Firing line

“ When a line halts at its points of firing, no time is to be lost in scrupulous dressing, and the firing is instantly to commence. But when a line halts, and is not to fire, the usual dressings must be attended to; and every thing will depend upon the coolness and attention of the officers and non-commissioned officers.
It should be observed with respect to firings in general, that after the march in front, and halt of the battalion, company, or platoon, firing ought invariably to begin from the centre, and not from the flank. ”

“ A fraction of the firing line about to rush should, if practicable, avoid using the long blast signal as an aid to cease firing. Officers and men behind the firing line can not ordinarily move freely along the line, but must depend on mutual watchfulness and the proper use of the prescribed signals. All should post themselves so as to see their immediate superiors and subordinates. ”

“ Troops in the firing line must be able to turn out, equipped in every detail for fighting—for days on end of fighting—not only quickly, but instantly; without any delay at all. That is why, in the British Army, at all events—and I've no doubt the French are the same—nobody in the firing line is allowed to remove his equipment. Officer and man alike, when we lie down to sleep, we lie down in precisely the same order as we go into action: haversack and water-bottle, ammunition and everything complete. ”

“ Half a dozen men of the signal staff are lying about the floor looking at week-old papers. In the next room I can hear the general, seated at a table and intent on his map, talking to an officer that has just come from the firing line. Outside the window a gun is making a fiendish row, shaking the whole house. Occasionaly there is a bit of a rattle—that's shrapnel bullets falling on the tiles of an outhouse. ”

“ Now they were at the first line of the German barbed wire. Some of it had been cut by the swift firing of shrapnel before the troops came from their trenches. But enough remained to be a hindrance, and quickly the men with cutters surged forward to open the way.
It was while the Americans were held up here that the Germans took fearful and heavy toll of them with their machine guns, which were now sputtering with terrific firing. Scores of brave men went down, some never to rise again. ”

“ One day was given to field firing practice, on which occasion I acted as one [136] of the 'casualty' officers—that is to say, I had to select various men during the sham attack and order them to drop out as casualties. Live ammunition was used in rifles and Lewis guns as well as live rifle-grenades; and I remember there were seven slight casualties from accidents with the rifle-grenades. These 'live' field days in France were not without their own little excitements, especially for those who had to keep up with the firing line. ”

“ When darkness began to descend the firing increased in violence. Though we could not see anything we fired away blindly because we thought the enemy would not attempt an attack in that case. We had no target and fired always in the direction of the enemy's trench. Throughout the night ammunition and materials were brought up, and new troops kept arriving. Sand bags were brought in great quantities, filled and utilized as cover, as a protection from the bullets. The sappers were relieved towards morning. We had to assemble at a farm behind the firing line. ”

“ Firing line to advance as far as possible before opening fire. The firing line must ordinarily advance a long distance before it is justified in opening fire. It can not combat the enemy's artillery, and it is at a disadvantage if it combats the defender's long-range rifle fire. Hence it ignores both and, by taking full advantage of cover and of the discipline of the troops, advances to a first firing position at the shortest range possible, as explained in par. ”

“ At 2 o'clock, the third attack on the interval began. The firing line on the front of the Fort head was inundated with cartridges from the enemy machine-guns. Our Fusiliers replied with fury. Their Commander had the hardest work to regulate the firing. The heated guns got choked. No matter, our men were determined the Germans should not pass. Our cannons fired at full speed. The noise was deafening. For more than two hours, we lived in the midst of this hell and we no longer heard the enemy's balls which came in swarms whizzing over our heads. One of the cannons was disabled by the firing. ”

“ He lay across a hummock of earth from behind which two or three grey men were firing. The son fought on above the dead body. The face looked at him each time he brought rifle to shoulder. The plain gravity of it, living, was gone; now it was contorted like a gargoyle. A third line of blue came shouting up to reinforce the other two; there ran a grey order to fall back to the earthworks. The tall, lean man, his musket yet in hand, stooped, put his arms under the elder’s body, lifted it, and with it across his shoulder started up the mountain-side. ”

“ The firing line, which will be continually strengthened by successive reinforcements, will thus fight its way forward until the immediate objective is enveloped, or partially enveloped, at the closest range by a strong firing line, which, in combination with the artillery will bring as powerful a fire as possible to bear against the defence, in order to rapidly establish a superiority of fire preparatory to the assault. ”

“ When dusk came and sullenly the firing ceased, the Federal dead and wounded lay thick, thick, up and down before the Confederate line, by ditch and wall,—perhaps two thousand dead and wounded. In the night-time some were taken away, but very, very many were left. The weather was deadly hot.
Dead and wounded lay there so long that it became frightful. The grey did not love the crying on their front, the gasping voices, the faint, dry, Water! Water! Water!—dry and shrill like insects in the grass. The dead became offensive, horrible. ”

“ How could the battle begin again when all was quiet along the firing line—quiet with the quiet of death? Do dead memories surge up into furies? Can dead hopes burn again? Is there any resurrection for the insurgent passions of the past laid for ever under the ban of wedlock? ”

“ It takes a good many bullets to get a man. However, don’t think of that. Do your duty. That’s what you’re here for!”
The lieutenant looked somewhat anxiously into the faces of the relief squad he was to command. Every officer likes to know that he has the bravest of men in the army, and this young officer was no exception. The firing line where the Motor Boys now were—the front-line trenches—was no place for cowards. ”

“ This piercing is most difficult in the conditions of to-day, for the enemy by establishing a new firing line behind the point carried by our troops may be able to enclose in a semicircle of fire the party that has made its way into the position. Against such an enveloping fire it is a hard task to make headway. ”

