Here's a bit from our Flame Thrower remembering his transfer to our unit,

Alright looks like I am starting a journal I guess, better than spending the night of my first day in the 503rd without sleep. I’ve always had issues with that, sometimes I sleep fine, other time sometimes I don’t even sleep. Like tonight, not too many people are up and in an hour or two I am going on a recon mission to the demolished town in no mans land. Apparently we have reason to suspect a german forward base is going to be made there I guess. Why I of all people am getting sent is a little bit of a mystery but sure if things go wrong I guess a flamethrower would be helpful. Sure if it turns out this forward base is the beginning of another trench. In addition to being the only person crazy enough to go into battle with a flamethrower I am also apparently the ONLY Irishmen. A little sad but I can’t bring myself to care that much, if there was anymore of people like me I have no doubt in my mind we would be leading an assault directly into several machine guns like last time. The british think of everything as expendable except themselves, hideous way of thinking about it. Bastards, but I can’t blame them too much. I can still hate them though.

Well first of all there used to be an actual group of men with flamethrowers once upon a time, until our CO. threw us at the German trenches at night one time to “soften” the resistance for the assault the next day. I think he just wanted us dead. Because thats what happened to the other five or so guys. Damn guns went straight through em. I was lucky I got caught in some barbed wire way back where they couldn’t see me. Now each one of us was given an asbestos blanket to wrap around our packs, my old LT was at least kind enough for those. I needed proof for my claims otherwise they would think I simply walked back and let them die. It took me some time, I didn’t want to move too much with my sixty pound pack I’d pretty much hand them my skull on gold platter. I’m glad my luck is still going strong, the Fritz didn’t even notice I existed. So I snuck to each one of my dead squadmates and took the blanket and wrapped it around different parts of myself, I ended up looking like a damn fool. Wrapped in that stuff made it unbearably hot and uncomfortable. I slowly made my way back to the trenches when my luck had run dry. Several riflemen opened up fire at me, I ran faster than I ever thought was possible. In no way did I want my pack exposed to them, the brits don’t like giving us new equipment as it is. It only took a few minutes to get back, the Machine gunners almost shot at me because they couldn’t tell if I was even human. I had to yell at them my name and where I was stationed at least five times.

So when I finally got back in I gave my report of the failed mission and went to my bunk. Turns out that the bullet that had my name on it was stopped by my squad mates blankets. I haven't been seen without those blankets since really. Sure there hot and uncomfortable, but as long as I’m wearing em I feel like I could march into the Germans Trenches and torch the lot of em. But I know that won’t happen. Well thats all that really happened for a few days until my LT told me to get my stuff and report to the 503rd down in the Abbey. I did just that, no complaint. I never really liked anyone there, I am more of the loner type. No use getting to know them if they are just gonna die. I remember thinking to myself how the 503rd wouldn’t any different to this troop.

Boy was I wrong, my goodness was I so wrong. I walk in and the first American I see is toting a small pump action canon. When i say small I mean small for a canon, not for a rifle. The thing was impressive and frankly I would not like to be on the end of that monster. He was just cleanin the thing like it was his babe. If I had something like that I would do much the same. But anyways, I went and reported to my new LT. the man was sitting in the most posh quarters I had ever seen. My god, here in this hole he managed to best my ma’s home in ireland. Now heres the kicker the man brings himself an honest to god elephant gun to the battle. Now in no way is that pussy footin around, first man in the charge getting shot with that is going to have the four other behind him with holes in em. He told me two things I didn’t expect to hear “I’m glad to have you here” and “Don’t tell anyone why you eat better than everyone else.” I have never had a harder time keeping a straight face in front of a commanding officer in my life, life seemed like it was turning up. Instead of face down in the dirt.

If I wasn’t completely loyal than after that first meal I would die for just about every man in the 503rd, even the frenchmen we still had. All seven or so of em. Why we had em didn’t bother me that much, I didn’t really care to ask. Now you see the Abbey used to be sorta like hell, with Jerry hill spewing down machinegun fire every once in awhile just to fuck with people. Until it kinda erupted into a giant explosion and it ceased to exist. Everyone heard it, whoever had the idea to turn a hill into a crater to deal with a few germans is fine by me right now. I like spending my time not being shot. Well it’s time for me to get to work, that American with the Canon is calling me. Looks like I am going for my first mission with these people.

On the events of October 1916, the first two weeks.

I am afraid that few of the men I served with have been very forthcoming in providing any written stories or even reports from the points before this. And since a good many men died, there is little which they could add now except what they left behind. The families are rarely eager to discuss the writing which was sent to them and finding any official reports is something which future generations will probably have better luck than I have had thus far; so what I continue to provide is my perspective ( mostly underground) and that of the people who were able and willing to add to it.

The October weather was very good to us, in fact I cannot remember it raining before the first two attacks, the winds were mild to fair which was good because it protected us from the damned gas attacks. Usually the winds were in our favor, there were atleast two occasions when they shifted and the damned gas man set upon us with poisons and chemicals.

We had managed to keep everything moving along fairly well despite having less than half the men we needed. This was both due to the fact that England is slow to deliver and quick to ask more of you, we had opted to keep a number of men "on the books" until it was proved they were dead. More food and supplies would show up for them until they eventually came home again or were proved dead and we were forced to report it. Men go missing all the time, it's nothing new to the army to have men gone a week in a battle field and turn up when things settled down enough and it was a lot of trouble to make a man "not dead" once the army had decided he was dead. There were several times men were in battle and wounded or simply lost in the confusion for days and returned to our unit after they had gotten medical care.

