OKE HAMPTON EXPERIENCES, 1892 . 145 
Average Results of Battery Service and Competitive Practice. 
Year. 
Average range. 
Time in action. 
fi 
« g 
PI 
© 09 
Is g 
g 
.A g 
r g-. g 
O g l 
© 
A 1 § 
S3 P O 
M (A 
r| 
u 
p, 
w 
Casualties per 
shell. 
Percentage of 
target destroyed 
per min. 
Remarks. 
1889 
1890 
1891 
1892 
1 
2 
3 
4 
5 
6 
7 
Ranging rounds are 
included in the cal¬ 
culation of col umns 
3, 5, and 6. 
2231 
2325 
2331 
2285 
17-0 
12-11 
11-57 
8-3 
1-2 
1- 7 
2- 15 
2-6* 
4-01* 
3-1 
2-08 
1- 5 
2- 3 
•331 
•806 
•697 
•91 
2-17 | 
2- 98 
3- 43 
3-65 
Column 3. Column 4. 
*6-gun batteries ... . 2-61 4-22 
4-gun n . 2*45 341 
Those are all the results that I have here. When the annual report comes out 
I daresay you will get quite enough figures. (Cheers.) 
Colonel Bain bridge —Would any officer like to make any remarks P 
Colonel Ollivant —There is one question that I should like to ask out of 
curiosity, and that is whether the lecturer ever noticed, in the practice of a 
brigade division, that any difficulty was found by the second battery coming into 
action in accepting the range from the first ? I happened to be the umpire this 
year at some practice which was carried out at Eawal Pindi by the Mountain 
Batteries, and I noticed that when one battery came into action, and was sup¬ 
ported by two others afterwards, the officers commanding the last two batteries, 
although they were told by the Lieutenant-Colonel what the range was, insisted 
upon ranging again for themselves. I should like to know whether this indepen¬ 
dence on the part of battery commanding officers has been noticed at Okehampton, 
or whether it has been the habit to accept the range as given to them, and to 
commence the shrapnel fire at once. 
Captain Blunt —I think, as a rule, it has been found necessary to verify, that 
is to say, to accept the range given as the starting point; but it does not seem to 
follow always that every battery must use the same. They may be slightly 
echeloned, or the part of the target told off to them may be at a slightly different 
range; and unless some sort of verification has been adopted, the practice, I 
think, has not, as a rule, been very good. It is hard to lay down any very 
precise decision about it, because in brigade practice it is impossible to have a 
range party, so that you cannot tell what the shell have been doing ; but, judging 
from the battery end of the shooting, it appears that some amount of verification 
is necessary. 
Colonel Spragge —Surely Colonel Ollivant does not mean that the Battery 
Commanders ignored the range passed to them for use by the Lieut.-Colonel— 
that would be tantamount to ignoring his orders. 
Colonel Ollivant—I noticed that they did range, and my own opinion was 
that they ought to have accepted the range. 
Colonel Spragge —There is one point that I should like to refer to, and 
that is the subject of Fire Discipline. I am one of those who think that Fire 
