headlam: developments in artillery 313 



the fact that in the heat of battle, inexperienced personnel had 

 forgotten the constant attention buffers require. Great atten- 

 tion has since been paid to this part of the training, and after 

 visiting many of the field workshops a few days after the com- 

 mencement of the attack in Flanders, I was able to report that 

 preventable damage was practically dead. But there are still, 

 alas, some cases of prematures, and with the counter battery work 

 that goes on now many cases of damage from the enemy's fire, so 

 that our field workshops are still kept busy. Close up to the front 

 you will find everywhere installed in ruined farms or under a tar- 

 paulin shelter these ordnance workshops, containing a hetero- 

 geneous collection of damaged guns and carriages. From thestore 

 of ' 'spares" it may be possible to put the damage right with some 

 adjustment, or from three such ''lame ducks" it may be pos- 

 sible for one or two to be made complete, and so the work goes on 

 all night, and by dawn the guns are in their places in the line 

 again. The work done by the officers and men who man these 

 workshops is a very material factor in the great artillery struggle, 

 but nothing can compensate for the daily care of the gunners, and 

 I always think the mottoes inscribed on the French 155-mm. Fil- 

 loux guns "should be on every gunner's heart : 



"Le Canon bien tendu en vaut deux." "Soyez bons pour les 

 f reins." 



I hope, gentlemen, that you will not think I have devoted too 

 much of your time to this subject of production and repair, but 

 it is one of absolutely vital importance to the efficiency of an army 

 in the field, and it is one in which science has a great part to play. 



Accuracy of fire. I had intended to tell you something of the 

 development of the work of artillery in the field, of counter bat- 

 tery work, and of the "barrage," a word which seems to have 

 captured the American imagination almost as much as ' 'camou- 

 flage." But time does not permit, so I will confine myself as far 

 as work in the field is concerned to giving you an idea of what has 

 been done in the way of developing the accuracy of artillery fire 

 during the war. * 



Accuracy of fire is of course the first essential to success in the 

 artillery, and the first thing therefore that the good gunner does is 