Now our task was one of tunneling, and listening to the Germans digging. I had great plans for all of this and every day when men weren't being squandered in the trenches we had them all working on deepening our tunnels for I had decided that crawling was both wasting men's time while they went about their jobs and making our unit look like a joke at parades which we were expected weekly to attend. I had just about finished our present task which was to create a proper base for our men to sleep and work in at the end of Sept, we were still fairly well off for man power and had managed to borrow some men in order to complete my project. The unit was to sleep in what was carefully redesigned to resemble "A proper barracks" as the English would know it.

I had envisioned four separate rooms for fifty men each with a central set of rooms / hall way which they were on opposing sides of. The rooms were laid out so that a man had to walk a serpentine walkway down underground to the level of the sleeping spaces. Then he would enter into a small "mud room" which served as an air lock to protect from chemical weapons attacks as well as explosives and marauding German troopers who might take the trenches. After the mud room they'd enter a second chamber which had three doorways; left / right / and middle. The first two were for the barracks sections, and from here those men could fire into the "mud room" through firing ports in the walls while locking the door from this inside track. After about ten feet the middle door could be opened and it had an identical set up, this was repeated several times. Those next two doors on the sides were for the officer's rooms who dealt with the men directly, then in the section afterwards was another barracks. At some point there were two doors which were later made the toilets for the men, we had instituted a policy where each man had a bucket and it was his to use and keep clean. As a result the instances of sick calls went down rapidly which made everyone happy it also kept the terrible smells down ( I have no sense of smell, but I"m told it was over powering when we arrived). Also it helped us wage war against the rats who's evils I have already informed you of.

Now at the back of our new layout was an "emergency exit" or the back door; and rapidly we found ourselves using it more and more to get cargo in and out of the tunnels. The problem was mainly that even though we had a truck, there wasn't anywhere secure beyond the small hole which we had carved out and sand bagged and tarped for our beloved ( filthy wreck) of a french truck. Late one night while I was given the less then enviable position of night guards for the back door ( They shoot you if you fall asleep) and it's also a place likely to get his by German artillery, mortars and the damned airplanes. I saw something coming towards us on the even more dubious "road to Paris" which was in fact the muddy filth path the trucks took supplies in on when they deemed to supply us at all. Now the problem is; they rarely supply us and when they do someone runs a message down here and we have to go get it from somewhere else.

To see lights approaching my position; even ones which were very dim were a clue to the enemy something was coming and somewhere there were German's sighting in guns or god save us their artillery. The lights became more and more numerous to a point I could see dozens of them and then the rumble of gas engines told me there were trucks and a good many of them coming towards me. I braced myself for whatever bad news was about to arrive and the yet unknown danger which was certainly to follow with them. What happened next was almost comical if it weren't so soon to be deeply depressing for all concerned with it. The first trucks stopped and out came a dashing officer in the Republic's finest uniform. Behind him were almost a dozen more finely clad men who were first timer's to the battle field. They were smoking and talking to each other in French.

I was the only person nearby they moved to me quickly, after several confused moments I managed to get enough out of them that this was a newly trained division from the Republic of France's infantry training grounds. They had been sent for a secret mission to the front lines here and somewhere along the way the drivers became confused over exactly where they were supposed to be taking up station. The trucks were filled with men, nearly a thousand or so of them and all of their equipment and supplies. This was exactly what I had been asking for and wasted no time getting them to kill all the lights after explaining the German's were only three hundred yards away from us. I showed them down to our modest situation and quickly explained that no one had told us they were coming, so I did not have nearly enough room for all the men but that I could house the officers right away. Then showing them to back to the place where our truck was housed and the "truck tunnel" which I was trying to get established for removal of dirts and soils I hit upon an idea which was one of my best. I took them down into a section of tunnel which was largely unused at the time and explained that this was all England had to offer France for sleeping quarters. They were displeased to say the least of it, but then I mentioned that we had an a supply of digging supplies and timbers, were the enlisted French men to spend say eight hours I could help them create an entire facility which could house them and serve as a head quarters for their entire force while safe and snug away from any German spies looking over the no-man's land.

They'd quickly agreed to this prospect and we set about getting all the French infantry into lines of bucket brigades to dispose of the soils removed while others dug away at the wall with buckets and shovels and picks. My officers awoke to the commotion of all of this and were completely stunned to find the place swamped with "frogs" as the Brits often called them. I explained this was some kind of "gift" from high command and we were ordered to keep them underground until further notice. By the end of the first day we had cleared a sufficient space for a thousand men, their supplies. The whole area was like a cellar, and it was quickly dubbed "The wine and cheese cellar", to the English speaking members of the group. Now the French were a very amiable lot, for you see these men were largely conscripts an not too keen on their lot here at the front. As a result I could ask nearly any reasonable tasks of them and they'd gladly take them on to keep from being posted to the wall. Though it turned out we were not allowed to post them anywhere, and were allowed to make use of their numbers to help make up for inefficiencies in English infantry and labor underground.

During their brief time with us our entire facilities and infrastructure underwent a marvelous expansion to which many if not all of our other projects became realities as a result of this work. Also we learned that the French were great cooks, skilled craftsmen and other useful people to have about the place. It was also terribly true that these men were only in the barest sense of the word "soldiers"; for they had little training and no veterans or senior leadership with practical application of their duties. And they lived in daily dread of being told they were being sent over the wall, every day some unit had the job to go over and repair the wires at night or spy on the enemy or make a massed attack. None of these were good jobs. So we tried to keep their minds off of it all by sending them along with the French speaking members of our unit to perform daily tasks like listening posts, guard duties and labor for excavation projects.

It should also be said the despite everything, France was very good at feeding their men, or more accurately France was better about it than England was a good deal of the time. This meant that the two groups of soldiers quickly fell into the habit of trading food and other consumable items ( smokes, tea and coffee) between each other.

