256th Tunnelling Company

By January 1915 it had become evident to the BEF at the Western Front that the Germans were mining to a planned system. As the British had failed to develop suitable counter-tactics or underground listening devices before the war, field marshals French and Kitchener agreed to investigate the suitability of forming British mining units.[2] Following consultations between the Engineer-in-Chief of the BEF, Brigadier George Fowke, and the mining specialist John Norton-Griffiths, the War Office formally approved the tunnelling company scheme on 19 February 1915.[2]

Norton-Griffiths ensured that tunnelling companies numbers 170 to 177 were ready for deployment in mid-February 1915. In the spring of that year, there was constant underground fighting in the Ypres Salient at Hooge, Hill 60, Railway Wood, Sanctuary Wood, St Eloi and The Bluff which required the deployment of new drafts of tunnellers for several months after the formation of the first eight companies. The lack of suitably experienced men led to some tunnelling companies starting work later than others. The number of units available to the BEF was also restricted by the need to provide effective counter-measures to the German mining activities.[3] To make the tunnels safer and quicker to deploy, the British Army enlisted experienced coal miners, many outside their nominal recruitment policy. The first nine companies, numbers 170 to 178, were each commanded by a regular Royal Engineers officer. These companies each comprised 5 officers and 269 sappers; they were aided by additional infantrymen who were temporarily attached to the tunnellers as required, which almost doubled their numbers.[2] The success of the first tunnelling companies formed under Norton-Griffiths' command led to mining being made a separate branch of the Engineer-in-Chief's office under Major-General S.R. Rice, and the appointment of an 'Inspector of Mines' at the GHQ Saint-Omer office of the Engineer-in-Chief.[2] A second group of tunnelling companies were formed from Welsh miners from the 1st and 3rd Battalions of the Monmouthshire Regiment, who were attached to the 1st Northumberland Field Company of the Royal Engineers, which was a Territorial unit.[4] The formation of twelve new tunnelling companies, between July and October 1915, helped to bring more men into action in other parts of the Western Front.[3]

Most tunnelling companies were formed under Norton-Griffiths' leadership during 1915, and one more was added in 1916.[1] On 10 September 1915, the British government sent an appeal to Canada, South Africa, Australia and New Zealand to raise tunnelling companies in the Dominions of the British Empire. On 17 September, New Zealand became the first Dominion to agree the formation of a tunnelling unit. The New Zealand Tunnelling Company arrived at Plymouth on 3 February 1916 and was deployed to the Western Front in northern France.[5] A Canadian unit was formed from men on the battlefield, plus two other companies trained in Canada and then shipped to France. Three Australian tunnelling companies were formed by March 1916, resulting in 30 tunnelling companies of the Royal Engineers being available by the summer of 1916.[1]

256th Tunnelling Company was the last tunnelling company of the Royal Engineers to be formed, in July 1916.[1] It was sent to the BEF and served under Fourth Army until after the end of the war.[6]

256th Tunnelling Company initially moved to the Vimy front.[1] The unit then moved to Nieuwpoort in June 1917, to construct shelters and wells for Operation Hush. 256th Tunnelling Company was involved in an enemy spoiling attack - Operation Strandfest - in this coastal sector on 10–11 July 1917.[1] In addition to 256th Tunnelling Company, 257th Tunnelling Company and 2nd Australian Tunnelling Company were also involved in this part of Operation Strandfest. While at Nieuwpoort 256th Tunnelling Company assisted 135th Siege Battery, Royal Garrison Artillery, to construct deep dugouts and underground galleries in the sand dunes. This battery, raised at Tynemouth, included a number of coal miners among its own ranks who were adept at this work.[7]

• Mine warfare

An overview of the history of 256th Tunnelling Company is also available in Robert K. Johns, Battle Beneath the Trenches: The Cornish Miners of 251 Tunnelling Company RE, Pen & Sword Military 2015 (ISBN 978-1473827004), p. 229 see online

• Alexander Barrie (1988). War Underground – The Tunnellers of the Great War. ISBN 1-871085-00-4.
• The Work of the Royal Engineers in the European War 1914 -1919, – MILITARY MINING.
• Jones, Simon (2010). Underground Warfare 1914-1918. Pen & Sword Military. ISBN 978-1-84415-962-8.
• Arthur Stockwin (ed.), Thirty-odd Feet Below Belgium: An Affair of Letters in the Great War 1915-1916, Parapress (2005), ISBN 978-1-89859-480-2 (online).
• Lt D.J. Walters & Lt C.R. Hurle Hobbs, The History of the 135th Siege Battery R.G.A., 1921/Uckfield: Naval & Military Press, 2004, ISBN 978-1-84342-983-8.
• Graham E. Watson & Richard A. Rinaldi, The Corps of Royal Engineers: Organization and Units 1889–2018, Tiger Lily Books, 2018, ISBN 978-171790180-4.

• List of tunnelling companies of the Royal Engineers, with short unit histories
• Simon Jones, 'Born Fighters: Who were the Tunnellers?' Conference paper