A communication trench comes out at a salient, and runs back from 150
to 200 meters. Patches of chalk, freshly moved and increasing daily,
are observed. These are indications of underground work starting from
the salient.
Four or five meters of enemy trench without loopholes, but with
loopholes close together to the left and right, may mark a gallery
entrance.
A miner's working relief reaches the gallery, each man carrying a
piece of the frame or a lining plank over his shoulder, the ends of
which can be seen over the parapet or through the loopholes. These
are indications of a gallery position, especially if the men all move
in the same direction and are lost to view at the same place.
From a raised point on the second or third line we see, with field
glasses, an abnormal accumulation of sandbags in a well-known area.
These sacks may indicate an underground gallery.
Patrols sent out in front of the enemy trenches sometimes bring back
valuable information. They may hear the rumble of ventilators, the
noise of a truck moving on the rails, men working near a gallery
entrance, etc.
The enemy fire with heavy calibers on portions of the first line.
Often the same corner is bombarded. This may indicate that the enemy
artillery is seeking to facilitate the miner's work by overthrowing
the entrances to troublesome galleries in the trench attacked.
_Listening for underground noise._--The observation of hostile
trenches may give indications which will limit the zone necessary to
be watched; but for accurate results we must listen for underground
noises.
_Positions of listening posts._--The listening post is placed at the
head of a gallery, in an angle of a gallery, in a deep dug-out, in a
niche under the parapet, or on the bottom of the trench. The points
nearest to the enemy trench are selected for the listening posts.
Below the outposts there is always a niche, allowing a man to place
his ear to the ground (hence the name listening posts).
_Hours and precautions._--The most favorable hours are morning about
4 or 5 o'clock, at 2 p. m., and at midnight. All the occupants of
that part of the trench must keep still, and all work in the trench
and the mine must cease for a given time.
_What is heard._--The inexperienced ear hears too many things, and is
easily mistaken in the noises heard. A relief passing in the enemy
trench or in his own trench at 40 meters sounds strangely like the
noise of a pick. A man hitting a ground sill or striking it with his
heel gives the idea that work is being done. The impact of bullets on
the parapet at night, when a fusillade is uninterrupted, also gives
the idea of underground work. A man filing a fuse at the foot of his
loophole suggests the presence of an enemy revolving borer. A man who
snores beside the gallery entrance imitates the noise of a ventilator
and may be mistaken for it.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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