This outfit they were using may have been very good for reasonable ranges, but these chaps were so far in back of the line that it was hopeless for them to think of doing any definite or accurate shooting. The nearest enemy targets were at least eleven or twelve hundred yards away, but they were doing most of their shooting at targets well over on Messines Ridge and I knew the range to these points was about two thousand yards. Now, with a machine gun, it is possible to put a burst on a target or group of men at such ranges and break them up and possibly hit one or two. But my personal experience has been that the firing of single shots, at individual targets, at ranges of more than 1000 yards is just a waste of time and ammunition. I have tried it myself and seen many others try it, but never saw any indications that the target had been hit.
But this sniping outfit from the Buffs was deadly serious in their efforts to damage something over there in “Germany” and I just had to admire their spirit even though their judgment was bad. I talked with the Lieutenant, who had just been transferred from the Territorials, and he told me he had been a competitor at Bisley, and I suppose he was really a good rifle shot; the two enlisted men were also good shots probably. When I told them that I was also a rifleman and had shot at Camp Perry, they invited me to try my hand. They handed me a rifle which they said was already sighted in right and told me to take a crack at something within the German lines about 1200 yards away. They had two very fine spotting scopes and the men watched while I fired. There was no wind at the time so I held right on one of the demolished brick buildings, just to get the hang of the thing, and touched off. The shot brought forth much congratulation and applause from my onlookers, I had actually “hit the side of a house.”
Then I took one of the spotting scopes and observed while the others fired. It was generally possible to pick up the strike of the bullet when they fired at the closest targets, as those brick walls gave out an appreciable “splash” when hit. But none of us were able to pick up any indications as to the location of the long hits fired across the valley. They just shot into space at those ranges. Having become pretty well acquainted with the crowd by this time, I ventured to ask the officer if he thought it was worth while to shoot away at targets located a mile or more off, and he replied they were acting under orders. That was typical of the “Imperials,” just do as you are told and think nothing about it. So I came on away then, and I imagine that outfit hung around there for many more days engaged in such useless work.
I remembered about this sniping post and those “specialists” after Charlie Wendt and the stretcher bearers were killed, and then commenced inquiring around. I soon learned that an authorized school for snipers was being organized and that specially sighted rifles and equipment were available for those who were detailed to and passed through this school. So I went to our Colonel, and after telling him my qualifications as a rifleman obtained a requisition for the regulation “outfit” without the “training.” I convinced them that I already had the latter, and as by this time the German snipers opposite our front were becoming a really serious menace I had no trouble in getting an immediate start towards abating the nuisance.
In order to get this rifle and special sniping equipment, I went, with the permission of Colonel Hughes, back to a newly-organized Sniping School, near the village of LaClytte. There I was issued a Ross rifle — one of the lot made for and used by the members of the Canadian Palma Team at Camp Perry, in 1913.
As all the old timers will remember, that team came near to cleaning up against all comers at Perry, that year. In fact they did a good job of it in the individual Palma — which was won by Major Hart MacHarg who was afterward killed at Langemarck. The only reason they did not also win the team match was that they took a chance and started experimenting with a new bullet which did not stand up so well in the wind.
These Ross rifles were exceptionally accurate and dependable with the Mark VII ammunition we were then using. For short and mid-range work, I am not so sure yet but that they were superior to our Springfield because of the longer barrel and better sights.
With the rifle I got a telescope sight. It was one of the type — new at that time — made by the Warner & Swasey Company. Prismatic and mounted on the left side of the rifle, it might not rate so high now but, at that time, it was better than any other I had ever used. One of the best features was that it could be mounted and used without interfering with the iron sights. I had a little trouble in getting it securely mounted so that it would not jar loose but finally, by using a wedge — made of a piece of safety-razor blade — and salt water, got her on so tight that I came near being court martialled when I finally turned it in. The armourer could not get it off.