One fateful morning too soon after their arrival orders arrived from Paris, their luck had run out and our new friends were going to be sent over the wall the following night. Now in order to keep everyone as confused as possible; this was the acting head quarters but the French had been taken the day or so before and dispersed among other English units. Nearly all of their supplies were kept with us and their officers stayed here but the regular men were off in a great many places. There went several hours of sending the messages along to the poor bastards who'd arrive here to pickup their last meal and supplies before an attack which everyone knew was doomed to failure.

That night we doubled the guards at all stations, the listening posts awaited the possible attack by German sappers who might break through any time. At the appointed hour, just before dawn after a several hour artillery barrage to give the German commanders every warning we were about to attack them there came a great shout as the brave men climbed up onto the destroyed earth of the no-man's land and began walking their way through the hip deep mud, house sized craters and tangled webs of barbed wire. They chanted battle songs and marched into the grip of German machine guns who waited for them with careful patience after two years of practice on these killing fields. They cleared the distance and passed through waves of machine gun fire and artillery strikes before jumping into the trenches. Here is the greatest show of bravery, the men who had walked through the death and explosions of those men all around them then willingly hurled themselves into a hole in the ground filled by hundreds of Germans carrying short swords on the ends of rifles. Many men were killed before they even got into the trenches, others were killed terribly as they fought for every inch of ground that the German's held.

In some areas the Germans were overwhelmed and the French began to hold a section, reinforce the position and then finally push into another one. The battle raged for almost two hours, until nearly every last Frenchman was killed, very few of them managed to escape back towards our lines and the sound of their fighting and deaths were heard throughout the morning. At some point the unofficial battle ended and both sides sent out peace signs so that the wounded and dead could be removed from the field of battle. I and most of my unit volunteered, we wanted to bring everyone back who was alive and get them aid. We also wanted to return the dead to be given proper graves. There was another motive too; the French were issued good rifles and their officers had automatic pistols which were very, extremely valuable. See the English never understood that in confined spaces a large rifle isn't any good, but a small pistol with a lot of shots is just what we needed. Dead men don't need their guns, and when we picked up a dead or wounded man we always brought his kit back with him lest the German's take it as a prize themselves.

After everything was said and done we managed to "Keep on" seven of France's brave sons who were fit for duty but had nothing to return to besides a new unit and certain death. At our posting they were treated like every other soldier and given regular duties every day. They were among the best men we had at that position for a long time.

The old saying about an eye for an eye was coined just for this war, and it was commonly known the next three days were going to give us a counter attack like pure hell.

Figures related to construction of tunnels

Submitted by “American number One”

We have just over one thousand, four hundred yards of underground facilities dug out as of the beginning of October 1916. This does not include living quarters, storage spaces or above ground conditions such as trenches. They will be added to this document at a later point in order to complete the estimations of which I am compiling now.

First it must be said that the military unit(s) which are responsible for the current projects have done their utmost to maintain all existing structures while improving them to more acceptable levels for the kind of duties they have been tasked to do while attempting to keep up with an ever changing and aggressive set of new projects delivered to them. The men involved have been worked beyond their recommended levels in the face of little or no proper reinforcement of troops trained in our present tactics and tools. Despite weekly requests for this to change we have only received token troop additions who were largely wiped out or badly wounded in the great battle which took place only a short time ago. At present I believe we are at or below half strength in terms of expected man power and well below what we actually need to be an effective unit for our task while expected to maintain combat readiness for above ground operations  The fact we were issued Chinese laborers speaks a great deal to the facts I am going to present here for your to read, and if they are representative of their people I should like to you send me all of the Chinese you can as they are the hardest working people I've ever seen. Which is no discredit to the British troops, but most of them are not miners, and fewer still are soldiers by trade which makes them less than ideal for underground construction and soldiering.

It is my belief that we need one soldier in the trenches every five yards, replaced every eight hours. And underground I must have without fail a minimum of sixty men for sentry duties and listening posts, on every occasion we have been short men and supplies to do this and the German's have exploited it with an alarming degree of ability. On the occasions when we were fully manned and the German's attacked the battles were hard fought to a point of nearly mutual losses. The use of what you English call “unsanctioned or personal firearms” has always been the factor which tipped victory in the favor of our little outpost. But since these weapons are purchased by the soldier out of pocket and shipped at great expense from my home country ( the United States of America) it is extremely time consuming to gain additional supplies, parts or god forbid ammunition. Also the massive increase in the number of hand guns; now being issued to all men underground while on duty has played a critical role in keeping the Hun from breaking through when they had surprise and numbers in their favor. However the continual lack of reliable supplies for ammunition despite our purchasing American guns in English calibers has become an issue for those who are charged with holding at all costs; or blowing their tunnels with explosives. The demolition of a tunnel is a constant threat to us as they are slow and expensive to construct, once blown we have lost the initiative and there is a risk the Germans will exploit our lost ground and expand their operations in the area. We also cannot remove our own men from the tunnel once it is declared “over run”. No matter how this is seen in terms of man power loss the impact it has on the moral of men in the unit when they are ordered to blow up a passage way filled by Germans and their own friends in this unit has a profound impact upon their work in the weeks which follow. Recently we suffered several situations in which tunnels were required to be blown up, or where men charged into them hoping to hold back attackers, and only two of the men have survived each of these; myself being one.

I am constantly reminded whenever I submitted reports that this is a war, also I am informed that my requests seem overly generous in their quantities and materials for the tasks which our unit has been given to complete. This is a remarkable thing to be told, at no point have I observed what I would term a war. Not a proper war atleast, in America when we go to war each man is issued a weapon for his task and equipment to carry it out. When men decide to carry their own weapons it is seen as a sign of supreme capablity that he has given up the weapon issued to him in favor of one which he will have exceptional skills in using. This frees up the rifle he was isued for some other soul who did not own his own fire arms.

