First World War tunnels uncovered during army homes build

While the existence of training trenches was known and recorded, these deep tunnels were previously unknown and were only discovered when a hole appeared when the site was being cleared.

Although ground penetrating radar had been used, a layer of flint about two metres below the surface reflected the signals and hid the existence of the tunnels.

“This is the first time anywhere in the world that archaeologists have had the chance to examine, excavate and record such an enormous expanse of First World War training ground,” said Si Cleggett, of Wessex Archaeology.

“These men were being trained for the real thing, using live grenades – we know that because we found over 200 grenades in the tunnel and 50% of them proved to be still live. We had to work side by side with experts in dealing with live ordnance, or it could have got very tricky.”

“The trenches and tunnels are directly related to battles fought 100 years ago,” said Martin Brown of WYG who is the Archaeological consultant to the Army Basing Programme. “The Somme in 1916 began with a number of mines blown, while the Battle of Messines began on June 7th 1917 with the detonation of 19 mines below the German trenches.”

“We have excavated below the trenches and exposed these tunnels which were used as fighting tunnels to go under the enemy front line and blow them up. Anyone who has read the book ‘Birdsong’ will be familiar with what went on, the aim was to break the stalemate by tunnelling under the enemy and blowing a gap and this is what they were learning to do here “We knew of three other sites in the country where this went on, but we had no idea that it went on on Salisbury Plain, it is absolutely amazing.”

The trench system revealed that the training was realistic, with finds of mess tins, tins of Bully Beef, combs, toothbrushes, Australian and Canadian food all showing that, despite the presence of Larkhill Camp only a few hundred metres away, the men were made to live in the trenches as they would have to do in France.

Another interesting find was a carpet of 100year old mustard seeds. It is thought that these were thrown on top of the spoil that was removed to quickly cover them with green do disguise evidence of the tunnelling.

In the tunnels over 100 pieces of graffiti have been found written on the chalk showing evidence of British soldiers from 4th Battalion the Wiltshire Regiment and lots of names from the Australian 3rd Division who trained on the Plain in 1916.

“Most exciting was the discovery of a chalk plaque inscribed with the names of Australian Bombers, soldiers specially trained to use hand grenades,” said Si Cleggett. “One of the names is that of Private Lawrence Carthage Weathers a New Zealander who in September 1918 would draw on his training as he charged the German frontline in France under machine gun fire, lobbing grenades into their trenches, returning twice to his own lines for more grenades, and knocking out three German machine gun posts and taking 180 prisoners. He died in an ambush a month later, without learning he had earned a Victoria Cross for his efforts.”

The nature of the chalk has meant that much of the exploration has been carried out using remote cameras. The chalk on exposure to the air quickly deteriorates and becomes crumbly and unstable.

This was not the first time some of these sites had been found, during the excavations there were some later finds including a 1950s motorbike and a 1930s red MG sports car.

Army Basing Programme Manager Andy Corcoran, said the site workers knew that news of the tunnels would still prove a magnet to the more adventurous local spirits, and so each day’s work was sealed with metal plates and blocked with tonnes of chalk, which all had to be dug out again the next morning.

The archaeologists have cleared eight Kilometres of trenches and discovered a wealth of prehistoric remains including a Neolithic enclosure some 600 years older than Stonehenge and some 4000 year old burials.

The tunnels will be filled in by mixing the excavated chalk with water and pumping it back into the site as slurry where it will harden and blend in with the existing chalk.

Many of the artefacts that have been discovered will be placed into teaching boxes for local schools and the new school that will be built on the site will not only have an artefacts box, but there are still earthworks from earlier trench systems that have not been excavated that they can go and look at.

Despite these extensive discoveries and the huge amount of archaeological work that has been carried out, there is no delay to the project and the first homes will be ready for the soldiers arriving in the Garrison in May 2019