HOW KITCHENER'S MEN ARE TRAINED.

Pukekohe & Waiuku Times, Volume 4, Issue 8, 29 January 1915, Page 3 (Supplement)

HOW KITCHENER'S MEN ARE TRAINED.

PREPARING YOUNG SOLDIERS FOR ACTIVE SERVICE.

Generally speaking, it takes four to six months to transform a raw recruit into a fairly efficient fighting unit. The system of training now devised by the military authorities for the various branches of the service is such that a man becomes fit and capable in the shortest possible time without the danger of being overworked, training being strictly according to the schedule set forth in the Army Orders.

Training for infantry recruits is divided into two periods. What is termed "recruit training" is completed in three months, after which "collective training" of the company commences. This extends to five or six weeks, the company training under its own officers and non-com-missioned officers.

Steady - Work. During the "recruit training" eight hours a day are devoted to steady work —squad drill, with and without arms, occupying four of the eight hours. The other four are devoted to musketry, lectures, physical drill, and instruction in what is known as fitting marching order. After the first week, however, the training varies somewhat. In the second week, for instance, the total of forty-eight hours is made up of six hours' physical training, ten hours' squad drill without arms, twelve hours' musketry, eighteen hours' squad drill with arms, and two hours' fitting marching order. In the third week there is another variation, twelve hours' extended order drill and three hours' night work being fitted into the schedule. Route marching begins in the fourth week, while outpost duties are added to the training in the fifth and sixth weeks, and entrenching in the seventh and eighth weeks. Platoon drill and bayonet fighting does not begin until the ninth and tenth weeks.

Artillery Training. In this way recruits steadily and gradually acquire knowledge of their righting duties, and then they enter upon the collective training of the company, to which reference has already been made, although it should be mentioned that specialists, such as machine gunners and signallers, do not perform company training, hut are trained as separate units. After company training, battalion and brigade training is carried on, the division being finally brought together. The training of artillery engineers and mounted men, of course, varies. For gunners and drivers of artillery the schedule for the day at the beginning of the training is as follows: Two to two and three-quarter hours' physical training, two to two and three-quarter hours' dismounted drill without arms, and one hour in the stables. In addition, gunners have to do two and a half hours everyday standing gun drill, including technical lectures, and one to two and a half hours' laying, fuse setting, and visual training, while drivers do one to one and a half hours' riding, one hour fitting and cleaning harness, and one hour stable management and horse mastership, including lectures every day. As in the case of infantry, the work of artillery recruits varies as the weeks go by and they become gradually efficient. For instance, after the finish of recruit training they begin collective training, and from the seventh to the twenty-sixth week officers are busy training their own sections and the specialists, such as signallers, range-takers, sergeantmajor, director man and layers. The art of taking up positions, laying out lines of fire, mounted parades drill and manoeuvre, and practice on miniature ranges ultimately follow. Engineers and Mounted Men. Engineers have a vast amount of detail to learn, and during the first three months are expected to acquire a knowledge, which varies according to their rank and position in the regiment, of the care of arms and parts of a rifle, regimental musketry drill, visual training and ranging, bayonet fighting, sanitation, duties of sentries and patrol, physical training, and swimming. F ; eld geometry and the use of the field level, knotting, lashing, and splicing, hasty field defences and concealment of works, encampments, demolitions. making up charges, fixing, and firing, are among the other subjects of military training which the engineer is supposed to be conversant with. The (raining of mounted men extends from the care of arms and elementary musketry, stable management, and care of horses during the first few weeks, to various degrees of riding and driving drill. During the remainder of the training subsequent to the first three months, they take part whenever possible in the training and exercises of the field company, undergoing combined training with infantry and artillery. The field companies generally march to a selected training ground by a river—the Thame.". Medway. Christchurch, or Lusk, i;i Ireland — where the pontoons (training equipment) can bo concentrated and mounted men can practise swimming horses, if the weather permits. Mention might also' be made of the divisional signal companies, who, during the first three months, learn drill, musketry, and riding, semaphore signalling, despatch-riding, and the care and riding of a motorcycle, while during the fourth and fifth months they study telephone cable drill, practical schemes with infantry and artillery when possible and ultimately co-operation in ail infantry brigade and divisional artillery training.