When an American carries his personal weapons he can walk into the Quarter Master's and show the weapon, then get the supplies he needs. There isn't any question about why some private carries a pistol and a shot gun, he has it because he needed it. If he asks for a shovel or a blanket no one feels the need to ask him to fill out paperwork for being without something he “might have been issued” at some point.

If a general in the United States were told to take and hold a position, he would look at the situation and then consult his under officer's. They would see who among their serving men were qualified to judge the situation locally and from there a plan is developed which will maximize the effectiveness of the troops at hand. The General would present the mission, the under officers would take up their tasks and local men are allowed to fight how / where on the field they are best able to do so.

In England's army: Someone ( I don't know who) forms a plan which works as follows,

1 Take less than half as many men as you might think are needed to do a job, prepare the enemy for days or months with repeated and formulaic attacks so identical as to render dates on orders completely needless.

2 Refuse to supply the troops at hand with any/all supplies they are screaming for on a daily basis and then tell them hours before hand it's their turn to climb over the walls.

3 Wait for the reports to come back of another failed series of attacks and countless thousands of good young lads killed for no reason at all.

Troops are sent over the wall regardless of their skill sets, cavalry units are deployed to trenches and engineers are ordered out of their positions to fill the holes in the infantry. The infantry are sent to make wave after wave of suicidal attacks. I have seen cooks and medics firing weapons picked up off of dead soldiers because there weren't enough trained men left to defend a position. I have seen Chinese men fend off Germany's best infantry units with nothing more than lengths of wood and hand tools. The cost to our man power is high and the loss of time is becoming very critical in nature, the materials lost are slow to be replaced on top of everything else.

If our mission is to be successful we need to be allowed to pursue the single task for which the unit was created and to which we are greatly desirous to complete. This unit needs to be removed from the roles of “Infantry” and seen as little more than extra troops to fill in the holes after another disaster takes the limited men present and throws them away.

We cannot remain effective while our forces are split between the task we have and serving as back up soldiers. We will not be able to complete the mission on time if we do not receive rapid replenishment of soldiers and laborers and qualified persons for mission specific skilled positions.

I have completed and submitted before lists of men I feel are very important to completing the projects with which we have been assigned, I will do it again for the sake of making a complete report of all things needed.

Now back to the reason we're all here, or why I'm here and what you can do to help me get out of this stinking hole while you declare victory or whatever it is you'll do when this is all over. These numbers I am about to give are absolute minimums we require. If less is provided it will result in delays or a complete shut down of projects. This mission cannot not be completed without required materials and timely deliveries, the team will not attempt to make do with insufficient or unacceptable substitutions as that would only cause tragic failures from which there would be no recovery.

I am providing a sample of existing material requirements per Ten Meter lengths, for the ease or the reader I am treating Meters / Yards as identical units of measure. However we know the difference actually and the exact figures are available in my office for MOD records after the war if they so desire.

20 8in x8in x10ft Beams (Primary supports)

36 2in x6in x10ft boards, ( the Roof )

36 2in x4in x10ft boards (cross braces )

These are the absolute min required to hold a tunnel up. Following are other materials which are essensial to maintaining our current project's viability and the unit's best possible progress.

33ft electrical wire for lights

2 light sockets

3 sections of 10ft long, 1in Outside diameter pipe. ( to pump clean air into tunnels)

3 sections of 10ft long, 1in Outside diameter pipe. ( to protect telephone and electric cables)

3 sections of 10ft long, 4in Outside diameter pipe. ( For removal of the water )

3 ( 55gal) steel drums, sunk into the floors to act as sumps for water removal.

300 square feet of “Chicken / pig / chain link” fencing to help keep sand bags upright on walls.

All of his weighs about one and a half tons, now to complete all our tunnels to acceptable levels multiply this by One Hundred and Forty Two times. According to common estimations I have from the work done and the regular work loads. This does not include the special project for which I will provide a separate document explaining it's requirements and time table.

The goods and materials which I have been given to use thus far are nearly spent in most cases and will require replacement in order to maintain our current pace of construction. It is also worth noting that while our detractors have claimed we do not “need” the quantities of materials we ask for it was those materials on hand which allowed us to replace all sections damaged by the German attack.

I am now at a stage where we can begin our glorious task, provided that I have the man power and the materials delivered regularly. It will not be enough to simply have more man power than I need, nor will an excess of materials and insufficient man power. I must have both in the required amounts on time or we are lost. If I have an excess of materials, they will be lost at the depot (stolen), or we will have no where to keep them safe and secure underground when they arrive. If I am required to leave them on he surface they become a target for German artillery, while the Kaiser's intelligence service will doubtless begin to piece together what it is I am trying to do here. And of course materials will go missing (more theft). If the German can see what is going on, he will reproduce it and attempt to beat us at our own games. For the record, the German is exceedingly good at this and if it were not for some good old “American Know how” I am sure this whole section would be another unfortunate page in military history.

While we are talking about the Americans, I have noticed there is an unofficial segratation among the officers, the none commissioned officers and the enlisted men which goes beyond the simple chain of command. There are units here from entire villages, counties and so on. When a military unit is wiped out you have lost dozens of men and boys from a single community, in addition to your decimation of localized youth it means that the units are extremely insular in nature. A new arrival is treated like someone who's wandered into the wrong apartment during a holiday, they are rarely welcomed by the old hands and are often given the worst possible positions that the unit has to take up.

