703 
AN INFANTRY OFFICER’S IDEAS ON 
OKEHAMPTON. 
COMMUNICATED BY 
THE SECRETARY. 
I have been requested to write down for the R.A.I. “ Proceedings ” tbe 
views and ideas I have gleaned during the recent “ Senior Officers* 
Course of Instruction " at Okehampton. I approach the subject with 
great diffidence, and I beseech my readers to bear in mind, that what I 
say is not criticism in the proper sense of the term, for in order to criti¬ 
cise one should be thoroughly acquainted with one's subject, whereas I 
am but a poor ignorant Infantry Officer, who has been taught a smatter¬ 
ing of the gunner's science at Shoeburyness and Okehampton ; one, well 
aware that “ a little knowledge is a dangerous thing," and by no means 
anxious to push forward his views, which may very possibly be incor¬ 
rect ones. Reminding you then that I write at the request of Artillery 
Officers, and not of my own desire, I will on without further apology. 
It would seem that by far the most important operation of artillery 
in action is finding the range of its enemy. Unless this is successfully 
done the fire is useless, or nearly so, for if the sights are raised to the 
wrong amount a destructive shell certainly partakes of the nature of a 
fluke. 
Next in importance is the puzzlement or deception of the enemy 
while he is endeavouring to range his batteries. 
I observed that the men entrusted with range-finders were extremely 
rapid and accurate at their work, but I have known range-finding 
N.-C.O.'s in my own branch of the service, who are so well acquainted 
with the ground they are working on, that they are aware of the dis¬ 
tance of most of the objects they are observing, and give the correct 
range whether their instrument makes it so or no. The ground over 
which the artillery practice at Okehampton is limited in extent, and it 
may be that the distance of the targets at the various exercises are more 
or less known by the gunners before they come on the ground. The 
question therefore strikes me “ Are the human range-finders thoroughly 
exercised in their art in unknown country at other times of the year 
than when undergoing their annual course V* It would be easy to test 
them by chaining a long base and making the men observe prominent 
objects from either end of it, while an officer checked their observations 
by means of a theodolite, finding the correct distance by construction 
or by calculation. 
14 , VOL. XIX. 
