The Stars and Stripes Part 10

Chartered 1822

The Farmers' Loan and Trust Company

NEW YORK

PARIS BORDEAUX 41, Boulevard Haussmann 8, Cours du Chapeau-Rouge

AND TWO ARMY ZONE OFFICES

Specially designated

United States Depositary of Public Moneys.

LONDON: 26, Old Broad Street, E.C.2 and 16, Pall Mall East. S.W.1.

The Societe Generale pour favoriser etc., & its Branches throughout France will act as our correspondents for the cas.h.i.+ng of Officers'

cheques & transfer of funds for MEMBERS of the AMERICAN EXPEDITIONARY FORCES.

BIG GUNS ON FLAT CARS TO BATTER HUNS' LINES.

A. E. F. Operates Railroad Artillery that will Hurl Tons of Steel Twenty Miles into Enemy's Territory.

LONG-BARRELLED 155s ARE ALSO DEADLY.

Fortresses and Mountains Crumble like Sandhills Before Blasts from the Busters.

When Rudyard Kipling paid his famous tribute to the late Rear-Admiral "Fighting Bob" Evans of the United States Navy some years ago, one of his verses ran:

"Zogbaum can handle his shadows, And I can handle my style; And you can handle a ten-inch gun To carry seven mile."

That was a pretty fair gun for those days. But nowadays, we speak of handling a sixteen-inch gun to carry twenty miles. Not only do we speak of it, but we--we of the A.E.F.--actually do the handling.

The "big boys" are here. They are busters. They have more machinery attached to them than the average small factory. Because of the fact that they are mounted on cars and ride on rails they are known rather as the "railroad artillery" than the heavy artillery. They have been practicing for a long time on a "blasted heath" somewhere in France, where there wasn't anything within twenty miles of them that would be hurt by their gentle attentions. And, when they do practice Jee-roos.h.!.+

Hold onto your ear-drums and open your mouth!

Big Fellows Hard to Move.

But the actual practice at making perfectly good targets resemble grease-spots on the oil-cloth doesn't take up but a bit of the time of the men who const.i.tute the crew. They have to know a lot about moving the big fellow, raising him and lowering him, anchoring him so he won't right-step and left-step when he's supposed to be firing, cleaning him up for inspection and the like.

About seventy per cent. of them learned a good deal about the firing end back in the Coast Artillery Corps in the States, but this business of riding a big gun on a railroad bed, and so forth, was new to a good many of them until recently. Now, they say, the minute the aero observer up above gives them range and so forth, they are ready to go ahead and batter the eternal daylights out of anything from the Kaiserschloss down to old Hindenburg himself.

Besides the big guns that hurl a whole hardware shop-ful of steel at the enemy, there are long-barreled 155s, and deadly devices they are in their way, too. But it is about the big babies, the instruments which, more than any other save the aeroplanes, typify for most of us the advanced methods of modern warfare, that most of the attention is centered. The 155s and the other smaller bores can be pulled up to within striking distance of the line by trucks and caterpillar tractors, but the heftiest never leave the railroad flat cars on which they are built. In other words, they are rolling stock destined to keep a rolling and a rolling and a rolling until they roll right on into Germany.

Getting One Ready to Fire.

It takes several hours to get a big one ready for firing but once its mechanism is started, under the capable handling of a trained crew, it works with the prettiness and precision of an engine. First the gun rolls forward on to an arrangement of curved tracks which are called "epies," and whose tips point toward the objective. Then, to steady the piece, twelve large wooden feet are dropped by hydraulic jacks against the rails, and the gun is ready to fire.

It fires, all right, sending a good ton of steel in the direction indicated by the aerial observer. When it recoils, the flat car and all slides back a good couple of yards on the rails. Then it is brought back into position again, the barrel is cooled by jets of water, the wooden feet are braced again, and the piece loaded. Even with all those operations, the big fellow can fire a good forty shots a minute.

But, though they can fire those forty per minute, each one takes a lot out of the big fellow's life. Unlike the guns of smaller calibre, they cannot be used over and over again. They are too powerful to be used in actual trench warfare, but let a fortress, or a mountain that has perversely got in the way of operations, loom up ahead, and down it goes! Also the big sh.e.l.ls have been found exceedingly useful in knocking in the roofs of German tunnels underground, even those that are quarried out ninety feet under the surface.

All in all, the big fellow has a short life, but--if he's directed right--it's a mighty gay one.

A BULL IS DURHAM'S PRIDE.

A Durham, N. C., enthusiast recently telegraphed to United States Marine Corps headquarters in Was.h.i.+ngton:

"Terrier belonging to U.S. Marine kills huge rooster after battle royal in main thoroughfare. Indignant chicken fanciers witness affair and demand dog pay death penalty. Then they learn ill-fated rooster's name was 'Kaiser.' Result: Dog is now pride of Durham."

"HE MAY OVERHEAR IT!"

"Aw, he ain't a bad skipper--as skippers go!"

"Gee, though, that was some clip he run us at on the way up that hill!

It pulled my cork all right, I'll tell the world!"

"Sat'day afternoon drill, too, eh? I wonder, is he goin' to work us all eight days o' the week?"

"Aw, lay off! Don't blame him! He gets h.e.l.l from higher up if he don't work us, don't he? He ain't the boss!"

"Listen, guy! I wish you'd of worked for the cap'n I had to work for in the Philippines! This bird is tame alongside o' him!"

"He's a good skate, all right, when he's off duty. I was talkin' to the top the other day, and he says--"

"Sure, he's the real thing! Served two hitches in the ranks before he come up to where he is now!"