THE PHILOSOPHY OF TARGETS, ETC.

New Zealand Herald, Volume XXIV, Issue 8064, 4 October 1887, Page 3

THE PHILOSOPHY OF TARGETS, ETC.

TO THK EDITOR. Sir,—la your issue of the 6th September you kindly published a. letter of mine under the above heading. Perhaps a condensed history of my endeavours in the face of professional prejudices would be suggestive of the /oily of bowing down to the fetish of militarism, there being no finality in the soldier's business more than in any other. It will also show that anyone has his work cut out for him if he advances any proposiposition counter to any existing military dogma. I will leave, your readers to imagine the great trouble taken by correspondence and otherwise to bring about the following separate inquiries, as it must not be supposed past military authorities chased me with offers to have them held. I will now proceed to show that in 1869 I first logically proved in your columns that targets ought to be dark and not white. In 1871 a Board of Officers was appointed to consider the questions, trials or tests were recommended which resulted in favour of my proportions, but I never obtained a copy of the report; and I may here state 1 bad the greatest trouble in procuring copies of the following ones within three months after they were made, I remaining ignorant of their t*nor in the meantime. In 1875 Colonel Moule reported to the General Assembly that he failed to see that Mr. soall had advanced anything worth adopting, and naively added, that musketry instruction had not been carried out in the Volunteer Foroe of the colony for the simple reason that the men could not afford the time — i.e., the time required by the army system. In 1870 a Board sat in the Waikato, and gave an adverse report, stating that a soldier was already taught to aim on a dark ground, viz., a black bullseye. Although the members knew, or ought to have known, that not one time in twenty oan he do so, as he has to aim ou some pare of the white target in order to get on the builseye, on account of the action of the wind. The Board was also of opinion that the range-finder proposed by Mr. Seall might assist the rifleman to get an approximate distance, yet it would be highly dan. gerous from the liability of being blown away. Now. sir, this is an actual impossi- « bility. Id 1879 another Board tat in Auok* land, and after it had been shown at Mount Eden on three separate days with ' thr.-e different squads of competitors that better shooting was made on the dark target than upon the white one, the Board reported that the targets and rifle sights I proposed might be advantageous, but not sufficiently so for the Board to recommend their adoption for the service. And further, the Board could not recommend Mr! Soall's proposed system of musketry instruction. This latter part of the report was made in the face of the fact that the Board never examined the system at all beyond the target question, for when I handed the manuscript of it to the President he simply handed it back to me, the other members of the Board not even looking at it, and to the present day they do not know what it is. The system was again referred to the Government lor consideration last session of Parliament by the Committee on Petitions, my petition again asking for a fair and open inquiry before all the volunteer officers of tins district, not a Star Chamber one like the others. /p Thus, Sir, yon perceive, I have not only been battling for the proper targets, but also for a feasible and general system of musketry instruction, applicable to all corps of volunteers—country, as well as garrison— corps having the means of instruction within itself. And now, Sir, it may be asked why I took all this trouble, and my answer is, because, for more than twenty years, we have been parading bodies of armed men, at an expense of some forty thousand pounds per annum, as assets for defence, when more than three-fouirtha were totally unacquainted with the theory of musketry, and would be in the field practically unable to use the arms they carry, all from the lack of instruc tion, as vide Colonel Monies report above. In the face of the beforegoing reports it may be asked whether I can produce any! expressions of opinion in my favour, Oh, yes. I have a letter of oommendation and approval from the late Sir Donald MoLeahjUlso, hit opinion in the Assembly, that I bad made valuable suggestions, letters to the same purport from the late Majors Gordon and Beckham, from Colonel Harrington, Lieu-tenant-Colonel Wales, Major Murray, Captain Wildman, the Hon. Mr. Swanson, and others. And the adoption of at least three of my propositions by the Horse Guards, in 1887, is surely an indirect if tardy approval of what I proposed in 1869. In conclusion, I may be allowed to quote a sentence from one of the above letters. The writer says :—" I cannot conclude without saying how much ladmire your pluck and consistency in face of difficulties, red tape, and cold water, which would have strangled or drowned a less earnest man."—l am. &c, J. C. Soall. September 17, 1887.