THE CHINA MAIL, SEPTEMBER 4, 1940
CHINA MAIL
WINDSOR HOUSE I
FIGHTING WITH FIRE
In condemning modern methods of warfare one is apt to forget that the an- cients invented incendiar- ism. Back in Biblical times armies threw upon each other burning oils and flaming fire balls of resin and 'straw. Delium in 424 B.C. saw the first flame projector-a hollow tree trunk with a basin of burning materials at one end and bellows to blow the flame jet. on the enemy. In the days of the Trojan king Aeneas burn- ing pots of resin, sulphur, pitch, and tow were pro- jected. Forerunners of to-day's incendiary bombs are seen in the inflam- mable bombs catapulted by the Romans and in the tube-like incendiary ar-
rows.
All these preceded the famous Greek Fire (be- lieved to have been in- vented by the Syrian Cal- linicus), which was used even in the wars of the Middle Ages. The troops of the Byzantine Empire used it against the Sara-| cens and saved the em- pire by its means. For centuries it was a secret weapon; finally, it was proved to consist of pitch, resin, sulphur, and petro- leum as combustibles, with the reaction between quicklime and water to set it going; water for ex- tinguishing it had to be used carefully, as it has on the thermite of to-day.
AERIAL CAVALRY
LINE OF LIFE.
CONSULT
•MADAME
BERCHTESGADEN:
OF
MUNICH.
CROSS HER PALM
WITH OIL.
4
"IF YOU BALKAN BOYS KEEP QUIET NOTHING WILL CROSS
INVASION
ENGLA
YOUR PATHS,
THE
ROMAN ORACLE WILL CONFIRM THAT. NOW LEAVE ME TO MY CRYSTAL GAZING."
America Discovers Our
Weapon
Secret
Gliders Like Moths
From Berlin it is reliably re- ported that during the past few months the German High Com- mand have ordered enormous quantities of gliders constructed of transparent material.
Noiselessness is the surprise fac- tor which gliders have contribut- ed to modern warfare. Acroplanes can be heard almost before they take off from their aerodrome; gliders carrying six men cach can arrive like moths in the. night.
They did this on the roofs of impregnable fortresses in the Maastricht district of Belgium. The gliders deposited their crews in silence. The men were trained. grenadiers, they rolled bombs down the ventilators of the case- matex and put the Belgian -gun- iners out of action almost before
they realised they were in it.
What could, Hitler do gliders used against Britain?
with
A few weeks ago, before the L.D.V.s were formed, he could have done a lot.
-He, could have taken us by sur- prise on the beaches, downs, and open spaces. He could have in- vaded our parks, our golf courses, and our racecourses; without the smallest warning. We were asleep then, we are alert now. Still, we must study the possibility of
anything new.
They Fly High
Gliders are towed by aircraft up to a great height before they are loosened for work on their own. They are then at the mercy of the air currents, but in skill- ed hands these can be turned to advantage and the glider
may descend within a reasonable dis- tance of its objective,
a
Little imagination is needed to show that it would be quite piactical proposition for thousands of gliders to start above the French coast and subsequently to arrive in Britain.
They would be more formidable than parachutists, in that a glider carrying six men can also carry an adequate supply of ammuni complete equipment for them and
tion.
Before we had our Home Guards' gliders might have made a sur- prise landing almost anywhere in Britain, because nobody was on the look-out for them. Now the "Parashots" carr quickly Become our "Glidergreeters."
It is safe to say that owing to the night-and-day watch provid- ed by the Home Guards in every.. town and hamlet in Britain the gliders would be quickly seen and located. In landing they are at a disadvantage in comparison with the parachutists; they cannot con- [centrate their landing in a definite Green astounded Britain British stoicism or whatever it ""The streets were crowded with The historians of the future, long area.
afternoon strollers, in-after the war is over, will extol have much in their favour: silence Sunday
Against that, however, by suggesting that not
they Yes, what is it? No one knows cluding a hundred girls who had them as the greatest people who and the opportunity of making a only soldiers but even-but it is going to win the war come down to pass the day with ever lived. But they don't know landing without accident.
Even the idea of landing troops by air is not a new one. In 1828 a certain Mr.
is
cavalry might be carried American newspapermen-Vincent
I joined, the other day. two their soldier boy-friends,
✡
✡
→
"Your
*
*
it.
✡
✡
Sheehan's tribute, though, was unconsciously, as 'great as« Stone- man's.
་
He was grousing about a maga-:
·
Watch Bridges
The glider may be a military proposition with which we shall have to reckon in the near future. But so long as our Home.Guards are vigilant, gliders can have no hope of success in this country.
