THE GERMAN SNIPERS

Evening Star, Issue 15907, 13 September 1915, Page 8

THE GERMAN SNIPERS

MAJST-SI'ALKING WITH A RIFLE. In each, despatch, ; in private letters and diaries, out orhoers and men deplore the sniper's depredations. Leaders are picked off, gallant lads struck down at their ■chum's side, with never a foe to be seen •tiiri apparently no war in progress at all. J he whole countryside cracks here and there with mysterious death. That shot camo from the window of a ruined cottage ; another from behind our lines, where the slim sniper lay hid all night. cFothed in khaki from our own dead. Shots appear to come from the wounded far out on the stricken field ; from leafy trees, and windmills, and ruined barns. It is horribly, perplexing. | —The Prussian's Teacher.— Now, it is 6afe to say that sniping was not part of the Prussian's training for war. it's too loose a plan, too individual, this free-'lance roaming with a gun and little else beyond a fine store of ready wit and uncanny tkill in disguise. But the German learned it from us, just as we learned it from the Boers—those splendid independent marksmen and born guerrilla troops. And the German improved upon his instruction till he became a real terror, calling for counter-sniping on a large and deliberate scale. The old "woman" refugee who brought water to our foremost works turned out to be a Prussian non-com., who before he died gave up a book accounting for 50 British officers, crueiV picked off. Head-money is given for these, it seems, after official investigation of each claim. Day and night these picked shots are at wc-Tk with extraordinary darin<*. Even machine-gun snipers have been found m our own lines, and that at enfilading centres whence in a few seconds these desperadoes work frightful havoc. They lie low in the mazn of ditches. They let our advance sweep by, and then coolly kill our men from the rear. The fact that they wear our uniforms and speak fluently, even slangy, English ("Got a fag about yer, matey?") makes it very difficult to detect these'deadly pests, especially in the excitement of preparing for a new advance. Here is a typical instance : A casual crack, as frcm a distant whip. A zip-putt— t—t! and one of our fellows falls mortally injured. The miper shoots to kill, being'.an enthusiastic professional armed with a match rifle, fine glasses, and telescopic sights. —The Gleam in the Twilight.— Each sniping crack means a serious casualty, and the shots seem to come out of the sky. No flash is ceen, thanks to bright sun and smokeless powder. The day wears on. Losses are suffered in grim silence, and dusk steals over a seamed and thunderous land. . . . "That tree," murmurs the best shot in the regiment. . . . Thought I saw a gleam that time amid the leaves." It's darker now, you see. Rifle flashes show faintlv—if you know where to look for them. Another crack. Ay, there's a sniper in that lofty branch. Out with him ! " Nine hundred yards," our marksman murmurs, weighing the problem calmly. "Gimme them glasses, Joe." "Why, there's a fella, below him too, passin' up the cartridges. I'll take him first. Wait—he's behind. Now he shows! You take the flash in the tree, Tom." Two careful shots whip out. Two more —half a dozen—a whole volley ! The snipers are sniped at last. The "man hirfi up in the leaves swings to and fro inert and dead, securely roped to his perch. His companion fell over in the very act of filling a new clip and dropping it into a bag which the marksman hauled up by a string. Night-roaming snipers fire upon our ration and water parties; upon trench postmen, too. Even doctors and stretcherbearers are not safe. Death flies everywhere in this wildering maze, to the dread music of great guns, near and far, of all calibres and kinds, from the trench mortar to the howitzer that throws a giant shell. The sniper is, indeed, the very eye of the 6iege warfare now in progress. To show head or limb above the parapet is fatal, or, at ..ny rate, invites a wound. Keen watchers, stand in enemy trenches with rifles fixed 'and sights aligned over ranges known to a yard. Our men teate these sharpshooters with dummies, and signal hit or miss with all tfae zeal of Bisley recorders on an international clay. —The Indian Snipers.