NEW FORM OF WAR SPORT.

New Zealand Herald, Volume LII, Issue 15884, 3 April 1915, Page 2 (Supplement)

NEW FORM OF WAR SPORT.

CRAWLING TO THE ENEMY.

OFFICER'S ADVENTURE.

A Canadian officer on service in France, writing from the firing-line, gives a thrilling account of a sniping encounter. He says :—

"Off I went, crawling through tho sodden clay and branches, going about a yard a minute, listening and looking. I went out to the right of our linos, where the Germans were nearest. It took about thirty minutes to do thirty yards. Then I saw the Hun trench, and waited for a long time, but could see or hear nothing. It was about ten yards from me. Then I heard some Germans talking, and saw one put his head up over some bushes about ten yards behind the trench. 1 could not get a shot at him, as 1 was too low down. Of course, I could not get up, so 1 crawled on again, very slowly, to the parapet of their trench.

"It was exciting. 1 was not sure that here might not have been somebody there, or a littla farther along the trenchI peered through their loophole, saw nobody in the trench, then the German behind put up his head again. He was laughing and talking. I saw his teeth glisten against my foresight, and 1 pulled the trigger. He just gave a grunt and crumpled up. The others got up and whispered to each other. " I do not know who were most frightened, they or I. There were five of them. They could not place the shot. 1 wan flat behind their parapet and hidden. I just had the. nerve not to move a muscle and stay there; my heart was fairly hammering. They did not como forward. 1 could not see them, as they were behind some bushes and trees, so 1 crept back, inch by inch. Shot in the Heart. " The next day, just before dawn, I crawled out there again, and iuund it empty again. Then a single German came through the woods towards the trench. 1 saw him fifty yards off. He was coming along upright, quite carelessly, making a great noise. I heard him beforo 1 saw him. 1 let him get within twenty-five yards and shot him in tho heait. He never made a sound. "Nothing happened for ten minutes. Then there was noise and talking, and a lot of Germans came along through the wood behind the trench, about forty yards from inc. I counted about twenty, and there were more coming. They halted in front. 1 picked out the one 1 thought was the officer. He stood facing the other way and 1 had a steady shot at him between the shoulders. He went down, and that was all I saw. "I went back at a, sort of galloping crawl to our lines and sent a message that the Germans were moving in a certain direction in some numbers. Half an hour afterwards they attacked the right, in massed formation, advancing slowly to within ten yards of the trenches- We simplv mowed them down. It was rather horrible. They counted 200 dead in a little bit of a line, and we only lost ten. "They were pleased about the stalking and getting the message through. It was up to someone to do it, instead of leaving it all to tho Germans, and losing two officers a day through snipers. All our men have started it now. It is quite a popular amusement."