Smoke Signals.

Pelorus Guardian and Miners' Advocate., Volume 29, Issue 38, 18 May 1917, Page 2

Smoke Signals.

A French paper gives the stbry of smoke from a chimney being employed to give information to the enemy. The members of a battalion of French infantry that had moved into a wellcovered country and thought themselves concealed were inundated with shells.

The officers were astonished at the accuracy with which these shells were delivered, and sought to find who was giving signals to the enemy. In a farmhouse at no great distance from the battalion a German, disguised as a peasant, was found seated before a chimney in which was a great wood fire. The pseudo-peasant was alternately raising and lowering a chimney cover or screen, which caused the smoke to come from the chimney in long or short puffs as he desired. While doing this he looked through a window upon the fields where the French battalion was performing ‘ its evolutions, these signals, which had been agreed upon between the spy and the enemy, readily informed the Germans of the movements of the little troop. On discovery of this strategm the false peasant was arrested and immediately shot.