In Britain, there are many ex-
"Nobody seemed to be talking "They are just Cockneys who over the enemy lines by Sheehan, author of "Personal about the air-raid, although most laugh, or workers who are throw- means of balloons.
History," and William Stoneman, of them had been sitting in shel-ing in every ounce of energy, or To of the "Chicago. Daily News." ters a bare hour before,
women who are merely 'carrying substantiate his claim he They were discussing the lat-i "This stoicism, or indifference, on."
ter's amazing fuck when, declared that he himself previous day, having gone down is Britain's secret weapon in this as the saviours of mankind-but on the or cool courage, or whatever it is, "They don't think of themselves had already made one to the South Coast, to see what war.
that is what they are." such ascent on horse-back to one of the scoops of his life.
was happening," he blundered in-j
people never seem from London. For some For, while he was sitting on the afraid," said Stoneman.
"The "Are they numb or dumb?" pert gliders, men who have play- reason best known to him-front of him.
cliff, a terrific air battle began in sight was so terrifying that, for a asked Sheehan, not cynically, but ed the game as a sport for years
time, I went into a pit. Then Ljust asking
and whose experience has con- self, however, he declined when challenged to prove his cabled story:
said, 'Heavens, I'm a newspaper "They're always like that," Itributed much to the sum of This is how Stoneman began. man. I must see it through.'
said. "Our people are never experience gained on the subject. his assertion by giving a
"So I got out again.
beaten because they don't know." They should be consulted now as "I sat on a cliff at Hell's Cor- "Yet, while the rald was going
"Your boys just don't think," to what gliders can do and where further publio demonstra-ner, the hottest-spot in England, on, two fellows in a machine-gun insisted Stonemain. That was as their efforts may be limited.. tion, and for the next while forty German Stukas divn- baby rabbits, they had caught the
for a solid hour this afternoon, nest were worrying about two far as he could get
Lt. Col. T. A. Lowe twenty-two years he suff-bombed a convoy just a mile previous day!"
away. A flaming Junker 87 vol- ered merciless ragging at planed down and knifed into the the hands of all his friends sea, half a mile away from where out at Bordeaux," had been
Stoneman, "before being kicked zine' story: he had written for the bombe dropping all around.
at "Red Book," a few days before, "Thank God, it's not raining!" and acquaintances. Fin-
Louvain and Lille and Boulogne, only to find that the Censor had he shouted to a pol. ...ally he decided to silence That part, though, you heard on British troops in action, he said, He had given certain harmless who, evacuated from London with
Yet, everywhere he SAW the killed the best part.
And I told of a woman friend. his tormentors and an-Stoneman's finish:
the air, perhaps. The point was they were talking about Hitler ás information just to make the point her husband's staff to a "safe nounced that he would
"He" and saying what they were that it was the troops that had place", had been in nearly thirty "Back in the near-by town, going to do with him and reter- suffered most that make an ascent on horse-found another sample of English ring to the Germans as "great keenest to get back again "to and who, asking, one morning, were the raids since the beginning of June, courage, or whatever it is. back from Vauxhall Gar-
big, dumb clouts,?”
have another go,"
what the row was the night be. "Why is it they talk like that "All that was cut from dens. The mount he chose mounted on the pony's right?" he asked.
my fore, was told by the maid: "Three while I am "almost frozen with story," he said, "although it hap-bombs dropped over the road, was hardly worthy of the back.
pened weeks ago. It would have ma'am.” 77 "They're just as scared as you helped our people at home to
And the mald went on laying name horse, being a dim- But even this feat was don't show it. Everyone's scar-
are," said Shdehan; "but they understand:"·
the Breakfast table! inutive pony, but the large completely put in the ca.” crowd that had gathered shade two years later
We argued, for half an hour, . "We're all afraid of something about what courage was-was it or other, anyway, I allowed, qua- forgave the slight decep when a Frenchwoman, "No, I insisted. "Our fellows a great quality or just sheer ig-lifying my boast. tion and gave him a great Mme. Poitevin, actually ike that. They may be stupid. I told of the Guardsman, swim-pressed his fear that the "Chi-
fare not scared, They're always norance?
- Stoneman proved that. Ho ex- ovation when he actually floated over London They may seem Indifferent. ming from the coast of Fianders,cago Daily News" wouldn't put did rise into the air'mounted on a bull.
"But, to-day, the Island people surrounded by the bodies of the his epic story on the front pagel of Britain are a race of heroes, dead-and other swimmers-with
HANNEN SWAFFER,
Issat,"
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