Commando's Camera

What the Commando's Camera sees

The previous page was: "Commando's Bridge"

Commando's Camera; You might ask: "what was the most important piece of equipment the Commandos have used?"

That is very difficult, if not impossible to suggest what item has stood the Commandos in good stead the most, but perhaps it might have been the Camera.

Photographs of their objective, of the way thither and back, of the obstacles, artificial and natural, to be encountered, and of a myriad of other details might, and often did, make the difference between success and failure.

A single picture of a line of trees was enough to give No. 2 Commando its exact position immediately after landing at Anzio. In the early days maps, especially those of the enemy held coast lines of Europe were usually out of date and often very sketchy.

There were no details of such vital matters as the high-and low-water marks, or of the type of foreshore (sand, shingle or mud), the underwater whereabouts of rocks, the height or steepness of cliffs and, most important of all the fortifications. Where were they?

Commando's Bridge

Photographs of these coasts

And their interpretation became therefore, of the first importance, and here the Commandos were fortunate to have among them Tom Churchill who, before the war had taught the art to the Royal Air Force School of aerial Photography at Farnham.

It was he, as much as anyone, who was able to show just what could be accomplished, and his skill was as invaluable as his enthusiasm was infectious.

"Having air photographs of a strip of coast we were about to attack explained to me by Tom Churchill," said Laycock, "was the most interesting of all of my experiences."

The art of photographic interpretation is best described in Churchill's words.

"The air photograph gives a bird's-eye view of the ground; it sees beyond hills and in between the trees in the forest. It is up to date to the moment when it was taken. It shows minute details, as, for distance, the exact width of a road, a river, or a wall. Unlike a map, it does not have to show things by conventional signs. On a map for example, the Dover road will be drawn as a red line of constant thickness, but it would be useless to measure it with a pair of calipers."

"On the air photographs

However, this road will be shown in all its curves and variations at exactly its correct width in relation to the scale of the photograph; and one could therefore measure its width exactly."

"Again, an air photograph is not defaced by a number of words, such as the names of villages. It is a straightforward document which is comparatively easy to read by someone trained in the art."

There are however, certain disadvantages which an interpreter must take into account. For instance, there are no contours on a photograph; also the scale is not exactly constant. It follows that photographs of comparatively flat country are less subject to scale variations than those that cover mountainous territory.

The first of these disadvantages, can fortunately be overcome by the use of the stereoscopic principle. The second cannot be avoided therefore it has to be accepted.

The fascination of a stereoscopic impression

Leaping, as it were, to the eye from two perfectly flat photographs, never fails in its appeal. The third dimension is suddenly revealed as if by magic.

In aerial photography it is the usual rule to take long over-lapping strips of photographs so that, if at any particular point or area to be examined, the 60 per cent overlap enables the object area to be studied through a stereoscope on two photographs.

The hills and valleys are revealed as such, seen from above, and the absence of contours no longer becomes a disadvantage. A photograph translates colours into tones which are graded from black to white or visa versa. An interpreter becomes an expert in recognizing an object from its shape and tone.

Since the photograph is taken from above, the shape of an object is not that by which one normally recognizes, like they do on the ground, but this difference can quickly be learnt. The tone is a harder task to master because it depends more on the rules of deflection than of the actual colour of the object.

For instance the path across

A corn field will appear lighter in tone than the cornfield itself, because the stalks that are trodden down will reflect more light than the heads of the corn.

A flat roof may appear darker in tone than a sloping face of a pitched roof because the light reflecting from the sloping roof may be striking directly in the direction of the lens of the camera. Newly turned earth, such as a parapet of a trench, always appears lighter than the ground surrounding it.

The presence of a belt of barbed wire can be detected, not because the wire itself can be seen, but because the vegetation underneath it tends to grow up more luxuriously owing to protection from cattle and from wind, and because of the drops of water which falls from the wire obstacle and provide additional moisture. long grass is always darker in tone than stubble.

An interpreter learns to recognize objects not so much by themselves but by their associated features. A machine gun or a field gun will appear as so small a speck that it would be hard to differentiate it; but by the shape of the trench which may enclose it, or by the characteristic disposition of the four or five emplacements which compose a battery, or by the shape and direction of the tracks which lead up to the position, its nature will be diagnosed by the interprter.

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Of course, every effort

Is made to thwart him by camouflage. He attempts to defeat the enemy by using first and foremost his military knowledge, then by use of the stereoscope; and by the examination of photographs of the same area taken many months earlier.

Or even by resorting to infra red photography which may, in certain circumstances, give a different tone value and reveal valuable clues.

Commando officers came to regard the air photograph as an almost indispensable supplement in the field. Map reading on the ground was much easier if one had a photograph to consult to compare the map.

In addition, realistic scale models of the coast to be attacked were constructed from the photographs, or the type of terrain could be used for training.

What the camera sees the expert reveals.

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