Battle of the Somme 1916 - Y Sap mine, La Boisselle

L'îlot de La Boisselle (french: ilôt meaning "small island") is a small,

historic site A historic site or heritage site is an official location where pieces of political, military, cultural, or social history have been preserved due to their cultural heritage value. Historic sites are usually protected by law, and many have been rec ...

in the

commune A commune is an alternative term for an intentional community. Commune or comună or comune or other derivations may also refer to: Administrative-territorial entities * Commune (administrative division), a municipality or township ** Communes of ...

Ovillers-la-Boisselle Ovillers-la-Boisselle is a commune in the Somme department in Hauts-de-France in northern France. Geography The commune of Ovillers-la-Boisselle is situated northeast of Amiens and extends to the north and south of the D 929 Albert–Bapaume ...

in the Somme department in

Picardie Picardy (; Picard and french: Picardie, , ) is a historical territory and a former administrative region of France. Since 1 January 2016, it has been part of the new region of Hauts-de-France. It is located in the northern part of France. Hi ...

in northern

France France (), officially the French Republic ( ), is a country primarily located in Western Europe. It also comprises of overseas regions and territories in the Americas and the Atlantic, Pacific and Indian Oceans. Its metropolitan area ...

. was heavily fought over during the

First World War World War I (28 July 1914 11 November 1918), often abbreviated as WWI, was one of the deadliest global conflicts in history. Belligerents included much of Europe, the Russian Empire, the United States, and the Ottoman Empire, with fightin ...

, when it was known as Granathof ( German: "shell farm") to the Germans and as Glory Hole to British soldiers. The site is private property and opens to the public by appointment with Claudie Llewellyn (who lives in Montauban-de-Picardie: 06 11 30 76 35).

Geography

Located in the small village of La Boisselle, the site lies south of the D 929 Albert–Bapaume road and occupies a small area in the southeast of the village
see photographs
. Once the location of a small number of houses, is now covered with grass and shrubs and separated from the built over areas of the village by the ''rue Georges Cuvillier'' (D 104) leading to Contalmaison in the north and the ''route de Bécourt'' leading to Bécordel-Bécourt in the east.

History

La Boisselle is a settlement dating back to pre-Roman times.''The La Boisselle Project'': project details
access date: 4 November 2016 The D 929 Albert–Bapaume road follows the course of a Roman road. After the Battle of Bapaume during the Franco-Prussian War (1870–1871), the village suffered serious damage. it was a place of armed struggle during the first war on surface trenches and in depth with mining galleries and mines explosions opposing French then British troops against German troops. It shows several mine craters and a mining galerie. The terrain was never modified after WW1.

1914

During the Battle of Albert (25–29 September 1914), French units were forced back from Bapaume but were able to stop the German advance along the D 929 Albert–Bapaume road at La Boisselle. After their advance had been brought to a halt, the Germans brought in heavy artillery and began to shell the French, who withdrew their infantry from the village but soon began to fortify their remaining positions with underground works. On 18 December, a French attack captured the village cemetery at the west end of a German salient in La Boisselle. The French had sapped forward for several weeks and a shortage of artillery ammunition had left the Germans unable to stop the French progress. When the attack came, the French were only from the German front line and then established an advanced post only away. The French attacks forced the Germans back from the village cemetery and the western area of La Boisselle by 24 December, but the advance was stopped a short distance forward at L'îlot, in front of German trenches protected by barbed wire. On Christmas Day 1914, French engineers began to sink the first mine shaft at La Boisselle. Local but heavy fighting underground in the winter of 1914 and spring of 1915 also took place at nearby Fricourt, Bois Français and

Carnoy Carnoy () is a former commune in the Somme department in Hauts-de-France in northern France. On 1 January 2019, it was merged into the new commune Carnoy-Mametz.Western Front, a line that stretched from the

North Sea The North Sea lies between Great Britain, Norway, Denmark, Germany, the Netherlands and Belgium. An epeiric sea, epeiric sea on the European continental shelf, it connects to the Atlantic Ocean through the English Channel in the south and the ...

to Switzerland and which remained essentially unchanged for most of the entire war.