I also got a fine spotting ’scope and a tripod for the same. The spotting ’scope was pretty high magnification — about 36-power I believe. Each article — sight, telescope and tripod — had its separate sole- leather carrying case, with convenient straps for slinging them over the shoulder.
Each rifle had been fitted with a particular sight and was thoroughly tried out in Canada before being sent over for issue. I happened to draw rifle No. 140 and sight No. 49. A very few shots fired at the improvized sighting range made me familiar with the scope adjustments and permitted me to check in the scope against the iron sight settings. Now, I have heard a lot of unfavorable comments against this Warner & Swasey sight, in fact, I cannot recall ever hearing a good word spoken for it. However, it is my opinion, that when compared to the others we had at that date and time, it was a pretty good sight. Naturally, it might not compare with the scope sights of today, as much progress has been made in these since the war. The one I used gave very good results, and was fully as accurate and reliable as the Winchester A-5 type. This latter model was particularly hard to keep “lined up.” So, late in November, 1915 I came back from LaClytte with as good and reliable a sniping outfit as was available at that time, and for the next two months I proceeded to “check off” that “fifty file of Germans” which I had mentally promised my dead comrades. I did it and with plenty to spare.
I first picked out my observer, and this is an important half of any sniping team. For reasons which will be given later, I am not much in favor of the “lone” sniper. A man on his own will not do half as well as a properly paired team of two. For my choice, I selected a particular friend, a lad named Bouchard, of whom you will hear much later on in this story. Bouchard was the closest friend I had in the Canadian forces and in addition he possessed the qualifications which made him a good observer. So I picked him to do the observing while I worked the rifle.
We already had available an ideal location for a main sniping post in an old barn located some five hundred yards to the rear of our front line. This place was the farmhouse before mentioned. It had every desired advantage, even to name and precedent. When the British forces first settled down in this spot they found eight dead Germans lying in front of this building, while inside was a dead French soldier, who, they figured out, had accounted for the eight before they got him. So they called the place Sniper’s Barn. My Machine Gun Section had already made some use of this place and we had a position in a small hedge which ran across the old orchard in front of the barn, on the side towards the enemy.
At first glance it may have looked rather foolhardy to place a machine gun post so close to a building which was in plain sight of the German lines and only some five hundred yards off at the nearest point. But I had remembered our experience at our first strafing place down at Messines where we were located about a hundred yards in front of some buildings which the Germans shelled industriously in the belief we were located inside them, with never a shell put anywheres near where we actually were. So I depended upon Heinie to run true to form again, and it worked. We kept both a machine gun and sniping post in front of Sniper’s Barn for almost six months, and while the Germans shot up the barn regularly during all that time, there was never a shell apparently directed at our position, except for an occasional short or two which burst near us. We fixed up a fine little sniper’s nest in that hedge.
Sometimes we would shoot from the hedge but more often from the barn, as it was slightly higher and gave a correspondingly greater command of the country across the way. I soon learned that, while they shelled the place every day, there were a few corners which appeared to be fairly well protected from the fire of the 77 mm whiz- bangs, which seemed to be the only sized guns that were working on that particular target. This was due to the fact that there were two very substantial brick walls dividing the different sections of the building which were almost, but not quite, perpendicular to the line of fire of these guns, and, by getting in close alongside one of these walls, one was fairly safe from a direct hit. We often were splattered with pieces of brick and stone, sometimes caught a few small shell splinters and, one time, by some freak of luck, a shrapnel shell struck an adjoining wall and ricochetted in such a way as to spill the whole charge right on top of us. Fortunately, although the shrapnel bullets cut off two legs of the tripod and one buried itself in the stock of my rifle, neither one of us was actually hit although we both had one or more holes through our caps and tunics. That was before the advent of the tin hat. We were all the time working on new “nests” and, eventually, had six, all well concealed and offering good fields of fire.
Every time we built a new sniping nest, we would immediately proceed to sight in and find the range to all the various prominent objects which could be fired upon in that particular sector of fire. Sometimes, these sectors
