The Salt Lake herald. [volume] (Salt Lake City [Utah]) 1870-1909, 1897-12-06
ENGLISH ARMY ACTION
RESULTS OBTAINED By USING
THE dunn DUNN, BALL.
Said to Be In Violation of the Com
pact Made at the st. Petersburg
Convention-Calibre of Rifles
Helmets Now In Use Not Salts
factory.

Der bullet. 1t has been claimed by
many that it will make a clean hole,
and that a man can keep on fighting
for quite while after he has been hit.
That is so of an.r bullet that is not
of the explosive variety. If the old
45-caliber bullet strikes in the right
part of the body it will not immedi
ately disable the person hit. But from
the report that come in, it would seem
that the small steel bullet now in use
is still less effective.
There has been considerable talk
lately of the action of the English in
their warfare against the Indian and
African border tribes by their use of
the ''dum-dum bullet. The dum-dum
bullet is the name given by the Indian
soldiers to the new bullet for the Lee
Metford rifle, which is in use among
these soldiers. Experience has shown
that the original nickled Lee-Metford
bullet made a clean cut hole in the
human targets against which it was
fired. The person hit, when no bones
were touched, it is claimed, did not
notice that he was wounded and was
able to remain in the fight for some
time.
Some of the officers in the dum-dum
factory were called upon to remedy this
defect, which they did. The nickel
jacket of the Lee-Metford bullet was
ripped up along it's length, leaving the
head whole. On the impact of the new
bullet the nickel strip and the lead
spreads out like a round fan, and nat
urally causes a fearful wound, and the
person hit is Immediately knocked
down. 1t is claimed in military circles
that this is violation of the conven-
4i0y, of TOatarcln of 1873 which
prohibits the use of explosive bullets
in small arms. These bullets are not
explosive, but it is generally held that
the letter of the St. Petersburg compact
is being violated, and that the atten-
ton Of the countries which signed it
should be- called to the fact.
Another subject which is receiving a
great deal of attention and is being
talked over, is the adoption of rifles
of different caliber for the army and
navy. At present the navy has in use
a rifle of still smaller caliber than the
one in use by the army. 1t is also OF
different make, and should it happen
that the United States would become
involved in a war, and the army @hould
work in cooperation with the navy,
two separate and distinct kinds Of am
munition would have to be carried. II
L
ammunition it would render that side
useless, for they could not obtain it
from the other
General Breckenridge, in his annual
report, makes a very proper protest
against the adoption of different cali
bers for the small arms used by the
army and navy An attempt will prob
ably be made to have the president OF
the United States, under his authority
as commander in chief Of the army
and navy, compel the two services to
come together in this matter by ap-
pointing a board to decide upon uni
form caliber for all arms to be man
ufactured hereafter. AT present there
are three different caiiberS of small
arms in use in this country. The reg
ular army is supplied with the 30-cali-
Der rifle the navy with the 20-cahoer
arm. and the militia with the old and
obsolete 45-caliber. In case of a war 1t
would be a pretty mess the country
would find itself in with the present
condition of affairs.
o 9 o
In making his annual report recently
on the affairs of the signal corps OF
the army, General A. w. Freely, chief
signal officers, says:
"The most notable advance is in the
development of the combined telegraph
and telephone apparatus devised by
CAPTAIN James Allen, signal CORPS
which is distinctly superior to any pre-
viously constructed, and admirably an
swers all requirements. An operator
can easily carry q combination tele-
gram and telephone office, and while
one soldier telegraphs a message, an
other. may, over the same wire, talk
tplephOnically with another station, the
distance receiving operators nearing
only their own message. The outft
weighs but Is pounds, including bat
terry, and has been rigidly tested up 70
distance of more than 600 miles. ana
is a pronounced success in its various
capacities as a buzz Morse, telephone
and phonoplex instrument.
g @ q
TT is expected that orders Will soon
he issued reviving the old system OF
having the troops by the paymasters IN
person A few years ago Secretary La
mont started a new system of pay
1 lIlor which from the very first has
been unsatisfactory. 1t was to send the
sum necessary to pay the troops IN full,
to each of the posts and have some OF
ficer at that place do the work of pay
ing the troops This has not met with
success. The system throws respon-
sibility on the shoulders OF one OF the
officers of a post that is not at all wei
come Then, too, he is not accustomed
to making payments of troops and 1t is
hard and unsatisfactory kind OF work
for him TO do properly.
Before this was in vogue it was the
custom to have regularly appointed
paymasters make trips to the posts
and pay the troops at the proper times
In this way it saved all the bother of
having the chief paymasters make the
proper remittances to one of the banks
in the city nearest to the post to be
paid. and from there transferred to the
officer, appointed by the commanding
officer of the post to make the pay
ments After that the officer would pay
the soldiers. And so it goes, with red
tape enough to swamp most individu-
ais Now it seems that the old system
is to be revived and it will be received
with the applause of the relieved rank
and file.
One of the first changes to be made
in the uniform as now in use in the
army will undoubtedly be the helmet.
The style of the helmet at present does
not seem to meet with approval, and
the question of d change is under con-
sideration by the war department.
Nothing definite has yet been decided
upon, but it is thought that a new form
win soon make its appearance. The
ouartermaster general has recently eX-
amined a number of helmets made of
bamboo, similar to those in use by the
English army in India, but was not
favorably impressed with them.
An article recently published in the
Army and Navy Journal says: John
G.. Shortall, president of the Chicago
Humane SOciefv objects 70 the recent