ASHBURTON DAY
By HUGH EWER*
IHAD not been to Bisley camp for twelve years. My previous visits were an annual series during which, as an officer of the 0.T.C., I used to travel up from the West Country with a school team for the Ashburton Shield competition. Since those days my interest has shifted to another school. Bisley is less distant, and can be reached by car, even with a standard petrol ration. This year I went to Bisley again to watch the schools shoot for the Ashburton. The camp has changed very little. It is still the orderly, pleasant, leisurely place that it was before the war. The competitors' tents are no longer, white, but muddy brown in colour, and the club huts along the avenues are shabbier than they used to be ; but there are still the broad walks, the grass plots, the trees and beyond the trees the ranges themselves. The inhabitants, too, seem to be much as they were. They are temporary inhabitants who come and go, but they return year by year to give Bisley the characteristic atmosphere which it has during the N.R.A. Meeting. It is not a dressy place. There are plenty of uniforms, of course, especially on Ashburton Day, but even those who wear uniform are by no means on ceremonial parade, and most of the senior competitors are in the oldest of civilian clothes. Trousers are shapeless, ties almost unknown, jackets bound and patched with leather at elbow and shoulder. Above all, there are the hats, ancient slouch hats with wide brims to shield the eyes from the sun.
Today the senior competitors are either on the long ranges or watching the boys, for this is the schools' day, and they have a monopoly of the Century Range, where a hundred targets stand in line. Each school team has one allotted to it, and each member of that team must keep the target number firmly in his mind. A shot on the wrong target means the loss of five points, a fine exacted by the range officer and the undying hatred of the school whose target has been violated. At 500 yards on a nervous occasion such as this it is not very difficult for the novice to aim at the wrong target, if he fails to look at the number above it before each shot. A gap in the trees leads from the camp to the 500 yards firing-point where the teams are now, for the morning shoot is over and the afternoon one about to begin. There are seventy schools here from every part of Britain, and this is the one competition in which they all meet simultaneously. There is nothing else quite like it. It is, too, essentially a team competition, although the boys shoot individually. Each of them has a certain maximum number of. points which he can score for the team—thirty-five points at each range. Every point which he loses is irrevocably lost to his team ; nobody else can redeem his failure. This may happen in a cricket match, where the inability of one or two to make runs can be compensated by another's good innings ; but it cannot happen in the Ashburton competition.
All the boys are in uniform, as the teams are officially entered by their J.T.C. contingents ; the Scottish schools conspicuous in the kilt. Immediately behind the firing-point there is a line of large black- boards set on stands, each bearing the name of a school, the names of the team and the morning scores, individual and aggregate. Half *Mr. Elder is headmaster of Merchant Taylors' School. of each board is filled with figures, and it is known to all which schools are ahead after the zoo-yard stage. By the end of the after- noon the boards will be complete, the final totals written in, and the winning school will be photographed beside the record of its score.
The first pair go on the firing-point and lie down ; with them is another member of the team as coach. The master in charge must remain behind the firing-point, and may not interfere or give advice during the shoot—although he may have much to say before and after. Meantime he watches and endures in agony of soul, for mistakes can be made in coaching as well as in shooting itself. The score for each shot is signalled from the butts by a frame which rises into sight as the target dips. It is a white-painted frame with four spaces, in one of which a black panel is placed to give the score—bottom right a bull, bottom left an inner, top right a magpie, top left an outer. So when shooting one prays that the top of the scoring frame will rise clear, and that the panel may be snugly in the bottom right-hand corner of the frame. If the top is clear, at least the worst has not happened, and an inner means the loss of only one point. But how the heart sinks if the black panel comes up in the top of the frame. This year the schools are keeping the registers for each other ; but in past years there were register-keepers in all competitions, who sat on the firing-point and called out the score as each shot was signalled from the butts. A story is told of a naval rating who found himself marking the score of no less a personage than an admiral of the Fleet who was also a peer of the realm. The great man's first shot was a bull, and the marker, bursting with pride, bellowed: "Admiral of the Fleet, Lord —, a BULL'S EYE, counting FIVE." Alas! two magpies followed and were announced in more subdued tones. An outer produced a note of veritable anguish. After the next shot the whole scoring frame rose clear. The sailor stared with unbelieving eyes, and then, resuming the part of Stentor, exclaimed: " Gawd, he's missed it! "
Today, however, there are no professional register-keepers, and the scores are not called. Sighting shots come first, and all along the line there is a continuous crackle of rifle-fire as the targets go up and down and the shots are recorded on the boards. The coaches are watching the wind-flags anxiously, for there is a stiff breeze blow- ing towards the firing-point, and it is shifting at times. The light, too, is variable, as the sun emerges from the clouds and retires again. In fact, it is a difficult day for shooting, especially at the longer range. After the two sighting shots, each man fires seven to count.
As the afternoon goes on, a fair-sized crowd gathers behind the ropes—parents, old boys and casual spectators. Some of them remain faithful to one place and their own school, watching every shot ; others drift up and down the long line, noting the scores of other schools and calculating chances. Most of the interest this year is on the left of the line, for it happens that the schools with the best scores at zoo yards are there, fairly close together. Scores of about 250 after the first stage are the ones which are going to matter this afternoon. Anything above 245 has a chance, but the others are probably out of it, for the standard is high, and not all the better teams are likely to crack, though one or two of them may. Certainly there are some magpies appearing in the scoring frames, and a few outers ; but tirre are more inners and bulls. Aperture sights have raised the standard of scoring, especially on a day like this. At one time the teams had to use the S.M.L.E. as issued, open sights and no slings—a better test of marksmanship, some think. But those days have gone.
Half-way through the shoot the position becomes clearer. Brad- field, All Hallows and Charterhouse are going to be in at the finish. Denstone and Dollar will not be far away. One or two others have, perhaps, just a chance, but for them every point is vital. Inners are not good enough ; only bulls will do. Now the last pairs are firing, and their scores are being written on the boards, shot by shot. All Hallows have finished with a total of 498 and have beaten Brad- field. One of the Charterhouse team has still his last shot to fire, and everything depends on that, for their total stands at 495. An inner will be enough to win, a magpie will mean a tie, an outer . . . but an outer is unthinkable. The shot is fired, the target dips and the scoring-frame rises with the panel marking a bull. Charterhouse, with a score of 500, has won the Ashburton Shield.
Previous page
