Official caption: “Übungsschießen mit einem Scharfschützengewehr am Schießplatz in Ferlach, 03.11.1915” (Practice shooting with a sniper rifle at the shooting range in Ferlach), showing an evidently high-ranking Austrian officer test-firing a German Gew 98 Mauser, equipped with an early scope, some 107 years ago today.
Via the Austrian National Library (ONB) https://onb.digital/result/11242BC9
The shooter, decked out not only with his own personal poncho and goggles but also firing under an umbrella to make sure his carefully waxed mustache remains intact, is General der Kavallerie Franz Rohr, who at the time of the range session had recently returned to active service after being placed over the Hungarian Honved reserve in 1913.
Rohr, placed in charge of a scratch force along the Carinthian frontier upon Italy’s entry into the war, would go on to lead the newly-formed 10th Army, then the 11th Army, before switching to the Eastern Front in 1917 to command the prestigious old 1st Army, picking up a baron’s title and adding a “von” to his name. Made Feldmarschall Freiherr Franz Rohr von Denta in 1918, at age 64, he would go on to become the head of Hungary’s postwar army before his death in 1927.
Also, note the peculiar Austrian use of a “dress bayonet” in lieu of a sword, but still outfitted with a Portépée-style sword knot, as displayed by Rohr’s very wet ADC, who does not rate a regenschirm.