1915

From January 1915 to the start of the Battle of the Somme in July 1916, was the scene of fierce underground fighting. Having started mining at La Boisselle shortly after the French, the Bavarian Engineer Regiment 1 continued digging eight galleries towards . On 5 January, French sappers were heard digging near a gallery and a

camouflet A camouflet, in military science, is an artificial cavern created by an explosion. If the explosion reaches the surface then it is called a subsidence crater, crater. The term was originally defined as a countermine dug by defenders to prevent the ...

was quickly placed in the gallery and blown, collapsing the French digging and two German galleries in the vicinity. A charge was blown on 12 January, which killed more than forty French soldiers. On the night of three more German mines were sprung close to . After the explosions, a large party of German troops advanced and occupied the demolished buildings but were not able to advance further against French artillery and small-arms fire. At a French counter-attack drove back the Germans and inflicted about For several days, both sides detonated mines and conducted artillery bombardments, which often prevented infantry attacks. On the night of a German sapper at La Boisselle inadvertently broke into a French gallery, which was found to have been charged with explosives; a group of volunteers took racking minutes to dismantle the charge and cut the firing cables. Between April 1915 and January 1916 alone, sixty-one mines were sprung around , some with of explosives. In summer 1915, the French mine workings around La Boisselle were taken over by the Royal Engineers as the British moved into the Somme front. G.F. Fowke sent the 174th and 183rd Tunnelling Companies into the area, but at first the British did not have enough miners to take over the large number of French shafts; the problem was temporarily solved when the French agreed to leave their engineers at work for several weeks. On 24 July 1915, 174th Tunnelling Company established headquarters at Bray, taking over some 66 shafts at Carnoy, Fricourt, Maricourt and La Boisselle. After the

Black Watch The Black Watch, 3rd Battalion, Royal Regiment of Scotland (3 SCOTS) is an infantry battalion of the Royal Regiment of Scotland. The regiment was created as part of the Childers Reforms in 1881, when the 42nd (Royal Highland) Regime ...

arrived at La Boissselle at the end of July 1915, existing trenches, originally dug by the French, were renamed by the Scottish troops which explains the presence of many Scotland-related names for the Allied fortifications in that front sector. To provide the tunnellers needed on the Somme front, the British formed the 178th and 179th Tunnelling Companies in August 1915, followed by the 185th and 252nd Tunnelling Companies in October. The 181st Tunnelling Company was also present on the Somme. At La Boisselle, elaborate precautions were taken to preserve secrecy, since no continuous front line trench ran through , which was defended by posts near the mine shafts. No man's land just south-west of La Boisselle was very narrow, at one point about wide, and had become pockmarked by many chalk craters. The underground war continued with offensive mining to destroy opposing strong points and defensive mining to destroy tunnels, which were long. Around La Boisselle, the Germans dug defensive transverse tunnels about long, parallel to the front line. In addition to digging defensive tunnels to obstruct German mining and creating offensive galleries aimed at destroying German fortifications, the Royal Engineers also dug deep wells to supply the troops with

drinking water Drinking water is water that is used in drink or food preparation; potable water is water that is safe to be used as drinking water. The amount of drinking water required to maintain good health varies, and depends on physical activity level, a ...

. In August 1915, the French and Germans were working at a depth of ; the size of their charges had reached . The British tunnelling companies dramatically increased the scale of mining operations by extending and deepening the system, first to and ultimately .

