American Falls press. [volume] (American Falls, Idaho) 1907-1937, 1918-03-15
LETTERS FROM POWER
COUNTY SOLDIERS.


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Mrs. c. c. Carney, of Rupert, former
ly of Rockland. kindly sends the fol-
lowing letter from her brother. The
Press will go regularly to this soldier.
Camp Lewis, Wash, March 4th, 1918.
Dear Sister: | received your letter
and was very glad to get it, but
thought you were never going to write
| was sure glad to get the American
Falls Press and l wish you would
send it every week 1t tells all about
where the Power county boys are and
what they are doing. You see if l
know what their addresses are | will
probably get a chance to see some Of
them when we get over there.
We are still having nOn-com. school
and it sure gets on our nerves at
times. If it wasn't for x. p | believe
/ would rather be a private.
We are still in quarantine for
mumps and measles and will probably
not be able to get away from camp for
about four weeks. Several of the fell
lows from our battery are in the base
hospital with one of these two diseases
now, but none of them are very sick.
Men are being taken out of this
camp most every day and sent to fill
up vacancies in other organizations.
We have lost about % or 80 that way
in the last month.
At present we have only about one
hundred men i'm the battery and il
keeps us rather busy taking care OF
/ all the equipment We have 164 horses
and a fun "three-inch battery" TO take
care OF A three-inch battery consists
OF four three-inch guns and twelve
caissOns a three-inch field piece is
too complicated for me to go into de-
tail about. but | will describe a caissOn
and a timber The gun is mounted on
two wheels and has a long A-shaped
piece out behind called the trail This
trail fastens on TO the back of the
timber to which the horses are hitch
ed The timber is an iron chest on
two wheels and is made to hold thirty
six rounds of ammunition The limb
er and piece are drawn by three pail
Of horses Each pair has a driver who
rides the near horse of his pair. The
caisson is an iron chest similar to q
timber but twice as large and viii
bold seyenty-twO rounds of ammuni
ton. II is also fastened to Timber
and is drawn by three pairs of horses
in the same manner as the gun.
4 battery of field artillery is divided
into nine sections. The first four con
sists of piece and caisson each, anC
the next four have two caissons eacl
and the last have two wagons calle'
the battery" wagon and store" wa
gon These wagons are also draw
. BIS three pairs of horses i'm the sam
manner as the piece and caissOn.
The first five sections are called tn
firing battery and the last four th
combat train The fifth section whicl
. has no guns is included in the frinl
iTGss # cSrF'ifegs' arr s''saf az C in
. struments used i'm figuring the frin
data
. A battery of field artillery cal
scarcely ever see the target it i
. sh0oting ar. SO all ranges and angle
. must bc computed by H6mber O
. % en- called battery commanders de
. tail who place themselves in a posi-
tion whore they can see both the tar
get and the guns
. ! will not go into detail about th
. methods of figuring this data as
. would hll a book And speaking O
. books, if l don't stop somewhere thi
. viii develope into a book
. ERNEST COMMONS.