The Tunnels of Arras

Wednesday, February 21, 2024

On February 21, we woke up in the City of Arras and found ourselves in a very beautiful apartment.

The first tunnels in Arras were dug shortly after the time of Christ, when the local population realized that the chalk rock about six feet beneath the ground was easy to cut and made great structural material. As a side note, these local people were actually Flemish but that is a different story.

As the city grew, they decided that it wasn’t all that smart to dig these huge caverns below your city, so they started a new quarry outside the city walls. As the city continued to grow, they continued to move the quarries. One of these quarries was the Wellington Quarry and that is where we went for our tour.

When the Allies moved into town during WW1, they realized that these tunnels would be great bomb shelters and some of the tunnels already lead most of the way to the German trenches. They conscripted miners, who mostly came from New Zealand, to connect the tunnels and continue them on to the German front.

The tunnels were amazing. They had built walkways, and the entire area was lit so we could see the work that had been done. The tour projected images on the stone walls which made for a poor image, but the effect was amazing.

Since the maze of tunnels was so vast and confusing, getting lost was a real risk. To help navigate, each support pillar was given a number. If you look carefully at this picture, you can see a #3 written on this pillar. They have maps with all the pillars and exits marked.

In the picture before the above picture, you can see stairs leading up to exit #10. On the walls they have projected images of soldiers running up the stairs. This tunnel led right to the German front line and the exit opened up yards from the Germans. In the middle of the night the soldiers ran up the stairs and attacked the Germans catching them completely off guard.

During this time, everyone (not just the soldiers) lived in the tunnels. The Germans continually shelled the city, and no one was safe so everyone who hadn’t left town, lived in the tunnels. They had stores, beds, kitchens, and even church, all in the tunnels.

And then, during the night, when the shelling stopped, everyone came to the surface and the city thrived with a vibrant nightlife of dancing and the markets all opened.

After touring the Wellington tunnels we took a self-guided walking tour of the city. We saw some pretty amazing things.

This picture of me and Alex is on the grounds of a big, beautiful cathedral.

Here are the three of us in the courtyard of an old convent. It is now a bunch of offices, but the exterior of the building has been preserved.

The older parts of this city were not made for people like me.

This is the grand market. Our room was in one of the buildings in the middle of the far-right side. Do you see that black structure in the middle of the parking lot? That is an elevator and a set of stairs leading down to underground parking.

Our room was on the top floor of the building painted blue.

After our self-guided tour, we decided to check out the clock tower.

Of course, my greatest interest was trying to figure out how all the internal mechanisms worked.

Once we got to the top of the tower we could walk around the outside of the tower. The views were amazing but boy was it windy. You can see the Grand Market in this picture.

The hands on the clock were so close I could have touched them if some spoil sport hadn’t installed the plexiglass shield to prevent people like me from damaging the clock hands.

Directly below the clock tower is the Little Market. It is surrounded by a bunch of cool little shops.

After the clock tower, we decided to take a tour of the tunnels below the city itself. At one time these tunnels were all connected, but since WW1 some have collapsed, and it is no longer possible to walk them from downtown Arras to the Waverly tunnels.

These tunnels are right below the city and so they were the original ones made during the Middle Ages and earlier. Over the years, merchants have fixed them up and used them for storing inventory and wine. 

This picture is taken looking straight up. That is a trap door that opens into a shop on the small market.

There are several entrances into the city above us.

For the tourists, they had several lights illuminating features that they found interesting. I don’t remember exactly what this light was supposed to illuminate. It may have been a storage area or something, but I found it fascinating that plants could grow thirty feet below ground just from a light that is on for a few hours every day. Nature is amazing.

Once again, these tunnels were not made for people like me.