The Lochnagar Crater

The Lochnagar Crater, located south of the village of La Boisselle, in the Somme department of France, was created by a large mine set off by the British Army under no man’s land, close to the German lines, on 1^st July 1916, to assist the infantry advance on the first day of the Battle of the Somme.

Mining during World War I involved digging tunnels toward enemy trenches and filling them with explosives to demolish strongpoints, machine-gun nests, and bunker systems, as well as creating breaches for infantry advances. The British began early mining efforts on the Western Front in late 1914 in the soft clay of Flanders, Belgium. In the Somme region of France, French and German forces started mining operations in late December 1914. Mining at La Boisselle was carried out in hard chalk. In summer 1915, newly formed British Tunnelling Companies of the Royal Engineers moved to the Somme front and took over around 66 shafts from the French, including those at La Boisselle.

In late 1915, the French and British agreed to launch a joint offensive on the Somme the following summer to break the stalemate that had developed along the Western Front. As part of the assault near La Boisselle, it was decided to dig a mine to destroy the strongly fortified German frontline position known as the Schwabenhöhe (Swabian Heights), located south of the village. The mine was named after Lochnagar Street, the communication trench where the tunnel entrance was to be located. Many fortifications originally dug by the French had been given Scottish names after the 1/6^th and 1/7^th Battalions of the Black Watch had arrived at La Boisselle in late July 1915.

The tunnel was started on 11^th November 1915 by the 185^th Tunnelling Company, and was completed by the 179^th Tunnelling Company, which took over in March 1916. An inclined shaft was dug at about 45 degrees to a depth of 35 metres, some 120 metres behind the British frontline, and 300 metres from the German trenches. Two near-horizontal galleries were then driven towards the Schwabenhöhe at different depths, but only one was continued, at a depth of around 15 metres below ground level.

Work was both arduous and perilous, with progress averaging 5 metres per day. For every 30 centimetres dug, approximately 48 sandbags of chalk had to be removed by working parties, who passed them along the tunnel one by one. As the tunnellers got closer to the German lines, progress slowed considerably, as work had to be carried out silently to avoid alerting the enemy. Men worked barefoot and on sandbags, while bayonets with spliced handles were used instead of pickaxes. Flints were carefully prised out of the chalk and laid on the floor, and if the bayonet had to be used two-handed, an assistant would catch the dislodged material before it hit the ground.

The final section of the tunnel was divided into two enlarged chambers, situated about 30 metres short of the German frontline. It was hoped that once the mine was detonated, the blast would eject enough material to bury the nearby German trenches, while creating a crater with soil lips that would offer cover for the advancing troops. The explosive chambers were loaded with 60,000 lb of ammonal in two charges, 36,000 lb and 24,000 lb, and some of the spoil previously removed was used for tamping to seal the explosives and direct the blast upward.

At 7.28 am on 1^st July 1916, following a week-long preliminary artillery bombardment, the Lochnagar mine was detonated by Captain James Young of the 179^th Tunnelling Company, who pressed the switches and observed that the firing had been successful. Debris from the explosion rose to a height of over 1,200 metres, while the noise created was considered the loudest man-made sound in history up to that point, with reports suggesting it was heard in London. The explosion also created a massive crater in the chalk, some 21 metres deep and approximately 100 meters wide, whilst obliterating between 90 and 120 metres of German dug-outs, all packed with troops.

Despite its size, the Lochnagar mine failed to neutralise the German defences at La Boisselle sufficiently. The sector was attacked by the 34^th Division. Although the crater was captured and held by British troops, the attack on either flank was mostly repelled by German small-arms and artillery fire. The objective of breaking through the German lines was not achieved, and the 34^th Division lost 6,380 officers and men that day, which was the highest number of casualties among the British divisions on the first day of the Battle of the Somme.

While many of the smaller craters from the First World War were eventually filled in following the end of the conflict, the Lochnagar Crater remained, though, over the years, nearby farmland encroached towards it. In 1978, an Englishman, Richard Dunning, purchased the land to ensure that the crater could be preserved as a memorial. Dunning erected a memorial cross on the rim of the crater in 1986 and later founded the Lochnagar Crater Foundation, which manages the site today.

The bodies of many German soldiers who would have been killed when the mine went off probably still lie onsite, while, in October 1998, the remains of a British soldier were found in the land just behind the crater. While a cross now marks this spot, the soldier, who was later identified as Private George James Nugent of the 22^nd (Tyneside Scottish) Battalion, Northumberland Fusiliers, was reburied in the nearby Ovillers Military Cemetery.

Today, the Lochnagar Crater is the largest, most famous, and best-preserved example of a First World War mine crater. Volunteers look after the site, and several information panels and memorials have been installed. In recent years, a new wooden walkway and an area for laying wreaths have been added to the base of the cross. The site attracts about 200,000 visitors a year, and there is an annual memorial service on 1^st July to commemorate the detonation of the mine and the British, French, and German war dead, when poppy petals are scattered into the crater.