What is Battle of Hill 60 (Western Front)?
{{more sources|date=December 2024}} Hill 60 was a man-made hill created in the 1860s from what was dug out from a nearby railway line. It had a height of 150 feet and was situated to the south-east of [[Ypres]]. It had been captured by the Germans in December 1914,<ref>{{Cite web|last=Author|first=D. V. A.|date=2017-11-15|title=Hill 60, Ypres: The peak of military mining|url=https://sjmc.gov.au/hill-60-the-peak-of-mine-warfare/|access-date=2024-11-14|website=Sir John Monash Centre|language=en}}</ref><ref>{{Cite web|title=First World War.com - The Western Front Today - Hill 60|url=https://www.firstworldwar.com/today/hill60.htm|access-date=2024-11-14|website=www.firstworldwar.com}}</ref> giving them a strategic advantage due to its height. Naturally the British wanted to take it back and so in April 1915 they began tunnelling. This use of offensive mining involved digging tunnels into and under the hill in order to place 22 mines beneath the hill (3 of which failed to explode).<ref>{{Cite web|date=2021-10-21|title=WWI's Battle of Messines: How Allies Used Massive Explosives and Tunneling to Win|url=https://www.history.com/news/battle-messines-world-war-i-tunnels|access-date=2024-11-14|website=HISTORY|language=en}}</ref><ref>{{Cite web|title=Messines - Tunnellers and Mines {{!}} Australian War Memorial|url=https://www.awm.gov.au/articles/blog/messines-tunnellers-and-mines#:~:text=Tunnellers%20%E2%80%93%20Hill%2060&text=Finally,%20along%20the%20whole%20British,even%20before%20the%20infantry%20attacked.|access-date=2024-11-14|website=www.awm.gov.au}}</ref>When they were detonated, they blew off the top of Hill 60, allowing the British to retake the crucial position. All the men who joined the Tunnelling Companies were experienced miners; they came from the coal mines in [[Northumberland]], from the sewers in [[Manchester]], and the tubes in [[London]]. Most of them had been digging since they were 10 years old, with generations of mining history and were often shorter than regular soldiers. In the barbaric, secret w