Manual for Noncommissioned Officers and Privates of Cavalry of the Army Part 55

=362.= After the new guard arrives at its post and has saluted the old guard, each guard is presented by its commander to its officer of the day; if there be but one officer of the day present, or if one officer acts in the capacity of old and new officer of the day, each guard is presented to him by its commander.

=363.= If other persons ent.i.tled to a salute approach, each commander of the guard will bring his own guard to attention if not already at attention. The senior commander of the two guards will then command: "1. =Old and new guards=, 2. =Present=, 3. =Arms=."

The junior will salute at the command "=Present Arms=" given by the senior. After the salute has been acknowledged, the senior brings both guards to the order.

=364.= After the salutes have been acknowledged by the officers of the day, each guard is brought to an order by its commander; the commander of the new guard then directs the orderly or orderlies to fall out and report and causes bayonets to be fixed if so ordered by the commanding officer; bayonets will not then be unfixed during the tour except in route marches while the guard is actually marching or when specially directed by the commanding officer.

The commander of the new guard then falls out members of the guard for detached posts, placing them under charge of the proper noncommissioned officers, divides the guard into three reliefs, =first=, =second=, and =third=, from right, to left, and directs a list of the guard to be made by reliefs. When the guard consists of troops of different arms combined, the men are a.s.signed to reliefs so as to insure a fair division of duty under rules prescribed by the commanding officer.

=365.= The sentinels and detachments of the old guard are at once relieved by members of the new guard, the two guards standing at ease or at rest while these changes are being made. The commander of the old transmits to the commander of the new guard all his orders, instructions, and information concerning the guard and its duties. The commander of the new guard then takes possession of the guardhouse and verifies the articles in charge of the guard.

=366.= If considerable time is required to bring in that portion of the old guard still on post, the commanding officer may direct that as soon as the orders and property are turned over to the new guard the portion of the old guard at the guardhouse may be marched off and dismissed. In such a case the remaining detachment or detachments of the old guard will be inspected by the commander of the new guard when they reach the guardhouse. He will direct the senior noncommissioned officer present to march these detachments off and dismiss them in the prescribed manner.

=367.= In bad weather, at night, after long marches, or when the guard is very small, the field music may be dispensed with.

CHAPTER X.

MAP READING AND SKETCHING.

=Section 1. Military map reading.=

When you pick up a map, the first question is, Where is the north?

This can usually be told by an arrow (see fig. 1, p. 259) which will be found in one of the corners of the map, and which points to the true north--the north of the north star.

On some maps no arrow is to be found. The chances are a hundred to one that the north is at the top of the map, as it is on almost all printed maps. But you can only a.s.sure yourself of that fact by checking the map with the ground it represents. For instance, if you ascertain that the city of Philadelphia is due east of the city of Columbus, then the Philadelphia-Columbus line on the map is a due east-and-west line, and establishes at once all the other map directions.

Now, the map represents the ground as nearly as it can be represented on a flat piece of paper. If you are standing up, facing the north, your right hand will be in the east, your left in the west, and your back to the south. It is the same with a map; if you look across it in the direction of the arrow--that is, toward its north--your right hand will be toward what is east on the map; your left hand to the west; the south will be at the bottom of the map.

[Ill.u.s.tration: Fig. 1, 2, 3, 4, 5 and scale.]

There is another kind of an arrow that sometimes appears on a map. It is like the one in figure 2, page 259, and points not to the true north but to the magnetic north, which is the north of the compa.s.s.

Though the compa.s.s needle, and therefore the arrow that represents it on the map, does not point exactly north, the deviation is, from a military point of view, slight, and appreciable error will rarely result through the use of the magnetic instead of the true north in the solution of any military problems.

Should you be curious to know the exact deviation, consult your local surveyor or any civil engineer.

Both arrows may appear on your map. In that case disregard the magnetic arrow unless you are using the map in connection with a compa.s.s.