These situations are extremely detramentle to the efficiency of units which are in mortal danger of extinction should they fail to gain and accept new members. Our own unit is now overwhelmingly non-English to a point that only the officers remain as the English born. Nearly all the enlisted men are either Americans or from distant colonies but lack their own leadership and as a result we have break downs in communication between officers born and raised to a cultural norm of military service which the non-English men frequently cannot understand and will be unable or unwilling to follow. It is not enough to simply tell men to throw away their lives “For King and Country”, most of these men have never seen the King, they do not benefit from the Grand Empire, and are here largely from the stories of adventure and glory or in some cases conscription. The idea that everyman is ready to die for the King and the Empire is entirely false, they want to live every single man. The idea you might need to die is one they resign themselves to, but do not seek or hope for.

When the officer's try to bolster them with stories of glorious death it only serves to cause men too closely acquainted with a situation's terrible truth to form discontent and resentment. Soon after will follow subversion or disregard for orders which they feel to be unreasonable and then outright mutiny. I have only met the French army a few times but many know they march to their certain deaths for no gain at all. If there was a way out, I know they ( individuals) will soon take it, if the French have defections, surrenders or mutiny the Colonial soldiers and finally the English farm boys will soon follow and that's all there is to it.

On the subject of man power, other than the sixty men per shift I'd need to staff the listening posts and serve as security in the tunnels ( a total of roughly one hundred and twenty men total). We will need about two hundred additional men for underground duties with a hope to have a total of three hundred infantry total. We will also need proportional increases in support persons and logistics which upto now have been handled almost entirely in an organic manor. If all of these units can be supplied within a fortnight I can have them working on the primary and secondary mission parameters by the the second week of their arrival. And will still possibly make the six months or less timeline. I cannot however stress enough the need for nearly complete autonomy and the need to maintain a steady stream of supplies throughout the course of our actions here.  

A letter from the Photographer

Dear Captain,
You will find enclosed 6 photographs I have taken of the crystal and other wonders in the cavern. Due to the reflective and refractive nature of the crystal, it was very challenging to take photographs and have them be decipherable as anything more than light. However between diligent photography, some clever developing, and shear number of photographs I have managed to produce the enclosed photos. The first is a sample of the crystal I took back with me to HQ so I could photograph it in better lighting, curiously I found an ant enclosed in one of the crystals. The second photograph I took was of a fish I managed to catch which I also took with me back to HQ. The third is of a fantastic specimen of crystal no less than 8 feet tall, the nature of the conditions caused the crystalline structure to be particularly apparent. The fourth picture is of the gorgon inscription over the inlet tunnel. The fifth picture Is of a particularly plain crystal that with proper lighting I was able to discern something inside, I have provided a second copy of the fifth picture that I have done some retouching to to make what I believe I saw more apparent.
I hope these pictures find you in good health and I hope that I can do more work for you in the future.

Sincerely, George H. Dennison, Company photographer

P.S. If you would put in a good word for me with the Colonel I am hoping to convince him to requisition a more modern camera for me.

DUKE TO VISIT FRONTLINES!

Hastings Russell, the 12th Duke of Bedford Plans to visit the now famous “London Trench” saying “Along with bringing them the accolades and regards of this nation, many of my Colleagues have awards and commendations to units on the frontline that I will be delivering in their name.” When asked Why he chose to visit “London Trench” he said “Too often we let the great battles such as The Somme over shadow the heroic efforts of those on the secondary fronts.” Russell continued saying that he would tour the trench with Colonel Winston J. Edinburgh III and was planning to make a personal visit to his own 503RD Sappers.

( clipping from British News Paper October 1916 and sent in by Cam Frisby).

Colonies and Allies come together to protect “London Trench”

The Hun launched an attack on “London Trench” In northern France. At 8:00 in the evening on Saturday October 5^th when many soldiers were given early rest so they could be in church at dawn, The Hun launched a surprise attack after bombing “London Trench” for hours with Artillery, Incendiaries, and Mustard gas, German commanders ordered a mass suicide charge on “London Trench” captured documents reveal that “German commanders are willing to sacrifice any number of soldiers, civilians, or land just to see ‘London Trench’ destroyed.” However steadfast in their duty, British soldiers and their allies repelled the attack. This reporter would like to highlight The Duke of Bedford’s own 503RD Sapper Regiment. During the German attack The 503RD Sappers were risking their lives to rebuild a French Church in No Man’s Land, not only did they protect the Church, The detachment of soldiers at the Church managed to recapture much of “London Trench”. The 503RD is comprised of loyal soldiers from Great Britain, Her Colonies, and her Allies. Englishmen, Scots, Irish, Aussies, Frenchmen, The Welsh, Even loyal Americans  fight together with unity to be one of the most successful units on the line. Colonel Winston J Edinburgh III Gave them high regards saying “[The 503RD] Have proven that, When properly motivated and led, a colonial soldier can fight above and beyond the call of duty” During the initial wave alone, the 503Rd directly credited with 79 kills, and capturing 54 Germans. Many of the Germans were quoted as saying “We would rather be prisoners of the British than Slaves to the Kaiser.”

(clipping from British News Paper October of 1916, submitted by Cam Frisby).

A letter from our Doctor at the time to some of his fellows

A letter from our Doctor at the time to some of his fellows, probably late September or early October.

"Greetings members and associates of the Organization.

I write to you from my current assignment with the British Royal Army, Stationed on the French front. As you know my primary assignment is investigating the plot behind this terrible war. That is who or whom wishes to raise these poor fallen souls, and how and for what purpose do they do this.

My secondary assignment is the investigation into the recent increase of those cursed with second life. In these past years I have as of yet been unsuccessful in uncovering why this is happening, but I believe I am making progress! Within the unit I have recently been assigned to there was an individual that I believe was afflicted with second life. This individual showed some of the known signs, but I was not able to interview or test the individual as they were captured on a night reconnoiter mission.

