japanese military tunnels, cave fortifications, and underground positions excavated into Shoushan (Monkey Mountain) in Kaohsiung during WWII. As the headquarters of the Kaohsiung Fortress (高雄要塞), the mountain was honeycombed with dozens of tunnel systems serving as coastal defense gun emplacements, ammunition magazines, command posts, communications centers, and air-raid shelters. Distinct from the individual Gushan Cave tourist site, this complex encompasses the broader network of military cave positions spread across Shoushan that formed the core of Japan's southwestern Taiwan defense system.
Sun Moon Lake Hydroelectric Power Plant (Daguan / Mingtan Power Plants)
日月潭水力發電所
Colonial Taiwan's largest hydroelectric complex, built by Taiwan Electric Power Company (台灣電力株式會社) between 1919 and 1934 at Sun Moon Lake, Nantou Prefecture. With five 22 MW generators (about 100 MW rated output), it was the largest hydroelectric power plant in Asia upon completion. The facility supplied over 60% of Taiwan's total electricity, powering wartime industries including aluminum smelting, chemical manufacturing, and military production. Heavily bombed by US aircraft in March 1945, destroying the main transformers and crippling Taiwan's industrial power supply. Now preserved as the Daguan Power Plant (大觀發電廠) and Mingtan Power Plant (明潭發電廠), both still operated by Taipower.
Sun Moon Lake Second Hydroelectric Power Plant (Jugong Power Plant)
日月潭第二発電所（鉅工発電所）
The second hydroelectric power plant of the Sun Moon Lake system, completed in August 1937 in Shuili Township, Nantou County, Taiwan. Built by the Taiwan Electric Power Company during the Japanese colonial period, the 43.5 MW facility utilized tailwater from the first Sun Moon Lake plant through a 4,409-meter tunnel, generating approximately 150 million kWh annually to fuel Taiwan's wartime industrialization. The plant was severely damaged by Allied bombing in March 1945 but was rebuilt after the war and remains operational today.
Taichung Park & Taichung Shrine Ruins
台中公園・台中神社跡
Taichung Park, established in 1903 during the Japanese colonial period, is one of Taiwan's oldest public parks. It originally housed the first-generation Taichung Shrine (台中神社, est. 1911), whose remnants — including stone lanterns, a torii gate laid on its side, bronze horses and stone lions — still survive in the park grounds. The park's iconic Huixin Pavilion (湖心亭), built in 1908 on the central lake, is a designated municipal monument and Taichung's best-known landmark.
Taichung Prefectural Hall
台中州庁
Baroque-Mansard government building designed by Moriyama Matsunosuke (森山松之助) and constructed 1913–1934 as the administrative headquarters of Taichū Prefecture (台中州) during Japanese colonial rule. Designated a national monument (國定古蹟) in 2019, the hall served as the wartime seat of the prefectural governor overseeing mobilization, rationing, and civil defense across present-day Taichung, Changhua, and Nantou. After 1945 it became the Taichung City Government office.
Taichung Shuinan Airfield
台中飛行場
The Imperial Japanese Army's largest airfield in central Taiwan, established around 1936–1940 in Taichū Prefecture. The airfield served as both a military base and the only civilian airport in the prefecture, operating scheduled flights to Japan proper. During the final months of the Pacific War, Shuinan hosted kamikaze special attack units and was heavily bombed by U.S. carrier aircraft on January 3, 1945. A surviving WW2-era machine gun bunker (機槍堡) is designated a historic building. The former airfield site is now the Shuinan Economic and Trade Park (水湳經貿園區).
Taihoku Higher School (now National Taiwan Normal University)
台湾総督府台北高等学校
Taihoku Higher School (台北高等学校) was the most elite preparatory institution in colonial Taiwan, established in 1922 by the Government-General of Taiwan. As the only higher school (高等学校) on the island, it was, until a university preparatory course opened in 1941, the only route on the island into the imperial universities, most notably Taihoku Imperial University. Admission was highly competitive and Taiwanese students were a small minority; the school educated future leaders including Lee Teng-hui, who later became President of the Republic of China. During the final years of the war, students were mobilized for the war effort. After Japan's surrender in 1945, the institution was reorganized and its campus became the foundation of what is now National Taiwan Normal University (NTNU), whose heritage buildings from the Japanese colonial era are designated historic sites by Taipei City.
