Harry Trounce was an American mining engineer of British birth and parentage who joined the British Army in October 1915. After the briefest of training in England and France he joined the 181st Tunnelling Company at Silly-sur-la-Lys in Flanders in January 1916. This book is a detailed blow-by-blow (in every sense of the words) account of life underground as a junior officer in this company. - Summary by Paul Hampton