A great deal of experimental laboratory and field work was done with
chlorine gas and the efficiency of gas masks and helmets. Experimental
physiological and pathological work was done on animals with chlorine
and other gases, and on the drying out and deterioration of gas
helmets and the chemicals used in them. Subsequently a Gas Service was
inaugurated and all work of this sort carried out in special
laboratories at G.H.Q.
Quite a number of cases of nephritis occurred among soldiers, and
arsenic was suggested as a possible cause. The laboratory was asked to
examine a considerable number of samples of wine and beer to see
whether traces of arsenic were present or not. None was found. A large
quantity of wine found to be diluted with ditch water, and sold to our
soldiers, was destroyed, and the vendors fined.
One day a young medical officer, so excited that he could hardly
speak, rushed into the laboratory with a lot of dead fish. After some
questioning we found that there were tens of thousands of dead fish in
the Aire-La Bassee canal and, as this ran into the German lines, he
suspected that the canal water had been poisoned by the enemy. We told
him that we thought the fish had probably died from asphyxiation as a
result of organic matter from a starch works being emptied into the
stream. He went away unconvinced, to make a further enquiry and
returned later in the day to report that the fish in the canal died
every year in the spring when a certain distillery dumped its waste
into the canal.
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