Today in Technology History
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April 22
Modern chemical weapons were first used in warfare exactly 87 years ago, during the second Battle of Ypres (pronounced EE-pruh) in Belgium. Here is how that attack is described in a book about World War One:
About the middle of April [1915], a deserter from the German lines had warned the Allied commander that the Germans were planning to annihilate the defenders of Ypres with poison gas, but the story was dismissed as a visionary tale.
On the afternoon of April 22d, without further warning, a cloud of greenish-yellow chlorine gas, five miles long, was observed to emit from the German trenches, being slowly wafted by the north wind toward the point where the French and Canadian lines met... As the poison cloud advanced, the vapor seemed to cling to the earth, seeking out every hole and hollow, and filling the trenches and shell holes as it crept along.
[French Colonial troops] being in the main path of the cloud, were first enveloped in the deadly fumes, which left them choking and agonized in the fight for breath. Thousands in the first support trenches and in the reserve lines either suffered violent suffocation, vomited blood, or fell in contortions, many dying later in the field ambulances, and casualty clearing stations.
Some were blinded or stupefied; others saved themselves by burying their faces in the earth, wrapping mufflers about their faces, or stuffing their handkerchiefs into their mouths. The majority of those in the front line perished. Throughout this terrible ordeal, the German artillery kept up its deadly work, the high explosive shells bursting among the helpless victims of the infernal gas...
The main path of the poison cloud also struck the left wing of the third Canadian Brigade... Though almost suffocated, and their line torn by the fearful cannonading, the brave Canadians held firm.
One detachment with handkerchiefs or mufflers tied over their mouths, actually charged back through the deadly gas cloud in the endeavor to reach the barbarous authors of the gas attack. What became of these heroic Canadians is not definitely known.
Penetrating this cloud of death, the German soldiers, all wearing respirators, poured through the four-mile gap in the Allied line... The day was saved by the timely arrival of five British battalions...
- W.C. King's Complete History of the World War (1922)
Related links:
Click here and here to read more about the gas attacks at the second Battle of Ypres.
Click here to read more about chemical weapons.
Click here to read about all the battles of Ypres.
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