Rogue River courier. (Grants Pass, Or.) 19??-1918, 1918-04-16

others would try, ny the SOUND, 10 To-
cate Fritz and his gun. After having
got the location. they would mount
two machine guns In trees. In little
clump Of woods 10 the left Of our Gene
terry. and while Fritz was In the middle
of his lesson. would open M and trust
10 luck. by our calculations. II would
take at least week 10 pull on the
stunt.
II Fritz refused 10 swallow our bait.
II would be impossible 10 locate his
special gun. and that's the one we were
after. because they all sound alike, a
slow pup-puppup. ia tf f,
{ Our prestige was hnnging by
thread. Ia the battalion we had 10 en-
dure all kinds of insults and fresh re-
marks as. TO our ability In sIlencIng
Fritz. Even 10 the battalion that Ger
inan gun was sore spot.
Next dny. Fritz opened up as usual.
I let him fire nwny for a while aud
Then buited 10 with my "pup-pup-pup-
pup-puppup." ! kept this up quite n
while. used two belts Of ammunition.
Fritz had stopped firing 10 listen. Then
he started In; sure enough. he had
fallen for our game. his gun was trying
10 initiate mine. but, NJ first he made "A
horrible mess Of that tune. Again ]
butted In with a few bars and stopped
Then he tried 20 copy what I had
played. He was good sport all right.
because his bullets were going AWAY
over our heads, must have been firing
Into the air. I commenced to feel
friendly towardshlm. st-t
This duet went on for fve days.
Fritz was u good pupil and learned
rapidly. In fact, got better than his
teacher. commenced TO feel Jealous.
When he had completely mastered the
tune, he started sweeping the road
ngaln and we clicked II worse shan
ever. But he signed his death warrant
by doing 80. because my friendship
turned to hate. Every time he fired he
played that tune and we danced.
The boys In the battalion gave us
the "Hal Hal" They weren't In on
our little frameup.
The originator OF the ruse and the
other two gunners had Frltz's location
taped to the minute: they mounted
their two guns. and also gave me the
range. The next afternoon was set for
the grand finale.
Our three guns. with different eleva.
tions, had their fire so arranged. thar,
opening up together. their bullets
would suddenly drop on Fritz like a
haIlstorm.
About three the next day. Fritz start.
ed ''pup-pupplng" that tune. blew a
sharp blast on whistle. II was the sig
nal agreed upon we turned loose and
Fritz's gun suddenly stopped In the
middle Of a bar. We had cooked his
goose. and our ruse had worked, After
firing two belts each. to make sure Of
our Job. we hurrIedly dlsmounted our
guns and took cover In the dugout. We
knew what TO expect soon. We dldn'l
have TO walt long, three salvos Of
"whlzz-bangs' came over from Fritz's
artillery, further confirmation that
we had sent that musical machlne.grn
aer on his westward-bound journey
That gun never bothered US again
We were the heroes Of the battalion
our captain congratulated us. said 4
wns n neat piece Of work. and. conse
quently. we were all puffed up over III,
stunt
There are several ways Tommy uses
10 disguise the location of his machine
gun aud get his range. Some OF Che
most commonly used stunts are as fol
lows: fM 3en 700 rSt'.
At night. when he mounts his CUR
over the top of his trench and wants
to get the range of Fritz's trench HI
adopts the method Of what he term.
"gettfhg the sparks" This consists Of
firing bursts from his gun until tn,
bullets hit the German barbed wire
He can tell when they are cutting the
wire, because a bullet when 1t hits Q
wire throws out blue electric spark
Machine-gun fire is very damaging t
wire and causes many a wiring party
to go out at. night when 1t is quiet tt
repair the damage.
To disguise the fare Of his gun al
night when firing, Tommy uses what Il
called flare protector. This is stove
pipe arrangement which fits over the
barrel casing Of the gun and screens
the sparks from the right and left. but
not from the front. SO Tommy, always
resourceful, adopts this scheme About
three feet or less In front Of the gun he