Evening Republican, Volume 21, Number 301, Rensselaer, Jasper County, 26 December 1918 — SPOILING HUN’S SLEEP [ARTICLE]

SPOILING HUN’S SLEEP

Desultory Bombing Distracts Antiaircraft GunnersDrop Two and Flit Away; When Frits Settles Down, Wake Him \. Up Again. ) Behind the British Lines in France. —One of the most exciting tasks to which airmen are assigned is “desulS bombing” over one spot for an or more. The object is to distract the attention of the antiaircraft def given district. ■< . A machine carrying a dozen or more bombs is employed for the work. The jdrman, a pilot and an observer approach their target cautiously. With engines throttled down, the craft glides nearer and nearer. Below all is quiet. No German searchlights are sweeping the sky. When the attackers are almost over

their object a rocket rises and bursts into a cluster of red stars. The machine’ has been discovered. At once six or seven searchlights throw their beams aloft. The pilot looks at his watch; it is time to begin bombing. He flies steadily on, although a barrage of bursting shells Iles now in front of him. The observer looks through the wires of his bomb sight. He thrdjhUiis lever forward and releases nHkombs. A few seconds later he the flash of the*r explosions, and hears two dull roars. He signals to the pilot and the machine sweeps away from the fiery ring of shells and searchlights. • A few miles away the airplane flies td and fro at top speed. The puzzled searchlights vainly feel the sky in all directions and then, one by one, are switched off. Then the pilot quickly returns toward the target. Another bomb is dropped. As it explodes the searchlights reappear and the barrage is renewed, while through 'the. shell bursts are threaded the chains of green flaming globes so much used by the Germans. Again the machine flies away and this time to bewilder the soldiers below, the observer fires a white Verey light, which slowly drifts down and fades out. All the searchlights follow it until it dies. Repeatedly the airmen retifrn to the attack. Bombs are dropped at intervals until the end of the hour, when the machine departs, flickering fires and clouds of smoke telling of the havoc wrought by the bombs.