The Abbeville press and banner. [volume] (Abbeville, S.C.) 1869-1924, 1897-08-04
SANS TARGETS.
new METHODS OF TEACHING SOL
DlERS TO SHOOT ACCURATELY.

Targets Are Built According to a Sensible
Idea-Soldiers Will Be Taught to Hit
an ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS and Descriptions
of the New objects For Marksmen.
When companies G and D, of the
Nineteenth Infantry, begin their range
practice at Mt. Clemens mt day this
week, says q recent issue Of the De-
troit Free Press, they will fire at new
targets called for by the revised re-
gulations for small arms iustissued by
the War Department. The keynote
of this new dispensation is to train the
United States soldier to fire at the
head and heart of his enemy. Target
practice under the new regulations
has for it's objective point representa-
tions of human figures in the various
positions in which the soldier would
encounter his enemy in action. A
glance at the accompanying illustra-
tons will convey, better than it is pos
sible for words to do, the full meaning
of this fact.
The targets range in their distance
from the soldier from 200 to 1000
wards. Careful calculation has shown
that it is within these points of dis
lance that the soldier must do his ef-
fective firing. 1t would be nonsense
to talk of firing with accuracy with q
Government small arm at q greater
distance than 5000 feet. When the
conflict becomes very much closer than
600 feet the only things for the soldier
to remember are to keep cool and shoot
at the head and the heart.
The first Of these targets is called a
short range. Sometimes it is used for
a hundred yards practice; that is, at a
distance of 100 yards from the marks
men. More often it is used at 200
yards, and occasionally at 800 yards.
On this target. in silhouette, is the
figure of a soldier lying down, as he
does in action sometimes. In such a
CASE as this, the soldier is seen direct
ly in his face, his head being elevated
from the ground as he leans on n ell
bow while taking aim. In other words,
it is the exact position of the Skin
misher, and the skirmisher is the man
at whom the soldier must ordinarily
first fire. as every advance of an army
is led by q skirmish line.
The centre of the target is rectangle
that is, a space of any desired size,
the four sides of which are right angles.
The rectangle may be in a form of a
square, oblong, or diamond shaped.
This centre, as it is called, is twenty
two inches high, just the height of a
soldier who is lying down, and four
feet wide, this latter being the width
of the target. This centre is one of
three divisions into which the target is
plated. The next division is known
as the inner, and the third or outside
division is known as the outer. The
score a soldier makes is made up in
high or low degree by the portion of
the target which his bullets strike.
These three divisions are subdivided
in two sections each, these two por-
tons being known as the right and left
centers, The same rule applies to the
inner and outer. To thoroughly I'M
derstand just what is meant, picture to
yourself something like this: Take a
target six feet high and four feet wide,
! divide it into three sections after the
fashion of the measurements given, the
sections running from right to left.
Then draw a line directly through the
center of this target from top to bot
tom. First you have the centre,
twenty-five inches high and four feet
wide. Then comes the inner which is
a ~rectangle also. This inner runs in
depth from a point forty-two inches
above the bottom of the target to the
lower line of the centre. The entire
target forms a rectangle six feet high
and four feet wide.