Description
Object description
British officer served with 1st Bn Cameronians, 19th Bde, 6th Div on Western Front, 12/1914-5/1915; served with Headquarters, III Corps at Bailleul, France, 5/1915-6/1915; served as Army Chemical Adviser with Headquarters, Second Army on Western Front and Italy, 6/1915-4/1918; served with Gas Services Department, Ministry of Munitions in GB, 1918-1919
Content description
REEL 1 Recollections of operations as officer with 1st Bn Cameronians (Scottish Rifles), 19th Bde, 6th Div on Western Front, 12/1914-5/1915: role as bombing officer and regular officers' attitude towards hand grenades; impact of German use of gas in Ypres Salient, Belgium, 4/1915; ineffective first anti-gas measures including issue of cotton wool pads; devising method of spraying gas neutralising chemical solution along trenches to counter gas; attending meeting with medical and engineering officers at Headquarters, 6th Div, 4/5/1915; experiments with gas on establishment laboratory at school in Armentieres, France; devising cotton waste gas mask impregnated with chemicals; demonstration in front of senior officers of dispersing gas with chemical solution whilst wearing respirator, 6/5/1915; improvements to cotton waste gas mask design. Aspects of period as officer with Headquarters III Corps, Bailleul, France, 5/1915-6/1915: role supervising mass manufacture of gas protection for troops.
REEL 2 Continues: move to training role lecturing troops on gas attacks. Aspects of period as Army Chemical Advisor, Headquarters, Second Army on Western Front, 6/1915-11/1917: pay; relations with other Army Chemical Adviser; establishment of central laboratory; contacts with Professor John Haldane and reports of his prior experiences on German gas attack in Ypres Salient including Winston Churchill's advice on gas masks; role giving lectures and gas mask training to troops.
REEL 3 Continues: routine duties; weekly meeting of Army Chemical Advisers at Central Laboratory, Saint-Omer, France and co-ordinating role of Major Edward Harrison; tests on British Smoke Hood and subsequent issue to troop; development of PH Gas Helmet to counter possibility of German use of phosgene gas cloud; intelligence warnings of imminent use of phosgene, 11/1915; improvements to PH Gas Helmet; demonstrations of use of oxygen breathing equipment to machine gun crews; trench raids to gain intelligence of location of imminent German gas attack, 12/1915; capture and interrogation of German NCO; prior interrogation of German prisoner of war on location of German mining works.
REEL 4 Continues: methods employed in successful interrogation of German NCO and consequent successful precautions prior to German phosgene gas attack in Ypres Salient, Belgium, 19/12/1915; first German use of di-phosgene in gas shells; German use of mustard gas shells, 1917; amusing story concerning introduction and use of gas defence code words.
REEL 5 Continues: establishment of divisional anti-gas courses and gas officers; development of dugout anti-gas protection using double blanket doorways; visit to front by civilian gas experts. Recollections of operations as Army Chemical Advisor, Headquarters, Second Army in Italy, 11/1917-4/1918: situation; inadequacy of Italian gas mask and arrangements to use of British pattern gas masks; state of Italian Army and Lieutenant General Hubert Plumer's negotiations with Italian high command.
REEL 6 Continues: Lieutenant General Hubert Plumer's offer of assistance in gas warfare; demonstration of superiority of British gas masks in Rome and subsequent issue to Italian Army; attending Inter-Allied Conference in Paris, France, 4/1918; posting to Gas Services, Ministry of Munitions in GB, 1918-1919.