Best form of parapet to conceal loopholes. Wrong type of parapet for concealing snipers’ loopholes.
SECTION OF TYPICAL GERMAN PARAPET.
Showing concealed loopholes made through tins, bags, &c. Note—The steel shields on top are dummies.
Drawings by] [Basil Head.
The chief reason, I think, for the success of the school was the great personal interest taken in it by the Corps Commander, Sir R. Haking, who would come out from his headquarters at Hinges and inspect the school at frequent intervals, as did also Brigadier-General W. Hastings Anderson, then B.G.G.S. of the Corps. We were inspected in July by the Army Commander, and from time to time officers from other theatres of war and from other armies visited us.
In a meadow near the school was a small pond, full of fish, which it was the ambition of Gray and myself to catch. There was only room for two fishermen at a time, and only on one occasion was a fish caught. This we gave to the farmer who owned the pond, and I presume he ate it, for he was up at Headquarters early the next day inquiring for a “médecin!”
Still, nothing could be more delightful than after three or four strenuous days, on each of which one walked perhaps eight or ten miles of trenches, to sit before that funny little pool in the French meadow, and forget there was a war.
At the time of which I write, the Corps which formed the First Army were the 11th, the 1st and the 4th. The 3rd had gone to the Battle of the Somme. The 1st Corps had a sniping school, which, at a later date, reached an extraordinarily high pitch of efficiency under Captain Crang and the late Lieut. Toovey, the author of “The Old Drum Major” and well-known Bisley shot. It was a party commanded by Captain Crang which went into the Portuguese trenches, where it was reported the Germans were showing themselves rather freely, and made a big bag. The 4th Corps also had a good school, but they soon moved out of the Army to the south. In fact, when I first went there, the system in the First Army was that which I had always advocated, to have Corps Schools of sniping and observation. The difficulty, of course, was that there was still no establishment, and that sniping schools did not officially exist. This was quite a common thing in the war, for when I first went to the large Third Army Infantry School, with a score of instructors, a large staff, and a couple of hundred N.C.O. and officer pupils, it did not exist officially.