by Gary Yee
Training picked up in earnest and besides referring to the old manuals, instructors from Hesketh-Prichard’s school were recalled to service. By 1944, the battalions that liberated Europe had a sniper section attached to the battalion headquarters. Corporal Arthur Hare, 15th Scottish Division, belonged to his battalion’s seven-man sniper section. Hare and three other snipers were in a house between the lines where Hare was watching a German sentry 150 yards away. Hare also studied a boarded-up house 350 yards distant and while no smoke emanated from it, was certain it was occupied. Hours passed and using iron sights, Hare shot the sentry. Gunfire and artillery broke out, Hare had stirred a hornet’s nest. He then remembered the house and attaching the scope, had just sighted it on the door when a shell hit its roof. A panicked German officer dashed out about 3 yards before Hare’s bullet nailed him. Working the bolt Hare saw another German officer emerge and Hare’s third bullet sent him leaping into the air. The third officer got 20 yards before Hare nailed him. Two more emerged and only the last one got away. Hare’s sergeant called him downstairs and as Hare turned, he saw his battalion advancing. His first shot had coincided with an assault that Hare was unaware of. For this action, Hare received the Military Medal.
At Baussem, Hare was ordered to investigate activity north of their position. Hare took another sniper, Packham, and started early in the morning. They were moving into a room at first light when a bullet smashed the glass and ricocheted around the room. Flattening out, they realized they were under fire from a German sniper. Edging to the back of the room, they rose slowly when another bullet came through the window, narrowly missing them. That confirmed it. They were faced with a German who had optical sights. Placing a cushion on a rifle butt, Packham slowly raised it to the window while Hare watched. It had risen no more than 1 inch when the third bullet knocked it off. That was enough for Hare to spot a slight movement of a curtain. He summoned Packham over who carefully wiggled across the floor before sliding up into the shadow cast against the wall. Hare pointed out a corner house two streets away. The next time the curtain moved, both men fired. There was no more threat from that window.
Hare and Packham’s encounter with a German sniper was not unique. Sergeant Harry Furness was summoned to remove a German sniper who had been inflicting casualties on a forward company:
[O]ver a long time no further shots were fired, I continue to search for signs using my more powerful scout telescope, and one house I watched for a while . . . had broken windows and damaged exterior wooden shutters . . . but now and again one of the shutters moved as the wind caught it. I must have been watching the area and that swaying shutter for hours when I caught a little movement—quick movements of any kind draw your eye to it if you are looking. I switched from my telescope to pick up my rifle and it seemed to me to be a hand reaching to get hold of one of the shutter by the edge. I fired immediately into and near the edge of the shutter, and even with the rifle recoil I felt sure I had seen an arm inside the house slide down and bang on the sill. I waited and watched until dusk before I left but saw no more movement nor had any shot been fired all the time I was there. That night a fighting patrol was sent out and they brought back for me a semi-automatic G43 rifle fitted with a telescopic sight. On the floor next to the window was a dead German.
United States
Like other Western powers, the United States was unprepared for sniping and its sniping equipment was obsolete. The Army adapted the M1903A3 Springfield rifle by installing a Redfield Junior Base and ring set. The low 2.5× Weaver 330 Scope with a crosshair reticle was adapted as the M73B1. The vertical picket post with two horizontal pickets on either end became the M73B2. Like the Winchester A-5, the M73B1 and M73B2’s narrow tube meant it had a small ocular lens and poor performance under low light conditions. Since it wasn’t hermetically sealed, it was susceptible to condensation and the lens had to be removed to drain it. The M73B1/2 bears the dubious distinction of being slightly better than Germany’s ZF-41. The Marine Corps went a different route and installed the 8× Unertl scope on the Springfield. While it gave the marine snipers the ability to hit at 1,000 yards, the Unertl was fragile and required delicate care from its user.
