April 22, 1915—The Second Battle of Ypres began at dawn, as the German Fourth Army peppered French and Algerian divisions with bombardment by 17-in. howitzers. Then, suddenly, a greenish-yellow mist drifting toward the French positions signaled a deadly and terrifying innovation in modern warfare: poison gas.
The Flemish market town of Ypres would witness four battles, more than a half million dead that would fill 40 cemeteries, and the destruction of much of its Old World-style architecture from shelling in the course of World War I. But gas warfare posed a unique horror.
The chlorine gas in the second battle at this dangerous point—5,700 canisters containing 168 tons—was unexpected and, at least at first, effective. Lance Sergeant Elmer Cotton described, in chilling detail, how the gas worked on those exposed to it:
“It produces a flooding of the lungs - it is an equivalent death to drowning only on dry land. The effects are these - a splitting headache and terrific thirst (to drink water is instant death), a knife edge of pain in the lungs and the coughing up of a greenish froth off the stomach and the lungs, ending finally in insensibility and death. The colour of the skin from white turns a greenish black and yellow, the colour protrudes and the eyes assume a glassy stare. It is a fiendish death to die.”
Across four miles of trench lines, 5,000 French troops fell dead within 10 minutes. The rest, temporarily blinded, coughing, and coughing, broke and ran, leaving a five-mile gap and 2,000 men who were captured.
France and allies Great Britain and Russia had only one consolation that day: German troops were almost as frightened by this new form of warfare as they were. It didn’t escape their notice that this wind-borne weapon could be blown back on them.
For that reason, the Fourth Army’s advance was uncharacteristically tepid. The German high command, which had not ordered reinforcements, believing that no troops on earth could fail to exploit this situation, were, thus, unable to reap the advantage of what turned out to be their best chance to crack open the Western front in 1915.
As awful as it was, the truly terrible thing about poison-gas warfare turned out to be that both sides began to use it. Not even a full year into the war, the Allies eventually decided that, since theirs was a war over the meaning of civilization itself, they could not allow this weapon to be used against them without retaliation.
By the fall, the British were releasing gas canisters at Loos. Later, the French used phosgene, which was even worse than chlorine gas.
But the Allies would tell you that Germany got there first. They introduced not only chlorine gas, but mustard gas, which resulted in blistering skin, vomiting, temporary blindness, and difficulty in breathing.
Both sides eventually came up with gas masks to counteract the danger. Before that, though, the victims were many—and, in a couple of cases, already prominent or about to be so.
It was the misfortune of New York Giants pitching immortal Christy Mathewson to become exposed to poison gas before he even went into battle. His exposure, though only occurring in a training exercise, had the same deadly effect as in other cases, though more slowly: he ended up contracting tuberculosis as a result, dying seven years later.
Another victim of gas warfare was a corporal in the German army exposed to it under British fire at Flanders in 1918. In an American Heritage article from 1985 on why America didn’t use poison gas in World War II (even though we resorted to the atomic bomb), historian Barton J. Bernstein speculated that the WWI experiences of gas victim Adolf Hitler made him reluctant to expose his troops to the same danger he’d experienced more than two decades ago. The same article noted that Winston Churchill, worried that Hitler would launch gas warfare against Russia, warned that the British would retaliate by using it against German cities, while FDR announced a no-first-use policy.
(The image in this post, by the way, is called Gassed, by John Singer Sargent. The painter created it after visiting a casualty station shortly after a mustard gas attack.)
The Flemish market town of Ypres would witness four battles, more than a half million dead that would fill 40 cemeteries, and the destruction of much of its Old World-style architecture from shelling in the course of World War I. But gas warfare posed a unique horror.
The chlorine gas in the second battle at this dangerous point—5,700 canisters containing 168 tons—was unexpected and, at least at first, effective. Lance Sergeant Elmer Cotton described, in chilling detail, how the gas worked on those exposed to it:
“It produces a flooding of the lungs - it is an equivalent death to drowning only on dry land. The effects are these - a splitting headache and terrific thirst (to drink water is instant death), a knife edge of pain in the lungs and the coughing up of a greenish froth off the stomach and the lungs, ending finally in insensibility and death. The colour of the skin from white turns a greenish black and yellow, the colour protrudes and the eyes assume a glassy stare. It is a fiendish death to die.”
Across four miles of trench lines, 5,000 French troops fell dead within 10 minutes. The rest, temporarily blinded, coughing, and coughing, broke and ran, leaving a five-mile gap and 2,000 men who were captured.
France and allies Great Britain and Russia had only one consolation that day: German troops were almost as frightened by this new form of warfare as they were. It didn’t escape their notice that this wind-borne weapon could be blown back on them.
For that reason, the Fourth Army’s advance was uncharacteristically tepid. The German high command, which had not ordered reinforcements, believing that no troops on earth could fail to exploit this situation, were, thus, unable to reap the advantage of what turned out to be their best chance to crack open the Western front in 1915.
As awful as it was, the truly terrible thing about poison-gas warfare turned out to be that both sides began to use it. Not even a full year into the war, the Allies eventually decided that, since theirs was a war over the meaning of civilization itself, they could not allow this weapon to be used against them without retaliation.
By the fall, the British were releasing gas canisters at Loos. Later, the French used phosgene, which was even worse than chlorine gas.
But the Allies would tell you that Germany got there first. They introduced not only chlorine gas, but mustard gas, which resulted in blistering skin, vomiting, temporary blindness, and difficulty in breathing.
Both sides eventually came up with gas masks to counteract the danger. Before that, though, the victims were many—and, in a couple of cases, already prominent or about to be so.
It was the misfortune of New York Giants pitching immortal Christy Mathewson to become exposed to poison gas before he even went into battle. His exposure, though only occurring in a training exercise, had the same deadly effect as in other cases, though more slowly: he ended up contracting tuberculosis as a result, dying seven years later.
Another victim of gas warfare was a corporal in the German army exposed to it under British fire at Flanders in 1918. In an American Heritage article from 1985 on why America didn’t use poison gas in World War II (even though we resorted to the atomic bomb), historian Barton J. Bernstein speculated that the WWI experiences of gas victim Adolf Hitler made him reluctant to expose his troops to the same danger he’d experienced more than two decades ago. The same article noted that Winston Churchill, worried that Hitler would launch gas warfare against Russia, warned that the British would retaliate by using it against German cities, while FDR announced a no-first-use policy.
(The image in this post, by the way, is called Gassed, by John Singer Sargent. The painter created it after visiting a casualty station shortly after a mustard gas attack.)
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