The herald., 1917-10-04

their yarn here and there and putting
on the final varniSh in the letters to
I the folks M home. making the censor
/ work overtime reading the dope
/ But chewing it over among them
selves, the lads suddenly discovered
! that they had been cheated So they
organized q delegation Ia wait on the
/ gunnery officer of the ship. In the
eyes Of the young bluejaCketS who had
just come in and are new Ia the game,
the gunnery officer stacks UP highest,
for he Is in charge Of the shooting irons
of the dreadnaught and is the whole
thing-like the angels rolled into one,
and cnameled at that. With the kids
he has the muzZle velocity of lj-inch
gun, and to the Youngsters the skip
per, in comparison. is just a myth
some invisible power in gold lace.
Now, the training given is most in
tenSive in character; each man is
made to specialize as far as possible,
and every effort Is made To perfect
each member of the crew in the work
To which h. Is assigned. The most
likely youngsters. even those who have
never seen anything larger than a H.
bore shotgun, are assigned arbitrarily,
To start with, as gun painters and gun
captains; the hefty. strong. wpll-huilt
lads are made Shellmcn and leaders:
men Of quick minds are assigned aS
Sight-SetterS and telephone operators:
and these men are trained, trained,
trained. and instructed. cautioned. Al
ways drilled together. they are made
10 feel that If any one of them falls
down in his particular job. the work
of the others is spoiled. 1t is all team
work, like on the diamond.
So this gang laid aft and waited on
the gunnery officer and presented their
case thus wise: "Of course. mister. we
are going TO be the next fellows in the
gun crew to go abroad, amt WEI
Certainly not; you had your trip
You have just come back"
"NO. sir. we didn't just come back
We never got there. You know when
we left you said we were going To Eng
land, and we never saw England at
all. We amt going back home and
have all the fellows guy US and say
that we didn't finish the job and that
the U-bOat ditched u.s." They went
back all right.
Here you have n sample of the met
tie of these youngsters. some barely a
month In the outfit. but getting the
punch and absorbing the spirit of the
service, the willingness 10 do the job,
the desire to play the game.
II is now tolerably well known that |
picked men from our battleship fleet |
have been sent TO man the guns OF the |
armed American merchant vessels that |
go abroad. This started first several |
officer in command would make q |
round trip, over and back across the !
ocean and then return To their ship. |
You know how well these men have |
done their duty. and truthfully their |
exploits have been reported in the |
pubic press.
But in hunting the U-bOat little has |
been said about the long, untiring
watches and the ceaseless vigil that |
these men must keep while crossing
the sea. and particularly when nearing
the danger zone. And these calls from |
the fleet have been so great that raw
recruits have been specially trained to
man the comparatively small-caliber
guns which our merchant vessels carry.
Intensive training has been the order
Of the day, and the fleet is full of bully
stories OF how these young and com
paratively inexperienced men have
taken TO the game.
There is such thing as being gun
Shy, and even old-time men might an