French mine tunnel - Butte de Vauquois - Argonne

French mine tunnel - Butte de Vauquois - Argonne. MIne wagon in a French gallery under the Vaquois. This is a standard pattern wagon of the Decauville light railway system invented by the French and effectively adopted by all the combatant nations in WW1. Original site of the village atop this hill was destroyed by mining during the period Feb 1915 to Feb 1918. The furious mining and counter mining blew away the entire hill-top and today the small village lies at the foot of the hill. Underground there are approximately 12, 000 metres of galleries, the deepest of which is 104m, and over 150 chambers and rooms. The American35th Div finally captured the hill on Sept 26 1918 by simply pulling back from the summit which they then saturated with gas and high explosive and pushed forward around the hill on either side

104m Adopted American35th Approximately Argonne Atop Battlefields Blew Butte Chambers Combatant Decauville Deepest Effectively Entire Explosive Finally Furious Galleries Invented Maur Pushed Saturated Sheil Simply Tunnelling Tunnels Vaquois Vauquois

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