If a map is being used on the ground, the first thing to be done is to put the lines of the map parallel to the real outlines of the ground forms, and roads, fences, railroads, etc., that the map shows; for the making of a map is no more than the drawing on paper of lines parallel to and proportional in length to real directions and distances on the ground.

For instance, the road between two places runs due north and south.

Then on the map a line representing the road will be parallel to the arrow showing the north and will be proportional in length to the real road. In this way a map is a picture, or better, a bare outline sketch; and, as we can make out a picture, though it be upside down, or crooked on the wall, so we can use a map that is upside down or not parallel to the real ground forms. But it is easier to make out both the picture and the map if their lines are parallel to what they represent. So in using a map on the ground we always put the lines parallel to the actual features they show. This is easy if the map has an arrow.

If the map has no arrow, you must locate objects or features on the ground, and on the map, their representations. Draw on the map a line connecting any two of the features; place this line parallel to an imaginary line through the two actual features located, and your map will be correctly placed. Look to it that you do not reverse on the map the positions of the two objects or features, or your map will be exactly upside down.

When the map has been turned into the proper position--that is to say, "oriented"--the next thing is to locate on the map your position. If you are in the village of Easton and there is a place on the map labeled Easton, the answer is apparent. But if you are out in the country, at an unlabeled point that looks like any one of a dozen other similar points, the task is more complicated. In this latter case you must locate and identify, both on the map and on the ground, other points--hills, villages, peculiar bends in rivers, forests--any ground features that have some easily recognizable peculiarity and that you can see from your position.

Suppose, for instance, you were near Leavenworth and wanted to locate your exact position, of which you are uncertain. You have the map shown in this manual, and, looking about, you see southwest from where you stand the United States Penitentiary; also, halfway between the south and the southeast--south-southeast a sailor would say--the reservoir (rectangle west of "O" in "Missouri"). Having oriented your map, draw on it a line from the map position of the reservoir toward its actual position on the ground. Similarly draw a line from the map position of penitentiary toward its actual position. Prolong the two lines until they intersect. The intersection of the lines will mark the place where you stand--south Merritt Hill.

This method consists merely in drawing on the map lines that represent the lines of sight to known and visible places. The lines pa.s.s through the map position of the places you see and are parallel to the actual lines of sight; therefore they are the map representations of the lines of sight, and their intersection is the map position of the eye of the observer.

After this orientation and location of position, one can deduce from the map everything there is to know in regard to directions. In this respect, study of the ground itself will show no more than will study of the map.

After "What direction?" comes "How far?" To answer this, one must understand that the map distance between any two points shown bears a fixed and definite relation or proportion to the real distance between the two points.

For instance: We measure on a map and find the distance between two points to be 1 inch. Then we measure the real distance on the ground and find it to be 10,000 inches; hence the relation between the map distance and the real distance is 1 to 10,000, or 1/10000. Now, if the map is properly drawn, the same relation will hold good for all distances, and we can obtain any ground distance by multiplying by 10,000 the corresponding map distance.

This relation need not be 1/10000, but may be anything from 1/100 that an architect might use in making a map or plan of a house up to one over a billion and a half, which is about the proportion between map and real distances in a pocket-atlas representation of the whole world on a 6-inch page. Map makers call this relation the "scale" of the map and put it down in a corner in one of three ways.

For the sake of an ill.u.s.tration, say the relation between map and ground distances is 1 to 100; that is, 1 inch on the map is equal to 100 on the ground. The scale may be written:

First. 1 inch equals 100.

Second. 1/100.

Third. As shown by figure 3 (p. 259).

These expressions mean one and the same thing. A variation of the first method on a map of different scale might be: 1 inch equals 1 mile. Since a mile contains 63,360 inches, then the real distance between any two points shown on the map is 63,360 times the map distance.

To find the ground distance by the third kind of scale, copy it on the edge of a slip of paper, apply the slip directly to the map, and read off the distance; and so we answer the question, "How far?"