Following the adoption of the U.S. Rifle Caliber .30 M1 (aka M1 or M1 Garand or even Garand), the Army realized that a sniper version would be useful. Numerous examples were submitted and the M1E7 from Griffin & Howe was adopted as the M-1C. Disliked by the Garand’s inventor, John Garand, the unhardened receivers were sent to Griffin & Howe in New York where they were drilled with five holes, tapped in three of them and pinned in the remaining two for the scope base. The assembled receiver would then be returned as a unit to Springfield Armory for hardening. Since the receiver and the scope base were fabricated from two different steels, it wasn’t unknown for one to warp during the hardening process—not the most conducive thing for accuracy. The M-1C mounted the 2.2× Lyman Alaskan scope as the M81 or M82. One of the few sealed scopes of the period, the former had crosshairs and the latter a tapered post reticle.
Garand preferred his own design, the M1E8, which was later adopted post-war as the M-1D. It consisted of a mounting block with a threaded hole that was slipped over the slightly turned down barrel and pinned in place. The final modification included shortening the handguard. The scope base and scope was afterward screwed into the mounting block. The M-1D with its 2.2× M-84 scope was quicker, easier and less expensive than the M-1C. The M-84 featured synthetic rubber gaskets for greater weather proofing and was meant to replace the M81/M82 as they became unserviceable. Only a handful of M-84s were made before the war ended.
Within the U.S. Army, a 1944 infantry battalion was allotted nine sniper 03A4 rifles (or one for each infantry platoon)—if they were available. No sniper training was provided to the men and officers were not instructed on sniper deployment. Distribution was haphazard and Sergeant William E. Jones, Company I, Eighth Infantry Regiment received his 03A4 sniper rifle because he was the best shot in the company. Private Charles Davis, Company L, Third Battalion, 415 Infantry Regiment received his M1903A4 because he asked for it. Private Robert Palassou of Company L, 363 Infantry Regiment turned in his M1903A4 when he transferred from one platoon to another. Private John Bistrica, Charlie Company, 16th Infantry, was given a sniper rifle by his lieutenant and told to climb a tree to snipe Germans. Fortunately his captain countermanded the order and probably saved him. Unlike most GIs, who carried the M1903A4 sniping rifle, Sergeant John Fulcher of the 36th Division received some sniper training in the states before being shipped out to Italy. This haphazard approach to sniping meant the United States Army did not field an effective sniper component during World War II. There were expert riflemen who gave a good account of themselves, but the potential was never fully realized.
Sniper versions of the Garand and any other semiauto rifle—including the Tokarev, Simonovs as well as the German semiautomatics and sturmgewehrs of that era adapted for sniping—shared one common problem: they were inherently less accurate than their bolt-action counterparts. While the barrel is 90 percent of any rifle’s accuracy, other factors come into play and the greater the number of moving parts in an action, the more difficult it becomes to ensure consistent movement among the parts. Called harmonics, any inconsistency meant that the gun could have a different point of impact with each shot. Bear in mind the tradeoff a designer must make between reliability, which may demand looser tolerances, and accuracy. It does not take much pressure on a barrel to shift its point of impact (hence the use of heavier barrels on modern sniper rifles). Knowing this, attachments like flash hiders for the M-1C or M-1D were often discarded or removed in the field—their attachment not only shifted the point of impact, it opened up the group.
Despite this, some positive results were obtained. In Sicily an American column en route to Palermo was held up on the San Giuseppe Pass by a German 88 supported by an infantry platoon. The narrowness of the pass meant the tanks couldn’t outflank the 88. Lieutenant J. K. Maupin from
Missouri moved his platoon up a cliff on one side of the pass and after deploying the machine gun on the opposite side of the pass had his men open fire at 500 yards distance. His two snipers killed the machine-gun crew. The 88’s crew was safely behind the gunshield and immune from bullets. Maupin left one squad behind to keep the 88 crew behind the shield and with the rest of the platoon, flanked the 88 and drove the crew off.
In Italy, Private James J. McGill, 34th Infantry, was patrolling with his squad when they bumped into a German patrol. McGill went prone and estimating the distance, adjusted his scope. His first two shots went low but his third dropped a German. McGill got two more and nicked a fourth when a machine gun at 600 yards distance fired at his squad. McGill steadied himself, fired and dropped a machine gunner. By his second shot, the machine gun turned its attention on him, forcing him to lay low. His squad took advantage of the distraction and forced the Germans back. McGill dropped another German on the run, making for his fifth hit for that patrol.