“ It was one of those charges in which everybody sees that if a miracle happens it will be all right, and that if it doesn’t happen—It was one of those charges in which first an officer stands out, waving his sword, then a man or two follow him, then three or four more, then all waver back, only to start forth again, then others join, then the officer cries aloud, then, with a roar, the line springs forward and rushes over the field, in the cannon’s mouth. ”

“ Presently he said aloud to himself: "It's absolutely impossible. It can't happen this way. How can it?"
His heavy pulse answered the question; a tense strain, irksome as an ache, dragged steadily at something within him which resisted; dulling reason and thought.
For a long time he sat there inert, listening for the sound of her voice which echoed at moments through the stunned silence within him. And at last he stumbled to his feet like a stricken man on the firing line, stupefied that the thing had happened to him; and stood unsteadily, looking around. ”

“ A man of my temper, little one, will never rest content at a firing line that's all surrounded about with ten-quart pots of boiling beef."
"Why don't you resign, then?"
"Resigned! How can I be resigned? I'm a chunk of dynamite in a suet-pot, hard to manage and ready to go off at any time that something strikes me. Meantime, I am like what they say is dirt: matter out of place."
"Then why don't you get out?" Weldon queried.
"I am out of place now, I'm telling you," Paddy returned, as he pensively rested his cheek upon the bowl of the spoon in his hand. ”

“ Under the leafy Louisiana shore the blue placed seven mortars. These kept up a steady fire upon the city and the river defences. At intervals the gunboats engaged the lower batteries. There was an abandoned line of works which was seized upon by a cloud of blue sharpshooters. These began to pick off men at the grey guns, and traverses had to be built against them. The grey had in the river batteries thirty-one siege guns, and a few pieces of light artillery. Even of these they had eventually to spare guns for the land defences. ”

“ The Artillery firing took longer aim, in order to reach points behind our line. Dixmude was bombarded to the uttermost, in order to prevent the arrival of reserves to our trenches. In the German lines, a ceaseless Infantry firing then took place and the lines gradually advanced. The enemy made use of the ground and the numerous coverts in the district, as the firing zone had not been cleared to any great extent. The enemy troops did not reach the assault position, as the firing of our men caused them considerable losses. ”

“ Two Uhlans cantered by, scanning us, and further on we passed another patrol. A corral of the familiar gray-topped wagons beside red brick farm buildings showed the location of a base of supplies, and in front of the house we saw a naked soldier unconcernedly scrubbing himself in a tub of water. And always the sullen roaring guns grew steadier and more disconcertingly clear.
"On this section of the line," Ober-Lieutenant explained, "the Staff told me that the French generally [58] begin their heaviest firing every day at half past three." ”

“ He saw Sergeant Billy Maydew, passing down the line, pause just a moment when he saw Dave. “I reckon I’ll be coming, too, directly, Dave,” said Billy, then went on with his duty. He saw Allan, tall and strong and fair, set in a great smoke wreath firing steadily. Fire!—Fire!—Fire!—Fire! There rose a question of ammunition. Jim Watts was one of those who went for cartridges and brought them while the air was a shriek of shells. Steve saw the cartridge-bearers askance, coming, earnest-faced, through the cloud—then the cloud grew red-bosomed, and he saw them no more. ”

“ The aeroplane from which the bomb had been dropped was not now in sight, but this is what had happened. One of the German machines passing over the front line, as they often did, had escaped the Allied craft, and had also managed to pass through the firing of the anti-aircraft guns. Whether the machine had gone some distance back, hoping to drop bombs on an ammunition dump, or whether it came over merely to take a pot shot at the American trenches, was never known. ”

“ He felt a certainty that the enemy was engaged in driving a mine under the point known as Elliott’s Salient.
“Why do you think so, General?”
“Their sharpshooters keep up a perpetual, converging fire, sir, upon just that hand’s-breadth of our line. On the other hand, they pay so little attention to the works to right and left that the men can show themselves with impunity. They are not clearing the ground for surface approaches—well, then, I think that they are working underground. ”

“ During the subsequent advance from the Black Line to the Green Line the casualties, which were particularly heavy amongst Officers, were again principally caused by machine gun fire. Reports were received from several Officers giving their location, and those machine guns immediately in our line of advance were effectively dealt with, but we were still troubled by guns firing from high ground beyond the Green Line and also by guns enfilading us from our right flank. ”

“ Uptown you can hear the firing!”
A young man struggled up in bed, first coughing, then breathing with a loud, whistling sound. The doctor glanced his way, then looked at a nurse. “It’s come. I’ll give him something so he can go easily. Let him lean against you. Tell the men to try to be quiet.”
Out at Yellow Tavern, six miles north of Richmond, Sheridan was formed in line of battle. Over against him was Stuart, his men dismounted. The blue delivered a great volley, advanced, volleyed again, advanced, shouting. The grey returned their fire. ”

“ It was in the German tongue, as they all knew, and they all realized that the crucial moment had come.
The lieutenant, seeing a figure in the darkness before him, shot at it pointblank with his pistol. There was a murmured exclamation, and the sentry 103 went down, his finger pressing the trigger of his rifle, discharging it as he fell dead. ”

“ At times, after a period of comparative quiet, 92 the trenches on both sides of No Man’s Land would suddenly awaken into life. This would be caused by a fear, either on the part of the Germans or the troops from America, that one or the other was starting a raid. Then the machine guns would open fire, they would be augmented by the rifles of the men, and, if the shooting kept up long enough, the rival batteries would awaken and the big guns would speak. ”