rorkesdriftvc.com :: View topic

Posted: Fri Jun 08, 2012 2:21 pm

Of course for us traditionalists there was a feu de joie done on the Diamond Jubilee weekend on Sunday, Monday and Tuesday during our arena shows at Osborne House. Not quite as big as the Guards but 18 Martini Henry's cracking off one after another in two ranks is pretty good going.

There is a Simkin print of the Guards doing the same in "Life in our Armies".

Atb - Tim

Posted: Sat Jun 09, 2012 1:16 pm

I watched it on the BBC and the firing did not proceed as I expected. I expect the instructions were almost impossible to hear above the noise of the crowd.

I'm grateful for the explanation by Galloglas as something appeared to be awry between the band and the Guards. Whatever was intended, it looked wrong.

Peter

Posted: Sun Jun 10, 2012 2:46 am

What odd customs you Brits occasionally have. I gather you sometimes use semi-automatic rifles to fire a funerary salute (more surprise than shock, but a bit of the latter as well)? Do your honor guards only pretend that they are working the bolts? And do they always fire three volleys as we do? Are three spent casings ever put in the folds of the flag? Curiouser and curiouser... In spite the the fact that the bolt action '03 Springfield has been obsolete since the very beginning of WWII, that's still our "traditional" rifle for ceremonies. And are your honor guards also always of an uneven number or is that just a tradition we Yanks made up?

Trivia alert! We always fire three volleys as that's the traditional signal since our Civil War that the battlefield has been cleared of wounded and the fighting can recommence.

Posted: Sun Jun 10, 2012 8:25 am

Another thing. When soldiers stand easy or at ease or whatever it's called with legs
slightly apart and holding the rifle resting on the ground, has that stance been abandoned?

Posted: Mon Jun 11, 2012 8:26 am

One of the unfortunate realities of the SA80 is that it 'doesn't reach the ground' - unlike everything since the matchlock/fusil - and, so, many of its drills are perforce similar to those used by Cavalry with carbines in the pre-Crimean period, except where the loading of a magazine-fed rifle as a drill movenent is a new feature.

It was scaled up to 5.56mm from a 1950s Royal Ordnance Factory Enfield design for a 4.85mm calibre similarly configured rifle - they were still the design authority for small arms - generating a variety of cooling and other problems for it and its associated Light Support Weapon.

It's also fairly heavy compared with other 'allied' rifles, hence the need to "Change arms" fairly frequently on longer parades. Several NATO armies retained the 7.62mm calibre; now having found it still fairly useful in Afghanistan.

G