Taihoku Prisoner of War Camp No. 6
台北捕虜収容所第六分所
Taihoku Prisoner of War Camp No. 6, located in the Dazhi district of Taipei (then Taihoku), was one of the principal Allied POW camps in Japanese-occupied Taiwan (Formosa) during World War II. Operational from November 1942 to September 1945, the camp held approximately 500 prisoners at any given time — almost entirely British troops, initially of the Royal Artillery and the Indian 11th Division's signals unit, captured at the fall of Singapore and transported aboard the hellship England Maru. The 74 POWs who died in captivity were victims of malnutrition, tropical disease, and harsh forced labor including park and lake construction, farming, and work in bus and railway repair shops. In its final year the camp served as a transit hub for prisoners being shipped to Japan and Manchuria. The site is now occupied by the Republic of China Ministry of National Defense headquarters in Dazhi, where a memorial stele was erected in 2011 by the Taiwan POW Camps Memorial Society.
Taihoku Station (Third-Generation Building)
台北驛（第三代駅舎）
The third-generation Taipei Station, completed in 1940 and in service by 1941 in modernist style, was the principal railway station in colonial Taiwan and a critical military transportation hub during WWII. It was demolished in 1986.
Tainan Air Raid Site (Tang Te-chang Memorial Park)
台南大空襲跡（湯德章紀念公園）
Tang Te-chang Memorial Park in central Tainan marks the epicenter of the devastating March 1, 1945 air raid, the most destructive Allied bombing of Tainan city during WWII. The US Fifth Air Force dispatched B-24 Liberators from the 22nd and 43rd Bombardment Groups, dropping 500-pound high-explosive and incendiary bombs that burned or destroyed 1,073 houses across the city center, causing massive civilian casualties.
Tainan Airfield (present-day Tainan Airport)
台南飛行場（現台南空港）
Major Imperial Japanese military airfield in southwestern Taiwan, operational from 1937. Home of the elite Tainan Air Group (台南海軍航空隊) whose Zero fighter pilots — including aces Saburō Sakai, Hiroyoshi Nishizawa, and Junichi Sasai — launched the devastating December 8, 1941 attack on Clark and Iba airfields in the Philippines. The base remained a naval air station (765th Naval Air Group from February 1945) while Taiwan's airfields served as staging points for special attack (tokko) sorties during the 1945 Okinawa campaign. Repeatedly bombed by American B-24 and B-25 aircraft from March to July 1945.
Tainan Prefecture Office
台南州庁
The Tainan Prefecture Office (台南州廳) was the highest administrative center in Tainan during the Japanese colonial period of Taiwan. Designed by prominent architect Moriyama Matsunosuke and completed in 1916, the Late Renaissance-style building served as the seat of the Tainan Prefectural Government. On March 1, 1945, U.S. B-24 bombers devastated the building during the Great Tainan Air Raid, with incendiary bombs destroying the Mansard roof, watchtowers, and all wooden structural elements, leaving only the outer walls standing. After the war it was roughly repaired for the ROC Air Force Supply Command (1949) and then served as Tainan City Hall from 1969 until 1997. Following extensive restoration, it reopened in 2003 as the National Museum of Taiwan Literature, Taiwan's first national museum dedicated to literary arts.
Taipei Broadcasting Bureau (Taihoku Hōsōkyoku)
台北放送局（JFAK）
The Taipei Broadcasting Bureau (台北放送局, call sign JFAK) was the central radio broadcasting station of colonial Taiwan; it began experimental broadcasts in 1928, and its surviving performance hall was built by the Governor-General's Office in 1930. On August 15, 1945, it relayed the Emperor's Gyokuon-hōsō surrender broadcast to the people of Taiwan, marking the end of Japanese rule. In 1947, the station was seized by protesters during the 228 Incident to broadcast calls for resistance. Since 1997 the building has served as the Taipei 228 Memorial Museum.
Taipei Prefecture Office
台北州庁
The Taipei Prefecture Office (台北州廳), completed in 1915 as the office of Taihoku-chō (台北廳), was from 1920 the administrative headquarters of Taihoku Prefecture (台北州) during Japanese colonial rule over Taiwan (1895–1945). Designed by prominent colonial architect Matsunosuke Moriyama (森山松之助), the Renaissance-style red brick building served as the seat of government for northern Taiwan — encompassing modern-day Taipei, Keelung, and Yilan. After Japan's surrender in 1945 the building passed to the Republic of China authorities, and since 1958 it has housed the Control Yuan (監察院). It is designated a National Monument (國定古蹟) and is considered one of the best-preserved post-Renaissance colonial buildings in Taiwan.
Taipei Public Hall (Zhongshan Hall)
台北公会堂
Taipei Public Hall (台北公会堂, Taihoku Kōkaidō), completed in 1936, was the largest public assembly hall in colonial Taiwan. On 25 October 1945, the Japanese surrender ceremony for Taiwan took place on its second floor, where Governor-General Andō Rikichi formally surrendered to General Chen Yi, marking the end of fifty years of Japanese colonial rule over Taiwan. Renamed Zhongshan Hall (中山堂) after the war, it is now designated a National Historic Site and serves as a civic cultural centre in Taipei.
