There was another thread about the correctness of a Lee cut down for underground fighting but thats not what is going to be discussed here in this one.
The tunneler companies that dug for so long as part of Haigs master plan had a strain far greater than the average joe had up in the trenches as there was so much that could kill you down there.
Absolute silence was a must hence when the call went out they employed clay kicker and experienced tunnelers to remove the blue or white Ypres clay.
There were varying strata of the clays and the British devised a way to go deeper than the German tunnelers going under them at a 100' depth.
The Germans thought the Schwim sand could not be passed so they stayed above it for a while in the end they got to grips with it but either side it was painfully slow & deadly work.
Apart from possible methane the oxygen levels down at the face were quite poor just enough to keep a candle lit.
The galleries as they were called snaked towards each others lines across no-mans land and at times either party broke into anothers gallery.
Where in the pitch blackness they fought hand to hand mainly with cut down bayonets, pistols or shovels at times not knowing who you were stabbing so confusing was the fight.
You never new when the enemy may blow a camoflette charge to kill you or if you would get them when you set yours off.
All the spoils had to be gotten rid of in secret lest the enemy see the bright clay suddenly appearing on the fields.
They tried a mechanical machine but it was a logistical nightmare was not silent and it lies there today entomed in a gallery beneath Flanders, as when the crew went for a break they did not back it away from the face.
After a short while whilst the crew was away the clay pressed in on the machine and thus pinning it there forever.
It was said that all but 2 of the mines went up along the ridge, and I think it was either just before WWII or not long afterwards a lightning strike set one of the mines off leaving just one sitting there.
It was a very nasty existence for the men cold damp claustrophobic and the pictures that have surfaced recently from investigations give a pitiful view of their existence.
The German dugouts were like a hotel room with paneling good beds and lighting where as the ever frugal British and Australian tunnelers lead a very frugal existence indeed.
No sir to go down there for the period of a couple of years in that lot of mud, mud & more mud in a dimly lit narrow gallery just waiting for a collapse of an enemy camoflette.
Beneath Flanders Fields is a good read
