New Zealand Artillery on the Somme.

Levin Daily Chronicle, 28 April 1917, Page 2

New Zealand Artillery on the Somme.

♦ NEW ZEALAND ARTILLERY ON THE SOMME. STRENUOUS WORK AND GOOD SHOOTING. HALF A MILLION SHELiLS. (From Capt. 'Malcolm Ross, War Correspondent with the New Zealand Forces in the Field.) ffn battles such as the Sonune, the first essential tu> successful attack is careful and elaborate artillery preparation, and the lire to be effective must be both accurate and. intense. There must also be co-operation as nearly perfect as can be .arranged with the infantry in tho attack itself. In <a-ll these matters the British have mack great strides since the beginning of the war. Our artillery is not perhaps so

brilliant as that of the French, ibut tho French have a genius for gunnery, and they have had a long start of us. The Germans have been classed as second only to the French. It says a, great deal, therefore, for the British that on the Somme, which may be reokoned as the greatest battle in history, they were able to obtain ia mastery over the Germans. The great majority of our •runners and. gunnery officers had to be trained since the beginning of the war. The guns and the ammunition (had to be mad© in a very limited time. New Zealand, in its own small way, has for some time now realised the importance of good guns and gunnery. English experts were imported 1 to train riur men and officers, and at the start of the war our country was the only one of the overseas 'Dominions that was armed with the up-to-date modern laowitzer. As everyone now knows, the Expeditionary Force took its guns with it to Egypt and to Gallipoli, and in the [atter campaign brilliant woi\k "was dono under the most difficult circumstances. Just before we came to France tho strength of our lartillery was inaos-i----ally augmented, and afterwards it M still further increased. - It is inadvisable to give details about either the strength, the dispositions, or the work of the aitillery in the Somme ibattle but some general particulars .may prove interesting. The New Zealand Artillery went by train to the Somme, and it treked. back. It got there before the infan- ; try, and it left after them. Early in September the guns were got into posi--1 tion, and they were not withdrawn till ' towards the end of October. During ' nearly all of that period the officers and gunners and the supply columns "worked' strenuously and heroically. It was 1 the touglitest job they had taken,, on since the beginning of the war. They 5 had to suffer from enemy higli-explo- ? sive, shrapnel, and ga6 and tear shells, r -rtrey —iiffO 'giuis' ;iiul Timbered wagons t and officers and men knocked out, and they liadl to advance to forward positions over soft, unroaded, shell-torn ground, yet they were always ready when and where they were wanted.

In the big attack of 15tli September I saw them shooting, at comparatively close range, from the slopes of a val!oy. that nil almost paral'ed with the !'ne between Bern a fay and Caterpillar Wocds, and as the waves of our infantry roPed cn iii the successful attack they got their teams up and rushed, the to forward positions behind the crest of the ridge between the battered Delville Wood and the equally shattered High Wood, in which for so long the Germans had offered stubborn resistance. Still later, at the beginning of October, most of the guns were pushed forward to more exposed positions in the vicinity of the village of <Flers, about which for days the New Zealand infantry fought 'heroically. The Artillery was arranged in groups, so< that not all our guns were in support of our own line. We bad the 'assistance -of English guns, and an English division had the assistance of some of our guns. II have in formed articles dealing with the fighting described as far as permissible the nature of the. barrages in connection with the infantry; attack, and so there is no more to be said) in the meantime. Our men were loud in their .praises of both the stationary and the creeping barrages, and when infantry praise their own artillery no fur-; ther attestation of its efficiency is resquired. One interesting point that may be noted 1 is that in the initial attack for the first time in the war gaps had to be left in the barrage to enable our new engines of warfare, the "tanks" to proceed. . This fact 'alone will give some idea of the arrangements that had to be made, and the accuracy, of fire that had' to be maintained.