Among the 3rd Division’s soldiers landing at Anzio was Platoon Sergeant E. L. Dean of Portland, Oregon. An expert shot, Dean used his sniper rifle to neutralize a machine gun that was annoying his platoon. He crawled out to within 900 yards of the gun and after adjusting his scope, waited. When the gun barked Dean fired and silenced it and followed it up with a second shot. On the next patrol the machine gun was gone. In another incident Dean hit a running German at 800 yards. Dean was modest about it, claiming it was a scratch shot but skill was certainly involved.
In Normandy, Private First Class Ray Register was scanning the line with binoculars when he sighted a machine gun being set up at the intersection of two hedgerows. Working the bolt on his scoped Springfield as fast as he could, he dropped all four Germans. His firing drew the attention of someone and Register noticed some movement in the hedgerow. An artillery observer had joined Register by now and Register asked him to spot. Steadying himself, Register fired one shot, heard a cry and didn’t need a spotter—the German fell from the hedgerow.
M1903A4 Springfield with M73B1 scope. (Springfield Armory National Historic Site)
Fighting in the Pacific alongside the Marines on Guadalcanal was Army Lieutenant John George. A competitive shooter, George brought a Springfield customized with a Lyman Alaskan scope on a Griffin & Howe scope mount:
In a moment, I saw something a few yards away from the body that made me drop the glasses and grab for the rifle. A live Jap had just risen from beside the corpse. Stunned and deafened by the blast that had thrown him from the bunker, he was holding his head with both hands in what could well have been a comical expression of exasperation. He remained exposed, probably in great pain—perhaps with burst ear drums. With Art giving me frantic directions in a nervous stage whisper, I held the shot. The scope had a tapered, flat top post reticle, with a lateral cross hair, sighted in to strike center on a 10-inch bull with a six o’clock hold at 200 yards. As I took up the slack and aimed, the Jap was on his knees in a prayer-like attitude which was far more appropriate than he realized. … I nudged his chin with the broad post—a measure calculated to plant the bullet somewhere on his chest at the 350 yard range. Then I gave the least pound or so of the three pound trigger pull a “gentle snatch.” The scope settled back in time for me to see the bullet strike the Jap and splash sand behind him.
While serving with Merrill’s Marauders, George carried a M-1 carbine but always used his Springfield to snipe.
Within the Marine Corps, impetus for newer scoped rifles came in 1940 when Colonel Julian C. Smith recommended for consideration to the Commandant the Lyman Alaskan, Noske (2.5–4×), and Weaver 330 and 440 (2.5–4× respectively). No action was taken until July 19, 1942 when the Division of Plans and Policies wrote the Commandant: “It is believed that sniper training should be initiated in the Marine Corps in the near future; that a suitable course be tentatively adopted for this purpose; and that after adoption of such course, sniper schools should be established.” It also pointed out that the snipers’ course developed by Major Van Orden was available on file at the Weapons School at Quantico and that an outline of a British snipers’ course was available too. The Commandant was receptive and schools were set up on both the East and West Coast.
The West Coast school at Camp Elliot, San Diego, accepted the fifteen expert riflemen from each replacement battalion. The course was five weeks long and the top five graduates were sent to the Raiders for an additional three weeks of training. Course material included camouflage, concealment, spider traps, map and compass reading, use of the telescopic sight, scouting and patrolling, etc. Upon graduation, the men were distributed three per company but as specialists, were not attached to any platoon. The East Coast school at New River, North Carolina had twenty students per class for its three-week course.
