The cellar
Auchonvillers was reduced to rubble by artillery fire during the Great War, but the cellars survived and were put to good use by Allied soldiers, both as places of relative safety in which to rest, and as operational centres.
The Ocean Villas Tearooms are part of Avril Williams' bed
and 
breakfast
complex, and the main house was originally a farmhouse rebuilt, in 1923, over
the original cellar, and what a cellar! If only bricks could talk!
Avril's cellar has a fascinating history, having been put to many uses during its military incarnation, including as a possible holding cell for James Crozier who was shot at dawn in neighbouring Mailly-Maillet, and as a strecher-bearer's post and aid station.
The cellar, and Avril, were featured in an episode of Professor Richard Holmes' BBC television series, 'War Walks'.
Tours of the cellar, guided by Avril, are available by prior arrangement. Contact Avril for more information.
building
was almost ringed with communication trenches leading
into and out of the front line, which ran across the
fields where the Old Beaumont Road (2nd Avenue,
as described by Blunden in Undertones of
War) joins the New Beaumont Road. Avril Williams
is available as a tour guide, please ask the tea rooms
for more information.