The Jasper news., 1918-08-22
CHAPTER V-Continued.

l never saw a battery better con-
cealed than this one. UP on the ground
you couldn't see the muzzle twenty
yards away--and that was all there
was to see at any distance. There
was ruined garden just outside the
gun quarters, and while the gunners
were there picking apples there would
be hiss and an explosion, and over
would go some Of the trees, or maybe
man or two, but never shell struck
nearer the guns than that. The poilus
used to thank Fritz for helping them
pick the apples, because the explosions
would bring them down in great style.
Shells from our heavy artillery passed
just over the garden, too, making an
awful racket. But they were not In 1t
with the "75's."
They gave me little practice with
"75" under the direction Of expert
French gunners before l went to my
14-inch naval gun, and, believe me, 1t
was a fine little piece. Just picture
to yourself a little beauty that can
send 3S-pound shell every two Sec
onds for five miles and more, If you
want 1t to, and land on Fritz vest
button every time. There Is nothing
like better than a gun, anyway, and
! have never since been entirely salts
fed with anything less than "75." -
AS you probably know, the opposing
artillery In this war is so widely sepa-
rated that the gunners never see their
targets unless these happen to be
buildings, and even then 1t Is rare. So,
since an artillery officer never sees the
enemy artillery or infantry, he must
depend on others to give him the range
and direction.
For this purpose there are balloons
and airplanes attached to each artil-
lery unit. The airplanes are equipped
with wireless, but also signal by
smoke and direction of flight, while
the balloons use telephones. The OBJ
servers have maps and powerful
glasses and cameras. Their maps are
marked off in zones to correspond with
the maps used by the artillery officers.
The observations are signaled to q
receiving station on the ground and
are then telephoned to the batteries
SAll our troops were equipped with
telephone signal corps detachments
and this was very important arm
Of the service. The enemy position is
shelled before an attack, either er
barrage or otherwise, and communica
ton between the waves of attack and
the artillery Is absolutely necessary
BombardmentS are directed toward
certain parts of the enemy position
almost as accurately as you would use
searchlight. The field telephones are
very light and are portable to the last
degree. They can be rugged up OIL
knocked down In very short time
The wire is wound on drums or reels
and you would be surprised to see how
quickly our corps established com
municntion from q newly won trench
to headquarters, for instance. They
were asking for our casualties before
we had finished having them, almost
Artillery fire was directed by mel
whose duty 1t was to dope out tn,
range from the information sent then
by the observers In the air. Two mel
were stationed at the switchboard
one man to receive the message ant
the other to operate the board. Al
soon as the range was plotted out 1
was telephoned to the gunners ant
they did the rest.
The naval guns at Dixmude wer,
mounted on fiat cars and these wer,
drawn back and forth on the track b!
little Belgian engines.
After had been at my gun for sew
eral days I was ordered back to m!
regiment, which was again in tn,
front-line trenches. My course wa
past both the British and French line
but quite a distance behind the from
lines.
Everywhere there were ambulance
and wagons going backward and for
ward. met one French ambulance,
that was long wagon full of poilu
from a field hospital near the firinI
line and was driven by q man who's,
left arm was bandaged to the shoul
der. Two poilus who sat in the reaI