At this time I have found no evidence that would implicate the “Allies” local military being involved, or even aware that this grave plot may exist! In my investigation of both the trench aid stations, and the nearest hospital all I have found are poorly trained and under supplied teams. I can not speak for the German Army as I have as of yet been able to investigate their medico organization, or hear from the other “Doctor's” placed in the German lines.

Though on a recent night raid I witnessed a German solder looting a fallen solder from the unit, when he retrieved what appeared to be a small gem from a pocket, his immediate reaction was to drop said gem and take aim at the Head. I incapacitated the German with a well aimed shot, but before I could secure him or the gem the area was incinerated by the flame trooper of our unit leaving nothing behind.

Enclosed with this letter is a greenish gem I had found while digging. I believe may be similar to the gem from the raid, as the solder with the gem had gotten lost in the tunnels the unit has been constructing.

With regards,
The English Doctor."

September of that year.

Concerning the events of September that year.

     Shortly after arriving the Americans among the group decided that the situation was unacceptable, and quickly put forwards a plan of "Improvement and expansion". The state of the sleeping spaces as well as the tunnels themselves were painfully under maintained, as well as completely haphazard in their construction and layout. It was then that a plan was drawn up, a proper plan with careful attention paid to security and the many dangers which faced us. At some point we will have to attach some photos which were taken of various aspects and events but that is for a latter point in time. It took several weeks to dig out and then to shore up the many sections which were being constructed. Being men of hope and daring; we built the rooms to suit about two hundred soldiers with their own bunks even though we only had about fifty men. I had spared nothing in the layout of this facility based on what I thought we'd need. the rooms were laid mirror opposites with a central corridor as their mutual entry point, and each having several layers of locking doors and reinforced walls to retard the advance of enemy forces while stopping explosives from doing damage to more than a single section per hit.
      Now the materials were a bit hard to get, for you see I based my numbers for material requirements on my working on classes at the Colorado school of mines and estimates for building homes. We might have also over estimated our total required goods abit too. But finally it was done, and we all had proper living conditions; or that's what it seemed like. There were so many damned rats we began to classify them as if they were ships! Everything from corvettes and tenders to First Rate Battle ships, and very rarely Dreadnoughts. These were both making our spaces filthy, and undermining the constructions by chewing away at the lumber we had so painstakingly cut and placed. We began a program of making false floors and placing pits with buckets or steel drums under the floors with food in them. These were to collect rats and them remove them from the areas several times a day. This was not a popular job for anyone and frequently used as a punishment for minor offences among the enlisted men.
     Now we realized very quickly the jolly old England wasn't giving two bleeding you-know-whats; about our situation or the lack of real supplies we needed and were not getting. So we set up a sort of game with the English army and their various representatives which although not legal were very effective in getting what we needed. I will point out that unlike many officers who were known by their men, or reported by the papers we did not seek to swindle the government out of materials and everything asked for was actually something which had a purpose. The fact that we occasionally over estimated the materials, man power or pay required for various tasks was simply an overbid because we knew they'd short us on whatever we asked for. Just like any good contractor I padded the accounts and when we needed extra there was something stashed away to hold us over while the goods were late in delivery. Quickly we realized too that it was too dangerous and tedious to bring in supplies on horse wagons and single trucks over the flat ground in daylight. So we put ourselves to building a sunken road almost seventy yards long and deep / wide enough for a large cargo truck could move freely without Germans shooting at it.
      One of the next things we did was go into town and buy up the first truck we could find, it was a terrible old machine which looked to be twice as old as is physically possible. But it ran ( sort of) and so we got into it and quickly put it to use moving supplies to aid our course and missions. Not long after we realized something more: The British were terrible about supplies, frankly I could order supplies from Sears and Roebuck in the United States of America ( still neutral then) and have them shipped to France via American cargo ships before London could manage to send us stuff. Now there are two problems with this; we had to pay for the goods in cash ( to get the best deals) and there were no promises England would pay us back for it later. So we did what all men do when they need something they can't afford; we pooled our money upto about a thousand pound Stirling and mailed it off fastest mail possible. Confirmation was returned very quickly there after and we ordered about three tons of supplies; mostly consumables of food and personal supplies also included a complete General Motors truck, a bath tub and some other items out of their outstanding selection of personal firearms and gun supplies. Unfortunately by this time there were a lot of things being shipped back to Europe and we wound up waiting more than a month and a half for most of it and some of it only arrived well after two months had passed.
   However, the arrival of the shotguns, pistols and ammunition was very speedy and we were thankful for it soon enough. The Germans had an extensive program of tunneling and countering out tunnels, soon we were fighting them inside the cramped conditions and poor lighting. The use of pistols and shotguns was I think one of the reasons we did so well. Rifles are not suitable for tunnels but a a scatter gun and a repeating pistol are.
     Then with some down time from German attacks stopped we set up our next great plan, we began digging up the existing tunnels until they were nearly two yards by two yards. Enough room for men to stand and walk comfortably around in them. The timbers were always built to five times the recommended strength needed; and that saved us when the German started throwing bombs through his holes at us. Now we had no idea how much distance there was underground, but there was a lot of it and it took ages for you to crawl to your destinations. As a result we set to measuring it out, and the number was Point eight miles; or eight tenths of a mile. This was dug with buckets and hand at a rate of seven cubic yards per man, per day. I leave you to figure out how many man hours were spent at that and what it must have been like.
    Here and there we got some new people but never as many as I asked for and increasingly I began to worry that this was not just a purgatory position but one where every level of command was wildly apathetic or incompetent to a degree which was going to get us all killed. And that was not acceptable. So we began sending daily requests for supplies each time adding to the stuff I was asking for until I hoped we'd be buried in materials and could get about doing everything.
     The tunnels were not fully expanded until well after two months I'm afraid attacks, counter attacks and other moronics got into the way of my planning. However we quickly became the unit who was known for having what needed getting and for fixing things which were problematic.
   During this time "American Number One" and "Irish Fire" helped lead attacks nearly every other night against the Germans until we got almost two weeks without night time surface attacks by their fabled storm troopers. Irish fire was addicted to asbestos, he believed it saved his life, and he was also the sneakiest damned man to wear his body weight in explosive death you'll ever meet. In several attacks they flanked Germans, crept up on them and took prisoners without being seen. Several other times they dismantled German mines and booby traps. Then replaced those with their own in nearby locations. Not all their missions were as successful however and on several occasions there were troopers wounded or killed who came with them. Upto this point none of them had handed over anything in the way of official reports, but I do know that between them they killed or wounded almost seventy Storm troopers in night time raids, with no ideas about how many were killed or injured by these explosives left behind. Now after nearly a month on station we also picked up some additional people with some of the most eclectic and dubious of skill sets and personal stories I'd ever heard of. Two dwarves; one a miner from "somewhere" and another who was a catholic priest of all things. He was sent here to keep the spirit of the men up as best he could, and soon enough we were working on constructing a small room to serve as a church for him. Now the first dwarf was a man born to his tasks, and soon enough we realized the key to happiness was to give him directions and leave him to it, then come back and scoop up the dirt he left behind. That man was a boring machine underground, and several times his hands saved our lives as well as kept the Germans in fear for their lives.
     Several times the remains of "Jerry Hill" (later renamed "The Alamo") were fought over and retaken from the night time predations of the Germans. Finally we gave up on that and simply tunneled under it, finding out our German counter parts had done the same, a short and bloody battle waged until we burned them out and bombed the tunnels they'd left behind. That hill became the near total focal point for our unit's safety and hazards the rest of our days at this post.

