NEW ZEALAND ARMY AT HOME

Evening Star, Issue 16911, 7 December 1918, Page 9

NEW ZEALAND ARMY AT HOME

SEVENTY DAYS’ TRAINING.

MACHINE GUNNER-SAT GRANTHAM.

[By.H. T. B. Drew, Second Lieutenant.]

Each reinforcement that leaves New Zealand for England includes a certain number of machine gunners, who, in addition to the ordinary reinforcement course, receive special training for this work before they leave. They rank as specialists with the reinforcements, but here no such immediate distinction awaits them, for on reaching England they go to the infantry camps with the rest. But when specialists are required for either the Machine Gun Corps or the Signallers applications are called for, and these previously trained men are usually selected. Thus they receive a lull month’s infantry training with the infantry at either Sling or Brocton, and are made expert in bombing, gas precautions, wiring, and all trench work. Popularly supposed at one time to bo peculiarly dangerous work, the Machine Gun Corps in New Zealand were recruited from tardy volunteers, who were called for when the new men came in ; but in reality circumstances are not quite so bad as that nowadays. As a matter of fact, machine gunners have the advantage—it is usually considered an advantage—of & considerably longer period of training in England, and certainly they have in New Zealand, than the infantry ; and with so much barrage work at the front these men during active service have a fair spell out of the advanced posts. For their machine-gun training in England our men are sent to Grantham, a junction town on the Great Northern Railway, 102 miles north of London, and reached in two hours from the metropolis. This is the centre of the British machinegun world. Over 50.000 men are camped round hero undergoing training. One wanders what the number was in pre-war days, when Britain held other views on the machine gun! There are three Imperial camps Harrowby (where the G. 0.0. and the schools are situated), Belton Park, and Chepstone (the last named being 30 miles away), where the draftfinding units are camped. At each of these places the officers and men are divided into battalions; and New Zealand, which has its camp at Belton Park, comprises one battalion. In March last wo had 400 men there, and on the Ist April last 164 officers and 2,455 men had passed through. There have been as many as 550 of our men there at one time. It is a good system to have the camp here, _ for it provides the best facilities for training, the necessary ranges are available, and the best qualified instructors. Major Hardie, who since has lost a leg in the war, had charge of our first camp. INCESSANT TOCK-TOCK.

To Belton Park from Grantham iown is four miles. Buses for a small fee _ and motor cars for a high ono carry you either way. Belton Park has coma into use_ as a camping ground since the war, being an addition to the Harrowby School. It is the private park of Earl Brownlow, and the grounds, which are really magnificent in their tree-clad front Belton. House, an old, roomy, mid-period mansion. High lands stretch away north and south, heavily wooded ; and through the calm air perpetually comes the distant took, took, tock of the ceaseless machinegun fire that anyone from the front knows so well. Our own camp huts occupy' a picturesque slope facing Belton House, and at the top of the slope stands, in ancient solitude, a magnificent old forest, for hereabouts are some of the finest woods of Britain. Only a few miles away are the linker ic-s and old Sherwood Forest, with its rheumaticky, propped-up oaks. Nottingham is 25 miles away, and _Leicester and Lincoln about the same distance. Our men have thus ample to interest them, and, indeed, are very fond of this place and its surroundings and wooded panoramas. The average time Now Zealanders spend here is about 70 days. By that time they arc ready to go to France. There is more to learn in machine gunnery than accuracy oi lire and knowledge of tho mechanical construction of the weapon. Experts are even heard to declare that we are only in the earlier stages of our knowledge of tho effectiveness "of tho machine gunZoncs of fire, the most advantageous angles, choice of fields of fire, and other things have all to he learned, and since \vo barrage with this weapon up to 1,600 yards, ranging from, maps—like the artillery—to stay attacks, or to bespatter enemy concentrations or depots, most intimate "knowledge of the things essential to tho success of the work is necessary. The deadly machine-gun bullet, with its sighing hiss, comes amongst you suddenly in flights from nowhere, death-dealing and fearsome as tho bursting shells. Then, officers and men must also know how to follow up and keep pace with the earlier -waves of an attack, and whero to place

machine puna effectively and rapidly to hold up counter-attacks. At Messines our splendidly organised guns did magnificent woik in this respect. This class of fighting particularly suits the initiative and ecu re. go of our men. RAPID GROWTH. New Zealand, when our men first went to Grantham, had only three machine-gun. companies in the field ; we sent another one over with the 4th Brigade before Messines, and still another went to France in December last. Our men learn quickly—indeed, one could say extremely nice things of them in the placo they occupy with t-lie “Tommies” at tho schools; but comparisons are odious. Our battalion camp adjoins tbs Imperial huts, and wo share a cookhouse with one of tho Imperial units. In tins case one can say that so close contact shows one how well by comparison our men faro in this department. Tho Hew Zealand half of tho cookhouse is neatness itself, with its polished stoves and while-washed walk, and on tho other side—well, it is not so. For this cookhouse cleanliness and similar things in other parts of the camp our unit has been complimented by the Imperial 0.0. Ingenuity and care, and supplemented rations, enable our cooks ta turn out meals that are the envy of th® “Tommy”; and all this can be put down in tho first place to the officers’ greater active interest in tho men, and—from the General in Charge of the Hew Zealand Forces in 'England downwards—-to the

careful supervision and non-perfanctory inspection of things. But these are facts tho Now Zealand homes must already bo acquainted with from the letters of the men themselves. The officers share a mesa with an Imperial unit. It is not quite the moss one sees in onr other camps. ASCENDANCY IN SPORT. Sport, thrives at all the camps, and & very fins spirit of healthy rivalry exists with the "Tommies.” The New Zealanders, who are popular, won all their Rugby contests this year with the exception of one agm'nst the Royal Naval Air Service team. They hare also held their own at cricket and “soccer.” In other amusements—theatres, concerts, pictures —they are well cattoed for in the camp, and at Ilnrrowhy, where the garrison theatre is (two miles away), and at Grantham. The New Zealand* men have their canteens, with their usual billiards, games, and anto-rooma; and a Y.M.O.A. adjacent offers them other attractions. There are bathhouses and all the usual appointments, and agriculture is proceeding in all spare places in our lines, in which the New Zealanders again show an example of industry. Viewing this well-appointed and picturesquely situated camp from an old quaint archwav structure that some equally quaint old nobleman erected many years*ago on the wooded rise at the back of the camp, one thinks of what a delightful day Now Zealand parents could spend in this secluded spot inspecting the quarters of their sons! What pleasant strolls they could bo talcing down the shaded lanes in the park woods, where deer flit suddenly by, and where fat wood pigeons coo from, the top branchesl If our recruits in Trentham could conjure up this scene, how volunteers would rush for a TD-dayjf training here I