The Pacific commercial advertiser. [volume] (Honolulu, Hawaiian Islands) 1885-1921, 1910-09-24

artllleryman is that fellow How then
are we to show our appreciation tC
! hlm' When you have. as YOU surely
VIII have, to give up to the artillery
the good road on which you are march
ing and take to the soft ground, mud
plowed fields or brush at the roadside
don t cuss the artillery. 1t can not
get along IN the fields When You have
as you surely will have. to do the big.
ger part of the guard and fatigue
don t growl and cuss about the artil
lery 5 doing nothing.
Don't Cuss the Artillerymen,
When you have, as you surely will
have, to dig most of the breastworks
don t bellyache about having to take
care of the artilleryman. He has to
do about twice as much as the infan-
tryman anyhow caring for his gans
and carriages, his harness and horses.
Finally, and this is the most important
of all, as he has taken care of You at
long range where you could do nothing
under hostile artillery fire. so do Won
take care of him. stick to and supnort
MIN, never leave him at short range
where he can not take care of himself
under hostile infantry fire. Do YOU not
see that infantry and artillery are thus
| mutually dependent on each other. that
they are compliments, the one of the
other. and must hang together? If
! you have learned this, you have learn
/ ed one of the very greatest principles
| of warfare
/ The second striking and important
| fhlng Tor an infantryman to bear in
mind about artillery is its rapiditv of
fire. Today all field artillery is rapid
firlng- Rapidf means five well
AIMED shots per minutes while of hur-
RED or unaimed shots, it means a
stream How is it donea To what is if
due? To three things mainly:
lst- 1t is due in part to what are
called recoil carriages which on dis
charge leave or put the gun back in
practically the very position it had at
the instant of discharge In other
words with the recall carriage the aieee
Js net thrown out of aim by the dis
charge, it is left aimed and conse,
quentl,v line is not lost moving and
| aiming it for succeeding shots.
md. 1t IS due In part to rapid york.
| ing breech mechanism, to swift, accu-
rate loading and firing machinery.
Sd. 1t is due in part te fixed ammu-
milton. The ammunition for field guns
today comes as complete cartridge, as
ready, and almost as certain in action
as the small cartridges issued to you
for your infantry rifles. and it all
goes In at once. almost at one motion,
and is fred with lightning rapidity
That Sudden, Awful Storm
l.. ~
tillery to bring upon you, if you expose
your troops even little while in close
order, groups or punches, a sudden,
awful storm, a perfect tempest of fire
which is called a rafale and which as
You can easily see. produces "a terrible
material and moral effect. Your only
safety under it is to lie down at once
and IN hole if you can.
The ammunition of artillery is today
of but two kinds, shell and shrapnel,
both of an oblong, acorn shape and
both explosive. Grape, chain shot, solid
shot, canister and the like are no more
Shell is used against inanimare OBJ
JectS, to destroy, batter down. blow up
walls, houses, magazines, Notifications
and the like. Loaded with some mod
ern high explosive it produces a terri
bic noise and shock and tears things
up where it explodes. This shock is
unnerving and terrifying even if it
does not kill. In South Africa it had
been learned that ordinary shell would
not drive good troops out of trenches
! In Manchuria japanese high explosive
shell two or three times made the Rus
slams move out of theirs.
Nhrapnel is the man-killing artillery
proiectile. 1t is metal case filed
with some go bullets Like the shell
it is explosive With a time or per-
cussion fuse it is made to burst at the
proper time and place and sweep the
/ spot with a shower of bullets. But
no more than your rife bullet can it
90 into hole in the ground after a
man. Remember that.
! There is now under test by our ora
nance department a combination she'll
and shrapnel, a single proiectile desi gn-
/ ed to take the place of the two. shell
! and shrapnel, now used. It will no
! doubt come.
Gun Firer Doesn't See.
| For an infantryman the wonderful
! thing about the artillery of today is
! that the artilleryman who aims and
! fires his gun, doesn t have at all to
| see the thing lac is aiming at, He can,
as il were, shut his eye. turn his back,
! even pretend to be aiming at something
else, and still pink his enemy. This
crooked, cross eyed way of looking one
way and shooting another-how is it
| done? The captain only of ali the bat
! terry needs to see the enemy. Up
! tree. on a hilltop, behind, in front or
oft to one side of the battery, he aims
i a telescope instrument at the enemy.
| That instrument, almost automatically.
makes certain angular and distance
measurements and the captain calls out
to the battery by voice or phone to set
! Their sights at so and so and fire. 1t
Is like she ships captain who calls out
his course north SO many degrees east
and he goes right. This is indirect
/ laying, sometimes called Indirect fire.
This method of aiming, together with
the curved fight of the proiectiIe in
the air for ranges of two thousand
| yards aud over, makes it plain to us
how the artilleryman can, and does,
today put his gun over vonder a Ger
tain distance, behind a piece of woods
or hill, entirely out of sight, perhaps
under perfect cover, and in all safety
= l. IL