WATCH AT NIGHT.

Auckland Star, Volume LXXI, Issue 306, 26 December 1940, Page 6

WATCH AT NIGHT.

BRITISH WORKERS.

ANTI-SABOTAGE GUARDS.

Extraordinary precautions to prevent sabotage in British shipbuilding yards are taken by volunteer Home Guards recruited among the workers, who are unsparing in their sacrifice of personal comfort and convenience.

Just how these men stand watch and ward at a Glasgow yard, which is typical of all others, is described by a London "Daily Herald" reporter. At strategic points atop a wall which surrounds the vast property are steel turrets with firing slot* cut in their sides. From a protected steel platform outside the "defenders" can hurl down hand grenades.

One of these turrets the reporter visited covers a<ll landward approaches to the plant. Others are placed to command all the vital points in the shipyard itself. Some guard the powerhouses, some the ships under construction. At night guards armed with rifles patrol the jard to the edge of the Clvde River. '

In the evening the reporter and his guides entered a darkened building, smelling of tar.

"A man with a rifle challenged us from the darkness and, satisfied, showed us into a well-lit room beyond, the barracks of the Home Guard.* At the entrance stood a rack of rifles. The floor was crowded with mattress beds, canteen tables, benches.

'"In one corner sat a few young men playing draughts, waiting their turn to take a three-hour spell of duty on the poet*. Some were mechanics "or technicians of the yard, some were clerks. A few of the older men had seen service in the last war in one or other of the Scottish regiments.

"Nobody Hμ Groused." "Young and old were making a real sacrifice in volunteering to guard their shipyard. This one works overtime two nights a week, and «11 day Sueday. On top of that, theee men put in a whole night's guard duty once every week and somehow find time as well to do * bit of drill and fire their courses on the range. "When his turn of duty comes each Home Guardsman starts his normal work at 8 a.m.. finishes it et 5 p.m. (if there is no overtime), does his drill till dusk, and then reports straight to the guard room. 'For three hours that night he patrols the shipyard, sleeping in the guard room for the rest of the time, but ready to turn out if there is trouble. At eight o'clock the following morning he,returns to his normal job—so he does not leave the shipyard for nearly 36 hours. "'Xobody has groused yet,' commented the section leader. "The reason this shipyard thinks more of sabotage, and very little indeed of the dangers of a direct attack, is that it is only one tiny eect'on of the defence the Home Guard has thrown around Glasgow—and Glasgow itself is, again, only the centre of a huge defence area, embracing all kinds of places—cities and viHages, moors, farmlands and islands." In this defence area in every factory, every shipyard, there arc Home Guard units rained among the employees, standing to their rifles every night, "protecting their own works, "in the open country farmlands and moors are covered by observation posts.

Little Fortresses "I saw one of those poets," the correspondent continue?. "We drove to a high point, high enough. I 'believe, technically, to be called a mountain. Darkness was just falling, and the night's patrol were on the way to take their posts. "Against one of the rough stone wall* that traverse the moor was bufit a little fortress of turf and peat—a 100 yards away you would scarcely notice it. In front of it were dug a few inconspicuous trenches, and a few yards behind stood a small peat hut which the Home Guardsmen built for their shelter. "My guide stretched his arm to point to the next peak of the moor, where the next section of observers were just taking up their nightly watch; to the far peak yonder, the * broad hill over there, all at that moment of dusk being manned, as they are manned every night. Beyond that, he said. th« next battalion took over, and doubtlese did much the eam« thing. "It was an impressive thing to stand on that moor top and know that a; darknew fell, all around me on farms and in factories, on lonely beaches and in crowded tenements, teoi of thousands of volunteers were taking over the ni«*ht watch. e "Nothing spectacular about it, plenty of fault* to find with it, maybe but froe that deeerted height it g» T e a tremendous seas* of Tigilanee "p-i