Taiwan Cultural Association Site (Da-An Hospital / Chiang Wei-shui Memorial Park)
台湾文化協会跡（大安医院・蔣渭水記念公園）
Site of the Taiwan Cultural Association (台灣文化協會), the most important non-violent anti-Japanese resistance organization in colonial Taiwan, founded on 17 October 1921 by physician-activist Chiang Wei-shui (蔣渭水, 1890–1931) at Blessed Imelda's School (靜修女中) in Dadaocheng, Taipei. The association's headquarters and Taipei branch were established at Chiang's Da-An Hospital (大安醫院) on Taiping Street (太平町, today's Yanping North Road Section 2). Now commemorated by the Chiang Wei-shui Memorial Park (蔣渭水紀念公園) in Datong District.
Taiwan Development Company Headquarters Site
台湾拓殖株式会社本社跡
Former headquarters of the Taiwan Development Company (Taiwan Takushoku Kabushiki Kaisha), a major Japanese "national policy company" (kokusaku kaisha) established in 1936 to direct colonial resource exploitation across Taiwan and Southeast Asia. Located in the Sakaemachi (榮町) commercial district of Taipei, the company controlled mining, agriculture, forestry, fisheries, and industrial development, playing a central role in wartime resource mobilization before it was closed down after the war and formally dissolved in 1947.
Taiwan Electric Power Company Headquarters
臺灣電力株式會社本社
Headquarters of the Taiwan Electric Power Company (台灣電力株式會社), established in 1919 as a semi-governmental enterprise during the Japanese colonial period. Located behind the Governor-General's Office in Taipei, the company managed all electricity generation and distribution across Taiwan, including the landmark Sun Moon Lake hydroelectric project, providing critical power for wartime industrial production. The headquarters was destroyed by American bombing in 1945; it is listed among the buildings hit in the Taipei Air Raid of May 31.
Taiwan Governor-General Communications Bureau
臺灣總督府交通局遞信部
The Communications Bureau (遞信部) of the Taiwan Governor-General's Office, completed in 1924–1925 and designed by Moriyama Matsunosuke. This Western classical building on Changsha Street in Taipei managed all postal, telegraph, telephone, and broadcasting services across colonial Taiwan, and served as a critical hub for wartime communications control and censorship. Now a designated municipal historic monument housing the Academia Historica.
Taiwan Governor-General High Court (Judicial Building)
台湾総督府高等法院
The highest court of colonial Taiwan under Japanese rule, housed in the landmark 1934 Judicial Building in Taipei. After Japan's surrender, the building served as a venue for war crimes tribunals and later became the seat of the Republic of China's Judicial Yuan.
Taiwan Governor-General Medical School (now NTU College of Medicine / NTUH Old Building)
台湾総督府医学校（現・国立台湾大学医学院／台大病院旧館）
Founded in 1899 as the first modern medical school in Taiwan under the Japanese colonial government, the Taiwan Governor-General Medical School (台灣總督府醫學校) became a leading centre for tropical medicine research. The iconic Renaissance-style red-brick hospital building, designed by architect Juro Kondoh (近藤十郎), was built from 1912 and completed in 1921, and served as the affiliated teaching hospital. During the colonial era the institution trained generations of Taiwanese physicians — including Tu Tsung-ming (杜聰明), Taiwan's first medical doctorate holder — and conducted pioneering research on malaria, plague, scrub typhus, and other tropical diseases. Renamed Taihoku Medical College in 1922, it was attached to Taihoku Imperial University in 1936 as the affiliated Medical Specialised Division (附屬醫學專門部) when the university opened its Faculty of Medicine. After Japan's defeat in 1945, it became the College of Medicine of National Taiwan University. The old hospital building (台大醫院舊館) is now a Taipei municipal historic monument in Zhongzheng District, Taipei.
Taiwan Governor-General Office (Taipei Air Raid Site)
台湾総督府（台北大空襲被災）
The Taiwan Governor-General Office, today the Presidential Office Building, was the primary target of the May 31, 1945 Taipei Air Raid. About 117 B-24 Liberator bombers (118 in some accounts) struck central Taipei from 10:00 AM to 1:00 PM; the death toll is often given as over 3,000, although Governor-General's Office statistics recorded 759 air-raid deaths in Taihoku Prefecture for all of May 1945. Direct hits set the building on fire, reportedly for three days, and reportedly damaged 83% of its floor area. It was not fully repaired until 1948.