HOW FAR ARE GUNS HEARD.

Pukekohe & Waiuku Times, Volume 5, Issue 225, 10 November 1916, Page 4 (Supplement)

HOW FAR ARE GUNS HEARD.

THE FIRING AT WATERLOO WAS HEARD IN KENf. There seems to be very little doubt that the recent terriffic bombardment on the Somme has bena heard in many parts of England. From places so tar apart as Hayward .« Heath in Sussex, Colchester in Essex, Faversham in Kent, and Dorking in Surrey, have come detailed reports, furnished by i>copl» of standing and repute, who claim to have heard them. Elevation and the nature of the ground, rather than distance, seem to determine where end when the fining is heard. On thw top of Leith HiH, for instance, in Surrey, the sound is plainly audible when the wind is blowing from France to England, as it is als> on the chriJk downs above Brighton, and at Guildford.

Nor is there anything very new in this. It ha* long been recognised that, given favourable conditions, the sound of gunfire may carry to almost incredible distances.

To cite hut two instances. The firing at Waterloo was distinctly heard at various places in Kent, situated at distances varying between 130 and 150 miles from th.> battlefield. When the U.S. warship, Kearsage, sank the Confederate cruiser, Alabama, off Cherbourg, on June 19th, 1864. the cannonade carried as far as Bridgwater, 125 miles away.