The midland journal. (Rising Sun, Md.) 1885-1947, 1921-01-28
Gas Warfare
Explained


Barring some of the secrets of the
great war, DR.. L. I. Shaw, of Washing
ton, assistant chief chemist of the
Bureau of Mines, lectured recently in
the Franklin Institute on Smoke and
Incendary Material" DR.. Shaw was
formerly a captain in the chemical
warfare service and was in charge of
the smoke and incendary section of
that service in France. In speaking
of that particular branch Of the
science of warfare, DR.. Shaw said, in
part:
"The use of smoke and incendary
material in warfare dates back to very
early times. The Egyptians made use
of smoke and fire in conducting their
campaigns. Greek fire and smoke
pots were used not only by the ancient
Greeks, but also by the other peoples
in early times The Greeks had many
of their battle galleys equipped with
pumps whereby burning oil could be
projected upon the enemy. The smoke
pots gave off smoke which was used
as a screen in attacks, and other ma
terial was put in thse pots which gave
obnoxious fumes.
"In every war since there has been
a certain limited use of smoke and
flame. Even in the Civil War some
use was made of these materials,
especially in the siege of Richmond,
where incendiary shells and rockets
were employed in an attempt to set
fire to the city. At the beginning of
the world war, however, very little
information was available from the
published literature.
"As with the poison gases, the Ger
mans were the first to employ the
smoke and with incendiary material,
first use of the latter being in the
form of fame projectors, which were
used early in the war in their attacks
on the Canadian forces.
Smoke and incendiary material are
really employed for opposite purposes,
the first for defense and the latter for
offense. In the employment of smoke
the main use is for smoke screens, in
order to mask an attack, or to simu-
late an attack, and thus cause expen-
diture of ammunition and activity on
the part of the enemy when no at
tack is to be made. 1t is also used
to screen ships, tanks and airplanes,
so that their movements cannot be
detected by the enemy, and is further
used to give visible burst of shell
and bombs for use in ranging.
When it becomes necessary to set
up a smoke screen at greater dis
lance than is possible by means of
hand or rifle granades, use is made of
rife grenades, use is made of other
devices. These consist of shells for
Stokes mortars, Twins projectors and
guns and howitZers.
1.-THE filling employed for these
shells was usually phosphorus, al
though smoke mixtures similar to
those in use in candles and grenades
were employed as well as the smoke
producing mixtures used in grenades.
In use, the shells normally burst just
before they reach the ground at the
end of the trajectory. If it were burst
after impact the shell normally buried
itself with the result that the smoke
material did not burn properly. Phos-
phorus here had the advantage as be-
fore OF being spontaneously infian-
mable, while if a smoke mixture were
employed it would be necessary that it
ignited during flight before the burst.
Small arms ammunition filled with
special smoke mixture in the projec-
tile were employed for use in airplanes
to give a trail of smoke following the
prcjectile in order to see the direction
of fire. These were called tracer bull
let's and it was the normal purpose
for machine gun on an airplane to
have one To FIVE or one to ten of
the cartridges equipped with traced
bullets. The advantages of this is
very APPARENT The smoke mixtures
normally consisted of magnesium and
oxidising agents of such a combination
that the friction of air melted out
fusible blocks which stoppered the
chamber and ignited the mixture.
due to the fact that most of the
buildings, except the temporary ones
within range of the front, were all
stone constructions and virtually in
fiammable, incendary ammunition
found A. very limited use during the