Stand in the room where Singapore surrendered
15 February 1942
The Former Ford Factory on Upper Bukit Timah Road is an Art Deco assembly plant that opened in October 1941 and is now a National Archives museum.
Why it's unique
On 15 February 1942, Lieutenant-General Arthur Percival signed the unconditional surrender of Singapore to General Tomoyuki Yamashita in this building's boardroom. Around 80,000 troops went into captivity; Churchill called it the worst disaster in British military history.
The boardroom is preserved and you stand in it. The building itself is part of the story — Ford's first motorcar plant in Southeast Asia, finished four months before the invasion, requisitioned by the British Army, then taken by the Japanese who used it as Yamashita's forward headquarters. The permanent exhibition covers the occupation years that followed rather than stopping at the signature.
Before you go
It is a working archive as much as a museum and it is quiet, which suits it. Allow ninety minutes.
Pair it with the Battlebox at Fort Canning, where the decision to surrender was taken that same morning, hours before the signing here. Doing them in that order — bunker first, boardroom second — follows the day as it happened.