SNIPERS WANTED

Wairarapa Times-Age, 4 March 1939, Page 6

SNIPERS WANTED

APPEAL TO MARKSMEN AT TRENTHAM SPECIAL TRAINING COURSE. PREPARATION FOR WAR EMERGENCY. (By Telegraph—Press Association.) TRENTHAM, This Day. An appeal to young marksmen to enlist in the sniper platoons now being recruited by the Defence Department was made by the president of the National Rifle Association, Captain A. F. R. Crawford, in an address to competitors before the start of shooting in the Service matches fired at Trentham today.

A week’s course of training for snip-' ers is to commence at Trentham next Thursday. After referring to the facilities and privileges extended to riflemen by the Defence Department, Captain Crawford said that young marksmen could do something in return for those privileges by supporting the sniper platoons. He appealed to members of the association and those of rifle clubs generally to give the project their support and to provide the snipers that were requires. It was a wonderful opportunity for marksmen between 16 and 32 years of age to learn sniping tactics. Any individual taking the sniper's course would be provided with transport to and from Trentham and would receive volunteer rates of pay and his keep while in camp. , "If war should come, we in New Zealand would not be exempt from the field'of operations,” said Captain Crawford. "I leave it to you to imagine what the position would be if a hostile fleet came to New Zealand, with its many isolated harbours where ships could be snug, and let loose machines that would bomb us. Attempts might be made to land men, and that is where our sniners would come in useful.”

Firing in the compulsory Service matelies will occupy all day. There are 317 competitors in this series, 39 marksmen attending the meeting for the purpose of taking jiart in these matches only,