The mainly forgotten story of the British and Australian tunnellers and their work on the
Belgian Coast during the Great War. Based on historical documents, military archives,
regimental records, testimonies and more than 350 photographs and pictures, the book
covers the fighting around the Belgian coastal town of Nieuwpoort.
Kristof Jacobs explores the presence of British and Australian soldiers at the Ijzer estuary
in the build up to Third Ypres and highlights the work in the dunes including that of the
Royal Engineers, the Dorset Regiment, the 135th Siege Battery, 2nd Australian Tunnelling
Company and Operation Hush and the diary of Major W. E. Buckingham. First-hand
accounts are included throughout and complimented with the story of eighteen-year old
Bert Fearns (1898-1997) a veteran from the 2nd/6th Bn Lancashire Fusiliers who ended
up in Nieuwpoort in 1917. It was his story that first inspired the research for this book by
Jacobs.