Although not quite coming up to the standards usually required by the strict health policies of the British Army for their temporary camps, the tunnels under Arras did provide a high degree of safety compared to the trenches at a comparable distance from the front and this was of some comfort to the men as they waited to go into battle. Latrines for officers and highly-ranked persons were installed in every room. The soldiers had to spend prolonged periods in the tunnels and so the latter were equipped with kitchens, water supplies from the mains or wells, and electric lighting throughout. The total length of the tunnels amounted to nineteen kilometres. The network of tunnels under the Ronville district of the town was, from 12 February 1917, the exclusive territory of the New Zealanders who named their galleries after home towns such as Wellington. The first, situated under the Cambrai Road, was the domain of the Scots of the 9th infantry division, who baptized their galleries with familiar names such as Carlisle and Glasgow, and the English of the 35th division, who likewise named galleries after their home towns of Manchester, Liverpool and Chester. The network of tunnels was divided into two main sections. On the eve of the Battle of Arras the caves and quarries under the town contained more than 24,000 soldiers, as much as the civilian population of the town prior to the war. Anxious to avoid a repeat of the slaughter inflicted on the Allied troops in the battles of Verdun and the Somme the previous year, the British general staff elaborated an innovative plan whereby New Zealand engineers would create a vast underground network of tunnels through which the troops could pass to come up directly in front of the German front line without having to face the deadly machine gun fire of no man's land.īy the end of March the tunnelling works, the largest ever undertaken by the British Army, were complete. Once the British began to prepare their plan of attack, which was to begin in early April 1917, the main worry for the high command was how to concentrate a large number of troops near to the front without arousing the suspicions of the enemy. This operation, combined with a large-scale attack in the French sector, was to draw in German reserve troops several days before the start of the French assault and thus facilitate the much hoped for breakthrough at Chemin des Dames Ridge in Champagne. The town of Arras, situated in the British zone, was picked to be the theatre of a diversionary offensive. The medieval town hall and its belfry were completely destroyed and much of the centre was severely damaged.īy February 1916, with very little of its civilian population remaining, Arras had become a British town and conducted its affairs in both French and English.Īfter the Chantilly Conference of 16 November 1916, where the military leaders decided Allied strategy for the following year, General Nivelle, newly promoted to the post of commander-in-chief of the French Army, and his British counterpart, General Haig, drew up plans for a combined action to breach the German line. Under Allied control but situated just a few kilometres from German lines for the whole of the war, the town of Arras formed a salient in the front and as such, from October 1914, was a regular target for German artillery. The Battle of Arras took place in the spring of 1917 and was one of the principal offensives undertaken by the British Army on the Western Front, similar in scale to the Battle of the Somme and the Third Battle of Ypres.
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