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Aviation History
1915
1915 - 0268.PDF
[jym APRIL 16, 1915. AIRCRAFT AND THE WAR. A YOUNG Colonial, in a letter home, recently published in the Times, gave the following description of an aero plane's visit to a camp in German S.W. Africa :— " We were just marching away, about fifty of us from the Scottish, when the alarm was sounded near us by the lookout, and the cry ' A-a-e-er-ooplane ' came floating down from another look out on a hill some way off. The camp is very much spread out, I may tell you. Everybody, except those on fatigue, &c, has to be right out of camp from dawn to breakfast time, drilling, &c. Well, there was not time to get out of camp or reach the trenches on the outskirts, so we just had to shelter where we could. got down beside the railway embankment, and I got between some half • buried water tanks. Mine was the better protection, unless a shell had fallen right into my hollow, but still I did not feel too happy, because the water tanks are the aviator's objective. I was pretty sure the two first bombs would miss us, but No. 3 was coming straight for my hollow till a few hundred feet off the ground. It is jolly hard to judge time in moments like these, but I should say the shells took half a minute to drop the 1,000 ft. I got down flat when the bomb was near the earth, and then with a terrific roar it burst, and a cloud of flame, black smoke, and dust rose outside my barrier of water tanks and sandbags. Bits of shell went whistling away overhead, and three telegraph wires were cut and dropped near me. I was certain the shell had burst just outside my barrier, and was surprised to find it had done so 40 yards away ; we seem to live for years while the bombs are falling." Mr. A. Beaumont, writing from Bale to the Daily Telegraph on the 6th inst., said :— " On Easter Monday the guns were hardly heard in the Sundgau, but, instead, we had an exciting aerial battle, which ended in the landing of two French aviators on this side of the Swiss border, and their capture by the Swiss authoiities. •' Early yesterday morning four French aeroplanes were seen coming over the Vosges. They headed for the Rhine valley, and were immediately pursued by several German aeroplanes. The Frenchmen boldly crossed the Rhine, and then steered northward over Miitheim and Neuenburg, where they circled defiantly over the stations and barracks, which opened fire. Then they flew back towards Colmar and Miilhausen, dropping a number of bombs on the German troops and batteries en route. Next they were seen leisurely following trains on the line to Mulhausen, greeted all along by the discharge of machine - guns and fire from hidden batteries. The heaviest fire directed on them came from a height outside Miilhausen, known as ' the Rebberg,' but they escaped, and dropped two bombs on the railway station of Napoleonsinsel, which demolished the rails. Their appearance caused tremendous excitement in Mulhausen, the inhabi tants of which place disobeyed the official instructions, and, instead of hiding in cellars, flocked by thousands into the streets to watch the flyers. The French aviators all this time were being pursued by German aeroplanes, which they dodged successfully. Finally, they flew away in the direction of Schlettstadt, and dropped bombs on the railway station at Markirch, where many troop trains happened to be stationed. As they crossed the Vosges the Germans gave up the pursuit. "Towards the evening a fresh squadron of four French aviators appeared, and could be seen distinctly from the Swiss border, where I watched them myself from the summit of the Blauen, a peak close to the frontier, between 6 and 7 p.m. They were flying in the direction of Illfurt, when suddenly five or six German aero planes appeared from over Tullingen, and started a chase, which became a thrilling one. The French aviators flew higher and higher, and for a while disappeared from view. At 6.45 p.m., while I was still on the summit of the Blauen, a French biplane reappeared over the Larg Valley, having evidently escaped the German pursuit. This aeroplane mistook the territory, and instead of landing within the French boundary it came down at Porrentruy. Almost at the same time a pursuing German aeroplane was seen coming from Altkirch, but when it saw that the Frenchman had landed in Swiss territory it turned round and flew back. " The two French aviators who had safely landed were surprised to find themselves on Swiss soil. The pilot and the observing officer were taken to the Town Hall before Swiss officers, who questioned them, and finally informed them that they would be interned. Then they were taken to the Hotel White