My Grandfather, William Ross, transferred from the Black Watch to a R.E. tunnelling company in 1916 after his brother Daibhid was killed in action, buried alive by a German mine in Dec 1914, while serving with the Seaforth Highlanders. I can only assume Grandad became a tunneller in order to get back at the Germans for killing his brother. Willie was badly wounded , breaking both legs and his right arm in an underground fight with Germans who broke through into his tunnel - using bayonets and spades as weapons. Sadly, like so many others, he hanged himself in 1923 aged 27, saying he couldn’t live with what happened in France. My mother , who was 2 years old when he died , didn’t remember anything about her dad, and my Grannie didn’t want to talk to her about about him. His war record , with all this information in it , was recently released by the British government and it was a real eye opener for me. Rest in Peace Granda, and thank you for your sacrifice.

I went down a WW1 tunnel in Belgium or France in my childhood and I remember how struck that the tunnel exit is next to a supermarket car park. These time capsules must be preserved.

As a man who spent 4 years in the Army, I do feel the ghosts when we see where these men lived in the field. I feel as though we endured very similar experiences, even across 70 years of time.

I would love an entire hour or more long documentary on these tunnels!

In France, you can wonder if beneath your feet are historical markings of major world turning points. In Canada, you can wonder if you're maybe the first person to ever set eyes on a particular part of wilderness.

I went into the tunnels at Vimy Ridge in the late 1990s and found them interesting. There are still many tunnels around that were dug to explode mines under the German lines that were simply closed with the explosives still in place. There are groups of engineers that investigate these. I know some of these engineers have been killed doing this work.

Thank you Dan and Co! Call it what you will, i call it Cave Art. All the more important that it can be seen so close to its creation, yet beyond its creators. For me, this visual link is priceless. Thanks again

Yet another great Dan Snow video, thanks Dan, excellent as always. Hopefully the artefacts found in these tunnels will be conserved for future generations to visit and see, and not just left as found to eventually just rot away! I remember years ago hearing of another "mine" (as mentioned elsewhere here) that the allies laid underground, a large one in theory, to blow up German entrenchments, and this "mine" is now lost and so a whole lot of explosive is sitting possibly under some cornfield waiting to be discovered!

“If you want a job done correctly you gotta ask the Canadians in this life”…..My 2x great uncle Colin Stanley Campbell died at Vimy Ridge on February 22, 1917 following a famous raid conducted by the 38th Battalion in the months leading up to the main April 9th assault. My great grandmother lost her two brothers and first husband in that war. Every year I bring out each of their memorial crosses and relish at what these men, whom I never knew, did for freedom. They were the very best that Canada had to offer and I’m so proud of them.

Magnificent, thank you.

Absolutely fantastic!

I went to Arras when I was a teen (early 2000s, shortly after they were re-opened). Russell and Auckland caves were accessible from the cellar of a church if I remember correctly. It was eerie as heck, particularly as there were young men there who were from my town (in New Zealand) and were just a year or two older than I was.

Wow Dan, Amazingly overwhelming at times, Big thank you to all great men that took the risky job to tunnel and get the job done 💐💪🏻👊🏻👍🏻👏👏👏👏👏👏👏👏👏👏👏👏👏

Brilliant episode

Thank you. 👍🏼

This was fascinating 👍

Keep up the great work fellows.

Fantastic!

Absolutely fascinating. Will be going on a road trip to WW1 sites this year with my son. Will add tunnels to the list

About 20 years ago I was involved in a documentary film about the first and last Allied soldiers killed in WW1. Our team was granted permission to access and film in a different, closed-off, section of the caverns below Arras. I believe we were told that these were initially excavated during Roman times. In some places, the vaulted ceilings were really high. We could hear the rumble of traffic above and I must admit to a feeling that it could collapse without warning. We were told that there had been a hospital down there and that the caverns extended to such an extent that both the Allies and the enemy simultaneously occupied various sectors. But the most incredible sight was of all the graffiti scrawled on the walls more than 80 years before. In some instances, this portrayed military crests or insignia, in others, more personal messages had been written. We had a sense of being surrounded by ghosts from the past.

we had a school trip to Belgium to visit some sites and cemeteries..

Incredible.

I've always liked this guy he's done a fantastic 3 part documentary on all the stuff that went down in 1066

That Blenheim Tunnel is by far more Interesting than the Town of Blenheim itself.