After direction and distance comes the interpretation of the signs, symbols, and abbreviations on the map. Those authorized are given on pages 272 and 273 (a reprint of Appendix 4, Field Service Regulations, 1914); but there are a good many other conventional signs in common use. A key to them is published by the War Department and is called "Conventional Signs, United States Army." From these you read at once the natural and artificial features of the country shown on your map.

It should be borne in mind that these conventional signs are not necessarily drawn to scale, as are the distances. They show the position and outline of the features rather than the size. This for the reason that many of the features shown, if drawn to scale, would be so small that one could not make them out except with a magnifying gla.s.s. If the exact dimensions are of any importance, they will be written in figures on the map. For instance, bridges.

In addition to the above conventional signs, we have contours to show the elevations, depressions, slope, and shape of the ground. Abroad, hachures are much used, but they serve only to indicate elevation, and, as compared to contours, are of little value. Contours resemble the lines shown in figure 4 (p. 259).

Hachures are shown in figure 5 (p. 259), and may be found on any European map. They simply show slopes, and, when carefully drawn, show steeper slopes by heavier shading and gentler slopes by the fainter hachures. The crest of the mountain is within the hachures. (See fig.

5, p. 259.)

_Contours._--A certain student, when asked by his instructor to define "s.p.a.ce," said: "I have it, sir, in my head, but can not put it into words." The instructor replied: "I suppose that under those circ.u.mstances, Mr. ----, the definition really would not help much."

And so it is with contours--the definition does not help much if you know a contour when you meet it on a map. For examples of contours, turn to the map facing page 274, and, starting at the United States penitentiary, note the smooth, flowing, irregular curved lines marked 880, 860, 840, 840, 860, etc.

The only other lines on the map that at all resemble contours are stream lines, like "Corral Creek," but the stream lines are readily distinguished from contours by the fact that they cross the contours squarely, while the contours run approximately parallel to each other.

Note the stream line just to the west of South Merritt Hill.

The contours represent lines on the ground that are horizontal and whose meanderings follow the surface, just as the edge of a flood would follow the irregularities of the hills about it. Those lines that contours stand for are just as level as the water's edge of a lake, but horizontally they wander back and forth to just as great a degree.

The line marked 880, at the penitentiary, pa.s.ses through on that particular piece of ground every point that is 880 feet above sea level. Should the Missouri River rise in flood to 880 feet, the penitentiary would be on an island, the edge of which is marked by the 880 contour.

Contours show several things; among them the height of the ground they cross. Usually the contour has labeled on it in figures the height above some starting point, called the =datum plane=--generally sea level. If, with a surveying instrument, you put in on a piece of ground a lot of stakes, each one of which is exactly the same height above sea level--that is, run a line of levels--then make a map showing the location of the stakes, a line drawn on the map through all the stake positions is a contour, and shows the position of all points of that particular height.

On any given map all contours are equally s.p.a.ced in a vertical direction, and the map shows the location of a great number of points at certain fixed levels. If you know the vertical interval between any two adjacent contours, you know the vertical interval for all the contours on that map, for these intervals on a given map are all the same.

With reference to a point through which no contour pa.s.ses, we can only say that the point in question is not higher than the next contour up the hill, nor lower than the next one down the hill. For the purposes of any problem, it is usual to a.s.sume that the ground slopes evenly between the two adjacent contours and that the vertical height of the point above the lower contour is proportional to its horizontal distance from the contour, as compared to the whole distance between the two contours. For instance, on the map, find the height of point A. The horizontal measurements are as shown on the map. The vertical distance between the contours is 20 feet. A is about one-quarter of the distance between the 800 and the 820 contours, and we a.s.sume its height to be one-quarter of 20 feet (5 feet) higher than 800 feet. So the height of A is 805 feet.

The vertical interval is usually indicated in the corner of the map by the letters "V. I." For instance: V. I.=20 feet.