     Now one night the damnedest thing happened to me, I was waiting for weeks on basically every order and supply request I had sent out. We were short handed due to some shootings with our Prussian counter parts and as a result it was my turn to stand watch over the truck tunnel. This was one of the most secret projects to date since the German high command would flip their collective tables and charts over if they learned I was building a high way underground right towards them and it was withing walking distance of their trenches from the word go. On top of that, the British land forces leadership would have developed a sudden and unrepeatable case of terminal piles at the mention of our unit's name. It took most of our men a week to get that thing built and then we built a four truck garage in order to house our future fleet of vehicles. Well there I was and I could see movement coming along the above ground portion of the road but it had not lights or signals on. So I flashed the lantern to show them where I was and hoped they'd keep the signal down. What I got was a shipment beyond measurement, it was an entire division of French infantry bearing their complete kit and supplies to last them a week or more.
     No orders to speak of on their part except to remain unseen by the Germans, so the officers marched over to me as the only man present. I speak French and as a result was informed they knew almost nothing about their mission perimeters. I got them underground and we quickly established they were here for several days, We did not have enough room to house a thousand men and their kit if we were to have anything in a hope of doing our own jobs. So I hit upon the only option; I explained that due to the top secret mission they had we were not informed of their presence until today, but that I had been expecting some troops and supplies were issued to help me. Then I showed them to a section of tunnel which was largely unused at the time, instructed them that if they could form up we could have them housed within twelve hours. The men who saw how we lived; in near luxury really, and decided that half a day of digging wasn't too much to ask from them for the same levels comfort. Now after they unloaded their stuff; which took up almost every foot of space I had prepared for proper troops ( ones which didn't necessarily exist) they got to work digging and passing buckets until the job was done. Few people in my unit spoke French, and almost no one wanted to question too much why a French division was doing our dirty work for us. So after an entire day we had a room large enough for a thousand men to sleep in it was dubbed "the wine and cheese cellar". Which most ironically it would later become, after the French left it was our supply dump for a good long while to be.
     The French posed several problems, I had to keep them underground and busy but couldn't let them know too much about what we were actually doing here. They were it turned out very quickly nothing more than sacrificial lambs for a battle not a single person would have laid bets on it's success. Less than a week later the whole group was broken up into several smaller groups and spread out with other British outfits. I feel this was a terrible injustice, to them it was certain death for nothing. To me it was the loss of my greatest asset, nearly unlimited man power. In only eight hours they'd moved more dirt than my whole unit could have in six months, and if I'd had them six months we'd have won the whole damned battle ourselves. But that's another tale for another day.
      Well by the time the French had been moved around we had nearly finished all our primary ( nearest the surface tunnels) which were of the least tactical value but posed a lot of extra room for use to move about and keep materials in. I don't know if the German's ever got a word out of the prisoners they took over the time we were there however I do know that their digging became damnably close to completely beating us several times and it was only by insane actions on my and a couple of others parts including detonation of our own tunnels before / at the moments of a German counter sap that we were able to hold onto the ground we took at all. More than once we were surrounded, dug into and attacked; but overwhelming firepower and some ludicrous stunts managed to win the day.
     Now one fateful day the French were ordered to make an attack at dawn after an eight hour artillery barrage by our forces against the Germans. This had been the plan for years, and the Germans knew it down to a minute how to counter every step of this three hundred yard walk of death. The attack barely made it to the German lines before there were too few left able to fight at all. By the end of that morning the attack was over and we were wearing non-combat markings to retrieve the men who lay dead and wounded all over the filthy ruined soil. Being critically short on supplies we took whatever rifles / equipment there was on the ground with the dead and wounded and brought it back with us. Those rifles later saved our lives when the Germans decided to pay us back for this fool's errand, too close was this battle to mirror the one which was coming for us.
    Every time we got more wood, sand bags we were building up the fort underground, the tunnels were over constructed as I'd previously mentioned and when electric lights came along we were soon to use metal pipes in order to protect the wires from rodents as well as bullets / knives and explosions. The amount of stuff I had to use to keep our place from sinking, imploding or flooding could have built a whole town up like the one we were shooting over and through in the name of saving.
     We had ordered something to the tune of a quarter of a million board feet of lumber in every dimension to build houses but in ten foot lengths to keep it manageable to move and to emplace. I ordered enough bricks to make a retaining wall one hundred yards long and one yard tall along with sand and mortar. sheet metal to roof half a dozen houses and many many other things for the construction of one of the most expensive and secure sites in all of Europe's battle fields at the time. We often joked that by the war's end, our living quarters were happier, safer and better furnished than the officers who sent us orders from the train station thirty miles back behind the lines.
    Every so often someone would show up for an inspection, the Colonel some times or the captain of our section at the time. And we made everything look like it was Horse Guards, uniforms and bunks and a mess area. Hell we even had toilets and showers by the second or third month there. Also the continuous expansion of living space for troops both present and "not present". Which would come in handy for those terrible times when they heaped a bunch of new guys on us, those men usually got killed the first battle we had. But thankfully were kept on the books long enough that their families could be given some additional funds as well as desperately needed supplies which were only delivered based on how many living / breathing men were reported to be here any given week.
   Now I know some of you are calling "Foul / Freud" and whatever else, but if you weren't there you have no idea what it was like. Any time we had stuff delivered which we couldn't use we handed it out to the other units around us, no one was getting rich off the "extras"; it was all put to use to help the unit and the buddy units nearest ours. Had England sent us what we'd reasonably asked for to start with nothing like this would have become a reality but there you have it.
     By the end of September our tunnels were some of the best that had ever been constructed, the rats were rapidly becoming less of a problem and with the addition of some electric pumps and motors and "Jenny's" to power it all we were pumping all the water out of our lower reaches too.  Soon we were installing wood floors in our most important work areas to speed up the transfer of soils to the loading stations and a system of winches hauled it all up to the truck tunnels or sloping passages made it possible to roll trailers of soil to the truck for disposal.
    There was one real danger which wasn't yet under any sort of limitation yet; Fresh air.

