Siege Mines And Underground Warfare

The siege became established as a perennial mode of human conflict ever since the first urbanised populations constructed walls to protect themselves and their property from attack. In the annals of siege warfare, few individuals commanded more fear and respect than the miner, who with his pick, shovel and crowbar was a serious threat to the security of the strongest foundations. This book traces the development of undermining techniques from the earliest evidence of ancient and medieval siege warfare. The advent of gunpowder revolutionised the mine in the sixteenth century and sustained mining as an integral part of the sophisticated fortress warfare of the eighteenth century. Beneath the trenches in Flanders during the First World War mining and countermining reached new levels of intensity and destructive capability, before the remarkably long history of tunnelling as an offensive strategy came to an end.