Would love to visit. My granddad's uncle fell during the second battle of arras his body was never found. Quite strange hearing Nelson, as he was in Nelson battalion royal naval division

Sen to the tunnels under Arras, amazing spooky place.

amazing history dan ,,WW1 and 2 have lots of hidden secrets

Love the SRD rum jugs

The monument at Vimy Ridge is breathtaking

There’s a similar disused quarry that was occupied by the French in Foulon near the Aisne river called the Caverne du dragon. It’s now part of the chemin des dames tourist route. Our tour guide informed us that the men weren’t allowed to wash because of the scarcity of water and the cool environment. The men drank wine rations and had to share their space with pack animals and a cemetery, often stationed there for months at a time without seeing daylight. It was taken over by the Germans who installed electricity, otherwise there was no light except for candles which they were forbidden to burn unless absolutely necessary. The system was taken back by the French and occupied until the end of the war. It was a very dank, chilly, mercifully short experience as a visitor - very hard to imagine what those poor young men endured. They were also carvings down there, including a few headstones where the temporary graves for the fallen had been put, in the chapel.

Absolutely amazing. I've always been so much more interested in ww1 than ww2. I'd love to go!

wow never knew about this

The tunnel tour at Vimy Ridge was greatly truncated when we visited it in 2018 - a fraction of the area we had seen back in 1988. The area which is out of bounds on the Arras tour used to be accessible via the town hall ( Hotel de Ville?) once upon a time, not sure if it still is or not. There was an area near Vimy Ridge signposted with a tiny sign "Ici souterraine" which was a privately owned tunnel area. I've never found it since I visited it in 1996 - it was amazing and by far the best I've visited. It's well worth visiting the Drachen Hohe up near the Chemin des Dammes.

Very interesting but my god does Dan Snow know how to ham it up or what!

I watched the film The War Below.It was very moving.

I get a chill thinking about being those tunnelers

Have you done a similar programme on the PRE WW tunnels in Gibraltar? All 36miles of em. You guys would love to visit.

J.R.R. Tolkien, the author of The Hobbit and The Lord of the Rings, was probably inspired by these tunnels to write about the Mines of Moria by these tunnels.

There was an Australian movie about WW1 concerning tunneling were they dug this tunnel under the German lines packed it with a hell of a lot of explosives and blew up the Germans and the explosion was so big it keft an enormous crater that dtill is there today

its amazing the tunnels are still there for the most part unclasped, wild!

Horrendous conditions and violence......brave young men.

I very much appreciate you mentioning the Canadian success at Vimy Ridge. All too often Canadian successes and sacrifices in the two world wars are ignored or glossed over (particularly in movies made about the period). Most don't appreciate that the Canadian Corps didn't lose any battles at the end of the war and that they were specifically selected to lead as the spearhead for the last 100 days (along with the ANZACs). Some things to note about Vimy. Although it was the first time the Canadians fought as a complete corps, it was not all Canadian. The Corps Commander for the battle was UK LGen Julian Byng and the corps was fortified by thousands of Brit troops. By the time of the attack on Hill 70, however, the Corps was basically all Canadian and commanded by the Canadian LGen Arthur Currie (later knighted by the King for his success). Also, your video makes it sound as if the success was all about mines. The Canadian Corps employed some innovative artillery techniques for the battle: creeping barrages that actually worked (unlike the Somme), locating enemy gun positions followed by rapid counter-battery fire, new levels of concentration of fires and coordination etc. Much of this was achieved by the team of Brig RA Alan Brooke (who became CIGS for WW2) and Canadian Col Andy McNaughton who initially commanded the Canadian contingent in the UK at the early stages of WW2. I had the chuckle at min 4 of the video when I clearly saw "44 FES" written on a beam above your head. That's for 44 Field Engineer Squadron from Trail, British Columbia in Canada. I doubt it's left over from 1917 (I don't even know if 44 FES existed in 1917). More likely, a modern day young sapper from that unit was visiting Vimy and, as young soldiers sometimes do, found an opportunity for some graffiti.

I was able to visit Vimy Ridge a number of years ago with my Acadian wife and some Canadian friends. My wife’s grandfather has fought there. A year or so after our visit an former soldier tried to locate the few of the large mines that failed to explode. This was difficult as many records had been destroyed or had inadequate detail to lead easily to a location. One he did locate, still intact was at Vimy Ridge. It is still there,, they removed the detonation charge and wires after much negotiation but because the removal of the huge amount of explosives would have meant the closure of the site to the public, they were left.

I went to the tunnels in Vimy as an army cadet back in 1999, it was fascinating. One of the key elements in the victory at Vimy ridge was also that all of the troops down to the lowest Private were knew the section/platoon orders. So that if the leadership fell, the next troops in line knew the plan, and could carry on without the need to stop and ask "what's next?".

So this guy is the guy always telling me to pay for a history subscription

You should do something on the burlington bunker

I wasn't expecting to see New Zealand markings never mind markings from our Island brothers in the Pioneer Battalion. Bloody emotional alright.

Mu grandfather John Morgan was a Welsh miner who fought in trenches and then became a tunneller..

i love the Canadians! It felt like it took a long time to mention the Welsh, but you got there!

