Every evening, Wilmington daily commercial., 1918-08-24
BOMBING THE DUMP
is HIGHLY EXCITING
One Air She'll May Destroy a
Months Ammunition Stores;
Hard Targets TO Hit.

Behind tho British Lines IN Frnnco.
Aug - The British aviation commun-
Iquc frequently contains a brief line TO
record that direct hits were obtained
upon an enemy dump at some point be-
hind the German lines Tins colorless
announcement may seem 10 the reader IN
America nothing more than the record of
a dull piece Of routine. hut the deed itself
Is different from its record
American airmen attached 10 the Brit
ish squadruns have long since found out
that the business Of bombing dumps
often is exciting and spectacular work
Moreover, the importance of its effect
upon enemy plans and operations can
hardly he exaggerated A well-aimed hit
on a store of German ammunition may
destroy the work of many months IN the
munltl0n factories, and cripple numerous
batteries for many long days
A British airman. Lieutenant W A
Barnes, has given The Associated Press
the following account Of 4 recent 5S-min-
ute RAID on a German dump rs character
lstic of this form of activity
'On this particular night there was not
enough moonlight for long raid, so the
target gwen US was a German anmuni-
ton dump. We welcomed the change, for,
naturally, the strain Of long distance
raids INTO Germany. night after night, be-
comes a hit wearing Dumps are of course,
situated as near as possible TO the firing
line, and so mean short raids
Dumps are by no means easy targets
10 find at night, for they are seldom sltuat-
cd near any definite landmarks. and are
usually well camoufaged BY the study
of maps and photographs, however, we
had pretty well located the position of
this one, and started out on the raid with
high hopes of success
We few almost due East from the
aerodrome. At the end of the so minutes,
we could Just make out the outline of
sheds This was good, but we let out a
parachute fare to light up the ground,
and make sure we were over the target
This promptly dlspelled all doubts, for
the Hun searchlights opened aup at once,
and hail of machine gun bullets leaped
up from the ground Anti-aircraft guns
had been firing for some time, but the
shells were bursting well above us, and
giving no trouble
The parachute flare proved real
friend, because both searchIights and
machine guns concentrated upon it.
giving us just sufficient time TO dive
swiftly, release our bombs, switch on the
When We turned TO observe results, we
witnessed the finest frework display |
ever saw. Ammunition was cracking off at
record speed, dense clouds of smoke were
rising, and highly colored flames were
leaping hundred feet and more from the
ground
we watched this pleasing exhibition
for some minutes, until the cough OF an
Archie burst near by TO remind US that
we were still over Hunland, and so turned
and steered for home.
''The whole job occupied exactly 58
minutes; but 1t must have cost Germany
hundreds Of man-power, hours in muni-
tions works-there was still some fire
there at noon next day and saved our
French allies a good many casualties, for,
as it happens, that big dump, we learned,
was to serve a bit of front facing French
troopes."