Wauwatosa news. [volume] (Wauwatosa, Wis.) 1900-1948, 1914-10-09

London OH6 WOuuSIo Nhnt hlAN
| of shells the French must have been
| using TO cause a regiment of German
/ infantry to die in their trenches,
standing bolt upright and still holding
/ their rifles in firing attitude re-
marked London paper the other day,
and another correspondent quotes an
American member of the Crois Rouge
as having seen the German trenches
| as the French guns had left them, but
with dead in such posture as the
/ world had never seen since the de-
| stroying angel passed over the Philis-
tine camp in that avenging night of
| Scripture, q silent company of ghosts"
But there is no secrecy about what
is now an open secret, '"Turpinite,' the
latest French "hell-producer," is the
invention of M. Turpin, the parent"
inventor of melinite and lyddite, which
latter is merely so named because the
| first experiments were made by Lydd,
in Kent, in presence of the French
inventor. How far this turpinite has
been or is being used by the French
| artillery is not known, and may not
| be exactly known till after the war,
| but one OF the salient features OF this
/ novel terror is that it cannot be fred
from an ordinary field gun, and for
| it's use guns of particular and diff
cult construction are required. The
handling of these guns is at present
| confined to specialists. Had the sue
cessful experiments carried out at
| ChalonsAsur-Marn taken place ear
lier, the result of this war, in so far
as its primary stages were concerned,
might well have been different.
So lethal in its effect is the new
shell on explosion that, should its use
become widespread, whole armies. in
deed, entire nations, would be COM
/ pletely exterminated in the course of
a few weeks.
Offered to France.
NJ. Turpin is not only a remarkable
man, he Is also man who for many
years nursed a serious grievance, and
who considered that he had been
deeply wronged in connection with
the discovery of his previous inven-
lions, melinite and lyddite. He be-
came resentful and suspicious, and de-
termined to discover some new ex-
plosive that would completely throw
into the shade his previous discover
les, which had been improved" by Of
fetal French technicians.
For years he worked in his quiet
country home some twenty miles from
| Paris, and it is not long ago since the
French government made him the
'amende honorable" This Modified
| him considerably, and he offered his
| new discovery to his country; but
4 France, at the imperious demand of
/ her democrats, had for many years
been cutting down her military ex-
penditure, while Germany had been
steadily increasing hers. In such cir
cumstances there was little money to
spend on experiments with explosives,
and the outbreak of war found France
not nearly so prepared with artillery,
| in munitions, in reserve forces, as was
Germany.
M. Turpin, however, used as he was
to war Office representation, had had
/
his own and conducted experiments
on the Atlantic coast before carefully
selected and invited officers.
A man who witnessed one of these
early demonstrations of the possibili-
ties of "turpinite" sends to the Daily
Express a description of its terrific eff.
fects:
ION a stretch of sand 500 yards
from high water level temporary
sheepfold had been erected, about four
hundred yards square, and rallied of
with wooden hurdles. In this space
were some dozen sheep and couple
of aged and WORKOUT horses.
"One of the horses was contentedly
munching away at some hay in q
trough, the other was rubbing himself
against one of the hurdles, while the
sheep were huddled together in one
corner.
As II Petrlfied.
This was what | saw through my
glasses when, from behind a ridge
some twenty-five hundred yards away
there came a sharp, loud thud and the
6hrleklng SOunu OF smaiI smell, Jus'
as If somebody had taken a piece OF
silk and rapidly torn it in two. II
was the same tearing sound, only
louder.
There was an explosion in the
open space in the middle of the impro
vised sheep pen. The sheep we're still
all huddled in corner some distance
of, one of the old horses was appar
emily leaning up against the railing
while the other, the one that had been
munching hay at the trough, lay on
his side.
When, ten minutes later, reached
the pen, the sheep looked for all the
, world as if they had been suddenly
petrified. They were mostly standing