1916

On the First day of the Somme, 1 July 1916, the D 929 Albert–Bapaume road was to be the main axis of the Allied attack. The British infantry was to attack with a gap at La Boisselle, which could not to be attacked directly as the deeply-cratered ground around made a direct assault on the ruined village impossible. The tunnelling companies were to make two major contributions to the Allied preparations for the battle by placing 19 large and small mines beneath the German positions along the front line and by preparing a series of shallow

Russian sap Sapping is a term used in siege operations to describe the digging of a covered trench (a "sap") to approach a besieged place without danger from the enemy's fire. (verb) The purpose of the sap is usually to advance a besieging army's positio ...

s from the British front line into no man's land, which would be opened at Zero Hour and allow the infantry to attack the German positions from a comparatively short distance. At La Boisselle, two mines with charges (known as ''No 2 straight'' and ''No 5 right'') were planted at , at the end of galleries dug from Inch Street Trench by the 179th Tunnelling Company. To assist the attack on the village, two further mines, known as '' Y Sap'' and ''

Lochnagar Lochnagar or is a mountain in the Mounth, in the Grampians of Scotland. It is about south of the River Dee near Balmoral. It is a popular hill with hillwalkers, and is a noted venue for summer and winter climbing. Names The English nam ...

'' after the trenches from which they were dug, were placed to the north-east and the south-east of La Boisselle. These four mines were detonated by the Royal Engineers at on 1 July 1916, two minutes before Zero Hour and 15 other mines were fired along other sectors of the Somme front line. The British attack on the ruins of La Boisselle on 1 July 1916 turned into a disaster: Despite their colossal size, the ''Lochnagar'' and ''Y Sap'' mines failed to help sufficiently neutralise the German defences in the village, and the German troops had deep shelters that withstood the British artillery fire. La Boisselle was meant to fall in 20 minutes, but by the end of the first day of the battle, neither La Boisselle nor Ovillers had been taken while the III Corps divisions had lost more than . At Mash Valley, the attackers lost 5,100 men before noon, and at Sausage Valley near the crater of the ''Lochnagar'' mine, there were over 6,000 casualties – the highest concentration on the entire battlefield. The III Corps' 34th Division suffered the worst losses of any unit that day. On 2 July, the British managed to cross , capture the German front line trench, occupy the west end of the ruined village by and to dig in near the church. The next day, the British gradually managed to drive the German units from La Boisselle, which was fully in Allied hands by 6 July. As the Allied advance continued down the D 929 Albert–Bapaume road until the end of the Battle of the Somme in mid-November, became redundant. Barton estimates that over 120 British and French miners died in the underground fighting on the site.Barton also made a television documentary on the archaeology of , which was shown on UK television as "The Somme: Secret Tunnel Wars" BBC Four (first aired on 20 May 2013), se

access date 31 October 2016.

After the war

After the

Armistice of 11 November 1918 The Armistice of 11 November 1918 was the armistice signed at Le Francport near Compiègne that ended fighting on land, sea, and air in World War I between the Entente and their last remaining opponent, Germany. Previous armistices ...

, the former inhabitants of La Boisselle returned and became private land again, although the farm and the other houses that had stood there before the First World War were not rebuilt. The deeply-cratered ground was left to the elements and the site gradually overgrew with grass and shrubs, thus preserving many wartime features of this former sector of the front line. is not normally open to the public, upon appointment.

Exploration

In 2011, British researchers around Peter Barton started an archaeological, historical, technological and genealogical study of La Boisselle with a special focus on . After the removal of bushes and undergrowth, excavations revealed that the site still holds traces of trenches, shelters and extensive tunnels related to underground warfare./> A network of some of tunnels at depths of between and has so far been rediscovered. Now the terrain is under the safeguard of an association : l'Association des Amis de l'Ilôt de La Boisselle (see website and facebook).

Notes

Footnotes

References

Books * * * * * Websites * *

External links

La Boisselle Study Group
an
La Boisselle Project

Ilot de La Boisselle

Aerial view of Ovillers-La-Boisselle

Surface model of the ''Y Sap, Glory Hole'' and ''Lochnagar'' craters
{{DEFAULTSORT:L'ilot de La Boisselle World War I sites in France Ovillers-la-Boisselle