Through the courtesy of the Commandant of the Forts, the Field Artillery Battery §.V.C. were able to carry out firing practice at Woosung on Suncay. In the early morning members of the Maritime Company had been busy, getting tar-time the Battery had put in an apgets towed into place, and by the pearance the targets were showing up against the skyline. The Battery had been early astir, and - by 9 a.m. the guns had been loaded on trucks, the ponies got into their special compartment of the train, and all the personnel was aboard. Major Davis was in charge of the parade, the other officers present being Captain Hay and Lieutenants Holland and Lobb. Col. Marr Johnson, 0.M.G., D.8.0., Was present at Woosung as was also Lieut.-Col. Trueman, 0.B.B.
In a case such ay the practice at Woosung there is necessarily a lob to be done before bringing the guns into action. Thera is the very interesting business of calculating the range, which generally occupies the attention of the battery commander, a junior officer and a sergeant,' if not a number of others. Meanwhile the battery itself i pulled into position and the horse teams ridden away. At the same time the Signal Section has its own arrangements to make; in fact it was pretty well employed throughout the whole proceedings as the crowd took a deep interest in the telephone line running from the O.P. to the battery with the result that it had to be mended on more than one occasion. Finally, before work could proceed the launch in the offing had to shepherd stray junks out of the danger zone Firing commenced at dead low water, and as it proceeded the usual fleet, of junks at Woosung began to sail up river on the rising tide. As a consequence the targets at times were practically screened by passing junks, and delay in the firing practice accordingly occur. red. In addition in the course of the morning the targets drifted betwoon 1,000 and 1,200 yards owing to the rising tide. The object fired at was invisible to the gunners, and as matters were the sighting needed constant correction to follow the drift of the targeta, To the points the practice assumed a very great interest, giving an idea of some of the difficulties the gunner has to overcome.
A very considerable number of people, foreign as well as Chinese, attended the practice, and noted the smart manner in which the work of the Battery was performed. The day was ideal for an outing, and it is satisfactory to see the community taking so much interest in the work of their Artillery.
Text read from the printed page and cleaned; old type leaves the occasional error.