Horse for the night, and. I believe, have already lefl this morning for Berne." The following message from its correspondent at Eccloo was published by the Telegraaj on the 6th inst. :— " The Allies' airmen are once again showing much activity ; after having bombarded certain works at Bruges and the German aviation field at Ghistelles, they have now inflicted damage in the districts of Lassen and Cortemarck, at the place where the Thorn-out-Ostend main railway line crosses the Ghent-Dixmude track." A Daily Mail correspondent at Copenhagen, writing on the 7th inst., said :— " Several German submarines which had taken refuge behind the Norwegian cliffs at Bergen Bay were discovered by Norwegian military airmen, who ordered the submarines to leave the neutral zone immediately, and said that if they did not they would be interned." Writing to the Daily Telegraph on April 8th, Mr. A. Beaumont said:— " The interest of the Swiss military authorities in the operations has been increased by the fact that at no time since the beginning of the war have the French aviators from the Belfort district shown such activity as during the last few weeks. As I already informed you, they even pushed their excursions over the Schwarzwald and into the Duchy of Baden, with a view of ascertaining day by day the reinforcements that are being prepared on the other side of the Rhine to be sent into Alsace. The towns of Miilheim and Nuen- burg, which I have already mentioned several times, received the day before yesterday the visits of no fewer than seven French aviators, two of whom threw bombs on the railway station and barracks which lie between the two towns. " Mulhausen also continues to be visited daily by tricolour aero planes, but the pilots abstain from dropping any bombs on the town. The visit of the French aviators causes such excitement each time in that town that, in spite of the strictest orders of the authorities, the inhabitants on these occasions, instead of taking refuge in the cellars, assemble in the streets and look on with friendly demonstrations of sympathy. The aviators in flying over it look upon it evidently as a friendly town, and sometimes drop the latest papers from Paris, which, of course, it is treason for the people to pick up. But the papers are snatched up and read all the same. In spite of the fact that the French aviators have been continually under gun and rifle fire from a score of military centres almost daily for the last month, they have escaped unscathed, and not one of them has been disabled." The Morning Past correspondent in Paris, writing on April 8th, said :— "The main effect produced by the Zeppelin raid on Paris has been a general reduction of the lighting of the town. Experiments are still being carried out ; more and more lights are extinguished every night, and aviators regularly look down and report upon the appearance of a city which is scarcely more lighted than the average town of the Middle Ages. In normal times the ' Ville Lumiere,' which is certainly one of the worst-lighted capitals in Europe, has 55,000 gas and electric lamps in working order. At present only 16,000 of them are allowed to shed a fitful light on the melancholy streets until ten, and after that hour they are reduced to 5,500. If a Zeppelin is announced there will be no need for any further reduction of the lighting until it is practically over the town, when almost all lights will be extinguished. "It is announced that these precautions are intended to prevent a German airship from sighting the lights of Paris at an enormous distance, but the general impression is that their real purpose is to persuade Parisians that a Zeppelin raid is a thing to be taken seriously and not merely an entertaining spectacle, which justifies everyone crowding immediately to the most exposed point of observation attainable. At the moment of the last Zeppelin raid crowds flocked to the top of Montmartre and the steps of the Sacre Coenr, bent on enjoying to the full the pleasant excitement of seeing a Zeppelin fired at with real shells and dropping real bombs." The Daily Telegraph correspondent at Rotterdam wrote on the 9th as follows :— " According to a frontier correspondent, English airmen last night made a raid upon the German defensive works in the vicinity of Zeebrugge. At about nine o'clock borabs were dropped at Heyst and Knocke, the object of the attack being to destroy the defensive works in those places. As yet no news of the damage caused by the bombs is known." The Telegraaf on Saturday printed the following message from its Sluis correspondent:— " Almost daily German aeroplanes are reconnoitring. One was 268
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