The Topeka state journal. [volume] (Topeka, Kansas) 1892-1980, 1919-01-14
TOPEKA STATE JOURNAL
INFORM ALTON
BURE AU
FREDERIC J. HASKIN. Director.
Washington. D. C
THE GAS WAS READY.
Washington. D. C

l.. C.,
the war was still going on this gov
eminent did not talk about its gas
program. Since it has come to on end,
the men of science have gradually
thawed out until now they are VIKING
to divulge many of the facts, while
still holding onto those secrets Wnlcn
are valuable to America.
So it is possible to tell the story OF
Edgewood arsenal, hidden in the back
water regions of Maryland, where sixty
million dollars was put into a piant
that would produce such quantlties OF
gas as to make the European output
look like u sample package. And to
tell the last chapter first, it may be
said that Edgewood arsenal was, at
the time of the signing of the arml-
stice, making as much gas as were
England and France together; that II
would have doubled its production in
another month, and that by spring II
would have tripled it.
By way of getting a further measure
of American gas production it may be
said that England manufactured a
NAHUM of thirty tons of mustard IN
a day, and that France had produced
as much as fifteen tons a day. Yet
there was a little supplementary plant
up the Hudson that was ready to pro-
duce fifty tons a'day. and another OF
similar capacity at Niagara Falls.
The chemical warfare service. at the
head of which was Maj. Gen. william
L. Sibert, builder of Gatum dam at
Panama and an engineer officer OF
long service, was responsible for this
production. The work had begun in
the early days of the war when, at
American university, in the suburbs
of Washington, was organized a corps
of two thousand picked chemists-the
best material in the nation. and prob
ably the most erudite group of men OF
this specially ever gathered under one
tent These chemists had mastered
the secrets of all the gases that were
being used in the war, and had gone
afield for a discovery Or two of their
own.
The emergency called for the imme-
diate production. of those staple gases
that were already in use on the battle
field. There were no established in
dustries for this manufacture, so the
government decided to make its own
There were no industrial giants in
poison gas manufacture, SO a college
professor, w. H. walker, of the Massa-
chusetts Institute of Technology. was
made a colonel and given the job.
He built a group of factories, TWEEN
ty-five miles out of Baltimore. Fac
tory number one was for the produc-
ton of chlorine-that yellow gas that
Germany released at Ypres in 1915,
thruStfng this horror into war and
killing some thousands of Canadian
and African troops. 1t is here that
| table salt, the main constituent of
poison gases, makes its first appear
ance. In salt, chemically, there are
two elements, chlorine and sodium. If
you take a salt molecule apart, you
have these two. There is a big fac
tory at Edgewood which busies itself
in taking salt molecules apart. 1t
| does it by running a current of cleo
RI nIf brtVl oI- ~ &c
carried off in pipes to be bottled up
| for use as chlorine. or to be used in
the manufacture of other gases more
deadly.
The Germans, after using chlorine
for while, turned to phosgene which
and much more deadly. To make
| phosgene chlorine is united with car
bone monoxide. Carbon monoxide is
the gas that passes off when coal
| shoulders without flame. If it escapes
into a room it is likely to asphyxiate
the occupants. The newspapers record
such deaths every winter.
| So a factory was built for the pro-
duction of carbon monoxide. The gas
! from this factory and from the chic
| rine factory were brought together In
third, where thu phosgene was final
| ~ made a reality, and where it was
/ locked up in containers weighing a
1
or for use in filling shells.
At Edgewood these ton containers
of phosgene covered ten-acre tract.
Then there was the fl lal stage in the
game of converting table salt into
those materials, the contact with
Which means death. In this process
salt was combined with sulphur and
| alcohol. The result of the conlbina-
| ton was mustard oil. which vaporizes
and becomes mustard gas, and which
was so maliciously deadly that it be-
came the chief of the chemical killers
in Europe.
| To manufacture this latter gas a
| sulphurization plant was necessary
and also an alcohol plant. Then, final
| ly, there was the plant where the ele-
ments were brought together. In this
plant there was constant danger OF
death, for a. mere smear of mustar I'd
may kill. The danger was such that
civilian labor was not employed, brt
men in uniform took their chances
which were as great as those of battle
A drop Of mustard spattered on the
sleeve of blouse might not be no.
I ticed. After a day or two however
1t would penetrate the clothing and
| burn into the flesh. The man touched
might get out of the hospital in three
months or he might not recover at all
bit Of mustard got on the back OF
a chair in which an officer at Edge
wood sat. 1t penetrated TO his spine
and he died.
When the first mustard plant was
established at Edgewood 1t was mod
eled on the French system-a system
that was afterward aban Toned ps
everybody. In this plant at Edgewoo6
the casualties ran as high as pei
cent day Later a method devise
oy our own experts was substituted
and IT was operated with much les:
fatality and produced much more gas
Phosgene and mustard were the
chief gases produced. If the casing
Is to be followed by an attack, phos-
gene is used. for it is immediately
deadly, but its effects do not hans
aoout in such a way as to interiors
with the later occupat ton of enemy
y trenches. Mustard, ca the contrary