AUDACIOUS AIRMEN.

Taihape Daily Times, Issue 220, 21 August 1917, Page 2

AUDACIOUS AIRMEN.

SKIMMING THE GROUND. MACHINE-GUNS AND BOMBS. LONDON, August 3. Correspondents relate that the airmen were audacious beyond belief on July 3.1, spreading terror in the enemy's ranks. They swooped down near the ground like hawks, on chickens, hovering over fortified farms, machinegunning down the chimneys, and squiring bullets through the open doors. Then they would suddenly shoot skywards. Mr. Perry Robinson likens them to swallows on a wet day, skimming incredibly near the earth and keeping contact with the advancing infantry. They did the most valuable work, though constantly under machine-gun fire. The airmen used 11,000 rounds of machine-guns ammunition. A Btritish and enemy machine encountered within 50 ft of the ground. The enemy sidestepped and crashed into ruin. One airman visited an aerodrome, and fired into the sheds below the roof-level. He subsequently dived upon and killed a machine-gunner firing from the ground.

•..Another patrolled the roads, and canals scattering fire on troops. He visited another aerodrome. The occupants were asleep. He dropped a bomb and set the inmates buzzing like a beehive He then flew to a height of 30ft bombing and peppering the inmates with his machine-gun. Then he chased some officers on horseback, and scattering a body of 20 troops, fought two aeroplanes. He shot down one, and prepared the crowd which gathered round the fallen machine. He returned and bombed the aerodrome, and chased and mac-hine-gunned a passenger train. A young pilot on his flight hunted a motor-car containing officers, and had a revolver, duel with the inmates, who descended and entered a farmhouse. The airmen flung a *very light, igniting the car, and flew off. He descended again, and killed five infantry from a party crossing, a bridge.