Item 01: Eric Susman war diary, 1 January 1915-4 April 1916 - Page 79
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[Page 79]
Wednesday 24 February 1915
This morning I was picked for a party detailed to mark at the butts for the 13th reinforcements. These men have apparently never done any shooting before, so they carried out some of the simpler and less difficult practices during the day. When you are in the trenches attending to the targets, you have a good opportunity of judging what the shooting is really like. I was in charge of the field telephone and had a particularly good chance of watching the general effectiveness of the fire.
As is the case with the whole of our regiment, the troops do not know their rifles as well as they should – the little individual and characteristic points of their respective weapons, such, for example, as a rifle firing a trifle high or a trifle low. I dare say the authorities have made every endeavour to give us plenty of rifle shooting but there has not been nearly enough of it – not by a long way. What is the good of a complex and elaborate scheme of training all drawn up with a single object in view – to get your men into the firing line with a minimum of loss – if when they do get there, they fail as an efficient fighting force merely because they cannot shoot.