60m per day by the Kiwis! Outstanding! i salute their memory!:-) 11/11/1918 Love NO H•te 🕯️

can ww1 mine still blow up?

Is that a skull at 14:05 in the left middle upish side of the screen

Comment N⁰2..…writing whilst watching. Imagine having to excavate tunnels underneath enemy tunnels, then all of a sudden you hear voices, men tunnelling beside your tunnel in the opposing direction ⬇️⬆️, so you'd have to break through and fight, fight underground with pickaxes and shovels, full on man to man combat, hard to imagine or even comprehend, amazing bravery on both side, no one can deny that. Edited: and at around 5:10 he mentions exactly that. 👍🏻

Love it but your videos are so few amd far between. Do more castles and tombs/ catacombs

You’re welcome, eh? 🇨🇦

Respect to these tunnellers but this is nothing: Unlike the mining efforts on the Western Front, where e.g. the mines on the first day of the Somme (1916) were constructed in a chalk and flint area and where e.g. the mines in the Battle of Messines (1917) were constructed in geology dominated by wet sand and clay, the mine galleries on the Austro-Italian front had to be executed at high altitudes in the hard carbonate rock of the Dolomites using hand-operating drilling machines and chisels. Fighting under these conditions, often in exposed areas near mountain peaks and even in glacial ice, required extreme skill of both Austro-Hungarian and Italian miners.

Siege of vienna would be an interesting subject

Thomas shelby👀

I would go mad in those tunnels

Is that the KSLI badge with a cat's head on top at the end?

wonder how tall dan snow is.he looks like a big guy

It's funny you mention graffiti. I remember being on stag in an old battle camp roughly 10 years ago reading graffiti from regiments long since disbanded/amalgamated during the 90's or even earlier. Funny how it starts off as frowned upon but when your a young lad freezing cold and miserable, reading graffiti from other young lads decades past in the same situation - bored, cold and miserable! - makes you realise times change, but the military will always ruin your weekend 😉😂

How long before Arras sinks into those tunnels?

Thank you and God Bless the men and women who sacrificed for our freedom!🇨🇦

My wife and I visit the tunnels to took us to in this video on April 9th 2017. My wife's Grandfather was in the 4th Canadian Division at Vimy Ridge April 9th 1917. He led a section of Machine gunners. It was very special for us to be here at home in and visit the Wellington and Vimy tunnels once again. On April 9th at the Wellington tunnels I had a lump in my throat and couldn't sing the national anthem. At the time I remember thinking about the closeness our boys must have felt in the presence of some many of our Commonwealth cousins.

When did you last see an overground tunnel?

It has to be boiling down there

Unlike overground tunnels?

Reality right in front of you,lost souls and they all have left their mark. We shall remember them .

I'm thinking the Vietnam tunnels would be worse.

"NZ tunellers could dig 60m a day" That's pretty nuts, those guys were machines

Ok at the 3:50 point the narrator says the miners could go 6 meters per day. At the 11:05 minute mark he states 60 meters per day. Come on people! Get your information correct!. 60 meters sounds totally unreasonable. So which is correct?

In the future,an archaeologist may find the graffiti & call it cave art. Thanks for the good show,

I WAS BORN IN WELLINGTON

I'm here by order of the Peaky Blinders

we faught in Arras

How u confuse an Irish man? Put 3 shovels against the wall and tell them to take their pick

Ask the Canadians to get something done

I’d prefer to be tunnelling than going over ground, that’s for sure. May those men that fought and lost their lives never be forgotten.

Ghosts

The job wasmt done vere properly

Love the way they reference medieval type warfare .. All warfare is stupid . In a hundred years it will look awful

It's hard for me to believe that no one knew about these quarries back before the 1990s. Especially anyone older that was living in that area, they surely would have been aware of these quarries.

I don't mean to criticise but, you don't exactly build a tunnel, you excavate it, dig it out when tunnelling beneath ground, or burrow through a mountain. Sorry Dan, but if you read this, you'd probably agree with me, because that's who you are, a stickler for correctness and the facts.

A superficial video, light on factual information, strong on generalisations whilst touring a museum including non public parts.

So the Welsh were the best miners in the world and dug 6m a day, yet the NZs could dig 60 m a day???

Dan, stop making the show about you. Try getting out of the way of the camera. We want to see what you're talking about. Experiment with voice-over sometimes.

What the heck is wrong with you guys? Why you call them "underground" tunnels? Has anybody ever seen an above ground tunnel? Oh I think I got it, it sounds a lot better, even if it's the same thing.

Brilliant information 👏 I want to go and I will go one day , one criticism is I'm English and your not the only one what keeps saying kilometers instead of miles , so can you start saying miles instead of kilometers as it doesn't make sense, we've left the E U so please use miles and if you see David Attenborough tell him the same , keep up the good work .

Around 70% of the original Canadian Expedition Force in August 1914 were ex Pat British men