It's a fact that in a mine, light and good air are the two most important things to a miner, in a battle underground this is even more so the case. For civilians can simply pump air from outside into the shafts and with regular vents to the surface make good circulation happen cheaply. In a war this is suicide, there are bombs falling, artillery shells screaming in and thousands of man walking around looking to kill you all the time. Add to that the use of poison gasses, which I have already spoken of my extreme distaste for their uses to you the reader.  This meant that we had large trucks burning fuel underground, hundreds of men, tens of thousands of rats ( whose smells were beyond description) and then auxillery power supply units to keep various areas in power. There were candles and lanterns for light always burning, these were all generating poison gasses and making terrible amounts of noise in a place where sounds were going to get you killed even if the gas didn't.
     We needed clean air and lots of it; so we built a system of chicken wire sections which could become pipe frames, then put canvas over them and made our own air ducts, this was at first to suck old air out of the deeper portions of the tunnels and keep it flowing. But sooner or later we learned this wasn't enough to supply all the needs, as well as it only opened them up to a new danger. By now Gas attacks were a reasonably uncommon thing because the weather was turning against their use and because nearly everyone knew how to avoid them personally. But in our case it could have been one gas attack from wiping us all out if they had but known at the time what we were doing and the scale which we had done it.
    So we build sealable doors over the truck tunnel; using wood and chicken wire fencing and oiled canvas in layered defenses like the airlocks of a warship. It proved to be very effective when it was finally needed, all machines were shut off and lights cut to min for the duration of the chemical attacks.
   Soon we began demanding sheet metal rolls, cutters and stove pipe sections to construct a proper section of airways as well as massive supplies of charcoal to make filters and fans to pump outside air through for a prolonged attack that we might be able to continue our combat effectiveness underground. It was a great plan and took stupefying amounts of planning to make it reasonably successful. But it vastly improved moral for the men and gave them reasons to believe in our unit and the mission.
     It was a cold day in hell when the train pulled into our depot's rail station, a cold rainy day with a chance of snow probably. Not only had we been given almost everything which we requested for the whole month but our military requests were sitting in five different locations around the supply depots while our civilian requests ( private purchases) had also been shipped out, though not in full. With one broken truck we drove off to get our supplies. Now wet lumber even the ubiquitous 2"x4" weighs as much as a pound per foot of length when soaked in water and getting our lumber delivered was later relegated to the British army's impossibly slow hands for ours was too precious a bunch of cargoes to hope they weren't stolen if we had delayed their pick up. Thankfully we got almost an entire week off as a result of the massive supply loads constantly being delivered to the wine and cheese cellar. Later on it was proved vitally important that we had them on hand, in subsequent attacks be concentrated German plans they had wiped out much of our tunnels more than once and also shelled our trenches to a point that they were barely recognizable as man made. It was the extensive use ( at my insistence) of prefabrication and pre-building supplies that we could replace things in a fraction of the time it took to make / set up originally.
     There in the closing days of the month more men arrived, many of whom died so soon after arrival that we only know who they were because there is a name on every bunk for who slept there. And one wall with every soldier who served / died marked down. I have omitted their names from this story because I do not have the permission of their families and because it's heart breaking to remember how many good men died for what I believe were futile and hopeless attacks by the officers of all armies involved.

     Of the men who survived I am even now receiving their version of events and will attempt to put them into some kind of order before putting them into this ever growing document. Failing that, I will move on to the events of October of that year.