PETONE NAVALS IN CAMP. BIG GUN SHOOTING.

Evening Post, Volume LXXVI, Issue 107, 2 November 1908, Page 7

PETONE NAVALS IN CAMP. BIG GUN SHOOTING.

The Petone Navals held an "At Home" at their camp at Fort Kelburne yesterday afternoon when about three hundred visitors were entertained at afternoon tea, and given an opportunity of witnessing from the hills above the fort an exhibition of big-gun drill. This morning the company carried out its first series of practice from six inch B.L. guns. The practice was merely instructional, for the purpose of what is known technically as calibrating the guns, or ascertaining how they shoot as compared with the ranges given by the rangefinding instrument. Every round fired was recorded as a hit, the ranges being about two and a-half miles. Captain Richardson was present as chief instructor. The range officer was Lieut. Standish, R.N.Z.A., Colonel Campbell acting as chief umpire. The series were fired by Lieut. Ellis and Lieut Robinson, who acted successfully as battery commanders, i The class firing commences to-morrow morning, when Major Hume will act as chief umpire. -Captain Freeman, who recently left Wellington to leside at Christchurch, l^turned to Wellington yesterday, and will remain until the termination of the camp. The camp has been a remarkably successful one, all ranks being keen and enthusiastic as in former years. It will, however, be hard for the corps to beat its shooting record of last year, which constituted a record for the Dominion, and which experts consider cannot be beaten.

Designs and plans ssnt in to the Hospital Trustees in connection with the proposed additions and alterations to the General Hospital are now being inspected by the Inspector-General for Hospitals (l)i. Valintine) and the Government Architect (Mr. Jas. Campbell). The work is expected to run into £30,000, and is urgently needed.