My unit in Kent was based on the densely wooded
spur between Chilham and Charing, and it soon became apparent to us that when the Germans came we should be very much better off if we had, in addition to our normal weapons, one that would kill, or anyhow disable, silently. We did not expect to use the bows and arrows often but we reckoned that they would come in useful if we found an odd German wandering along the rides of our jungle, presenting a target which we could engage at short range but which wouldn't be worth engaging if it meant firing a shot and thus attracting atten- tion. We also discovered that if you strapped a detonator and a short length of safety-fuse to an arrow, lit the fuse and shot the arrow, at night, into your opponents lines a gratifying amount of alarm and diversion would be caused. Looking back on it, though, I feel that it is probably just as well that we were never actually called on to qualify as international archers.
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