Bronx native Bob Stiles enlisted after Pearl Harbor. Qualifying as expert at boot camp, he was asked to and became a scout-sniper. On Guadalcanal Stiles was summoned by his battalion commander, Lieutenant Colonel McKelvy, who told him that a company was pinned down by a sniper. Stiles described what happened next:
So I moved over to where the company was and started moving through that damn konai grass and looking into the treetops. I was completely concealed by the konai yet I had a perfect view of those high trees. Eventually I saw some movement in one of the trees. Pretty soon a head and then a rifle barrel came into view. I had my rifle sling nice and tight and my sight elevation was perfect. I let go and, wham, out of the trees comes the Nip.
Unimpressed by USMC snipers on Okinawa was Private Sterling Mace: “I had already seen one of those snipers operate, and all he did was clean his rifle, look through his scope for a few minutes, and then resume the rifle cleaning. Over and over, he would perform this noble task, never deviating from the script; then, when he felt he had sniped enough, he’d move to another spot in the rocks in case the rocks on the Jap side of the line spotting him spotting them.” Mace’s opinion would probably be different if he witnessed Private Daniel Webster Case, 1st Marines, knock out a Japanese machine gun at 1,200 yards distance. Case’s captain later told him that several bodies were stacked around the gun.
Post World War II
World War II concluded and the nuclear age meant that an army could be destroyed by one bomb. With exception of the Soviet Union and the British Royal Marines, sniping was forgotten. After all, the bomb meant ground warfare was highly unlikely; that is, until Korea broke out and schools were restarted in response, only to close when the necessity was over.
In 1960, U.S.M.C. Captain Jim Land temporarily opened a sniping school in Hawaii. Material gathered by Land was later used by Captain Bob Russell, 3rd Division, to open an in-country school in Vietnam. Vietnam was heating up and 1st Division General Herman Nickerson, Jr. ordered Land to open a school for his division. Land arrived in Vietnam in 1966 and began gathering personnel and equipment. He drew 30-06 Winchester Model 70 rifles from supply and, using recreation funds, bought scopes from the PX. Land transferred from the MPs a graduate of his Hawaii school, Carlos Hathcock. Hathcock not only instructed but became one of the highest scoring snipers in Vietnam with 93 kills. There were others like Army Sergeant Aldebert Waldron who had amassed 113 kills, Chuck Mawhinney with 103 and Eric England with 98.
Post Vietnam, the pattern repeated itself with sniping again being forgotten by the United States. However, one dedicated group, the Army Marksmanship Unit thought it more than competitive match skill but also useful on the battlefield. In 1977 the U.S.M.C. established a permanent sniping school and the U.S. Army followed. After 9/11, snipers proved their worth in fighting terrorism. When the Maersk Alabama was captured by pirates and its skipper, Richard Phillips held hostage in 2009, U.S. Navy SEAL snipers aboard the U.S.S. Bainbridge killed the three terrorists who were on the lifeboat with Phillips and captured the fourth who was aboard the Bainbridge negotiating Phillips’ release. New long-distance records were made and broken including: Staff Sergeant James Gilliland’s 1,250-met
er kill with his 7.62 mm Nato M-24 rifle in Iraq in 2005; Sergeant Nick Ranstad, 1-91st Airborne Cavalry, with 2,100 meters in Afghanistan in 2008; Corporal Rob Furlong, Princess Patricia’s Light Infantry, with 2,430 meters in 2002; and Sergeant Craig Harrison of the Blues and Royals, 2,475-meter kill in 2009.
The perception of snipers and sniping has changed over time. In the flintlock musket era it was thought unfair to aim. Civil War soldiers felt sharpshooting was murder and many disliked sharpshooters including their own sharpshooters. Hesketh-Prichard was called a professional assassin. In Vietnam snipers were derisively called “Murder Incorporated” after the Chicago gangland killers. Today, snipers enjoy the support of their fellow soldiers and officers as well as the public. As a force multiplier, they are seen as a necessary component that saves lives and prevents greater harm.
SELECT BIBLIOGRAPHY
Bailey, DeWitt, British Military Flintlock Rifles 1740–1840 (Andrew Mowbray Pub., 2002)
Beaufoy, Henry [A Corporal of Riflemen, pseudo.], Scloppetaria (1808), (Richmond Publishing Co., 1971)