Only an Observer by Lieutenant Charles G. Johnson

Author:Lieutenant Charles G. Johnson [Johnson, Lieutenant Charles G.]
Language: eng
Format: epub
Tags: Biography & Autobiography, Military, History
ISBN: 9781525523434
Publisher: FriesenPress
Published: 2018-06-04T23:00:00+00:00

ZONE CALLS

Of all the equipment assigned us, to enable us to carry out our duties, our maps were by far the most precious. If one’s machine gun, for instance, developed a fault, one could be assigned another that surely could be better than the faulty one. So it was with other equipment. But it was not so with our maps. We took our maps to bed with us, as it were, for so precious were they. We never loaned our maps, for there was the danger that the blighter wouldn’t come back. Should our quarters catch fire and we had to flee, one would indeed be a careless Observer who escaped from the burning building minus his maps. For he would then be in a jamb, unless he could pick up a good set from a casualty. Indeed, it was a mark of the greatest affection for one who had accumulated a Blighty to whisper, as he was about to be carried away, that some particular person was to have his maps. For he would not now require them, or to remember after recovering from anaesthesia at the hospital to leave such a message with a nurse.

All this kind of talk may be hard for the layman to understand. You see, we got new maps about every three months, absolutely up-to-date on the day it went to press. Everything of interest on the enemy’s side of the line was there, but only up to the day it went to press. Enemy trenches were in blue. Nothing else over there was coloured. The only military establishments on our side, which were permitted to show, were our trenches, which were coloured red. Our maps were so precious because we had to colour them ourselves, brown for roads, green for woods, and so on. Then we had to mark known enemy battery and other positions. The fact that many of these positions were not active did not matter. They could and frequently did become active. Should our infantry make an advance, even a minor one, it meant that we had to colour the trench or position with red over the former blue.

Our maps were marked out in squares in such a manner that, with the receipt of a short signal, such as “N26A35”, a man on the ground, in seconds, could put a pin into his map at that position. But for some of our work, we could be speedier than that. By a system of zoning these squares and numbering known positions in each square, we had but to send a signal thus “NC15” to designate a pinpoint. All this made our signals shorter.

When our maps were up-to-date, we did not have to grope and spend so much time to get our position correct, and too, if we sent a map coordinate instead of a zone number, it would reveal to all and sundry (including our Squadron Commander) that our maps were not up-to-date and that would warrant at least a mild reprimand from him.

Download

Copyright Disclaimer:
This site does not store any files on its server. We only index and link to content provided by other sites. Please contact the content providers to delete copyright contents if any and email us, we'll remove relevant links or contents immediately.