— The German sniper aimed specially at our officers, and that with such success that now our subalterns carry packs and rifles, so as to be indistinguishable from the private soldier. In our own lines counter-sniping has been brought to an i uncanny pitch of perfection, especially by the Indian marksmen—Pathans and Sikh's and Garhwalis—who can hit a 6in German loophole at 200 yards five times out of six. Turbanned figures stand like statues . in sinister patience, to be rewarded sooner , or later by an incautious victim. i Some Tegiments make it a point of ' honor to repay each sniper casualty with at least three against the enemy. Here our officers take a hand, for the sword is an outworn weapon, and the rifle, when all is said, the king of the whole armament. Trench sniping is confined to selected shots; an able and watchful man j can do great damage in the long summer's day. But the wandering free-lance—the dar- ' ing sniper at large—is much more to be feared. He has uo regard whatever for his own safety, and quite alone will turn an attic in a ruined cottage into a fort, with water, provisions, and ammunition. for a week—perhaps also a wire to a senior officer, that he may act as spy as well as sniper and add valuable military information to wholesale killing, undiscovered and unsuspected by our "men. —-The Mystery of It.— It is the mystery which is found so demoralising—faint cracks from nowhere, and chums dropping in the twilight of a village street commonly thought quite secure. Or sudden death in the narrowditch at dusk when the star-shells soar and light the rugged spaces with ghastly radiance. One's pal behind falls headlong ' suddenly. Who can have shot him? No one in front—someone behind there, one of those cursed snipers who follow persistent as flies upon our food ! I We tear off our friend's pack—it's dark I down here now, and eager hands touch I a dreadful patch at last", all warm and wet and sticky. W 7 e shudder instinctively I to a wave of wild unreasoning fear. "Will I our turn come next moment? And a I sudden roar of guns gives a dreadful I reply. So the successful sniper is a demoralis- I ing influence. At any cost he must be i located and shot down—no easy matter, seeing that all German cunning goes to this work, all German genius for deceit and treacherous dealing. The English captain of a Pathan regiment was sorely troubled in this way, and bade his Moslem sergeant keep a sharp lookout. "'Sir," said the sepoy at length, "the foe is there." j "Where? I see nothing but a hav-j stack." " j " In that hay." j To reach it unsuspected, the officer made j a detour of three miles, then crawled to ! the base of the stack through long grass, j and remained motionless as his Pathans, ! a party of whom had, followed close be- j hind. ' I Crack ! A faint explosive lash, a barely ! perceptible movement in the apparently ! solid wall of hay. Swiftly, though with- I out a _ sound, the officer rose and put a magazine pistol _ at the tell-tale place. ' When he'd emptied it his men rushed up j and tore away the hay, revealing a regular chamber, loopholed and aired, with a store of water, provisions, and 900 rounds of ball cartridge. ' In this snug hiding-place a young German officer sat collapsed with six bullet holes in his head. " It's high time." the R 7f n ? er sai<1 ' recallill 8 da >'s of inexplicable lose and grave anxiety. —The Greatest Game.— So to snipe the sniper is now the greatest game in the British lines, one calling for peculiar gifts of mind as well i as trained marksmanship. "I cleared out a whole nest," an Essex I man reported, "Mind you, it's a <.■<:■<!- ' blooded, far from pleasant job, this Lvng- i distance shooting, hut our whole safety \ and comfort depend on xL Ficst of a-Tl

spotted a Bavarian officer at 950 yards Ly means of the telescopic sight and my < bserver. _ His mon. were filling sandbars and building a Tegular sniper s paradise for our benefit. '■■' Well, I killed him. I killed the two men who ran out to haul his body in, and I brought down a fourth fellow who was making loopholes in the parapet. Then we had peace. We could stretch our legs and lift our heads for a bit—to say nothing of starting "a sniping campaign of our own that inspired real respect. We must ( be top dog with 1 these Germans. That's why we trot out our crack shots and show the foe fresh sniping feats each day."—W. G..Fitz-Gerald, in the 'Scotsman.' '