Chapter X: War's Strange Devices

CHEMISTRY A DEMON OF DESTRUCTION--POISON GAS BOMBS--GAS MASKS--HAND GRENADES--MORTARS--"TANKS"--FEUDAL "BATTERING RAMS"--STEEL HELMETS--STRANGE BULLETS--MOTOR PLOWS--REAL DOGS OF WAR.

Things new and passing strange--thousands of them--have been brought into being by the great world war. Human minds have developed things undreamed of by science or fiction--things that a few years ago would have been considered too strange and fantastic for even the professional romancer to weave into the tissues of his stories.

Every known science has been called upon to produce its quota of new things which might be used for the destruction or the protection of men at war. The wonders of chemistry have always lent descriptive inspiration to the pen of writers, but mankind to get a vivid conception of the horrors of chemistry has had to wait for the great world war.

The conflict which has involved the entire world might almost be termed a warfare of chemists. Without their diabolical products, ranging all the way from high explosives to poison gases, it would have few of the characteristics of ultra-frightfulness that render it unique in the history of international struggles.

But of all the instruments of destruction used in this war, there is none more horrifying than the so-called "incendiary bomb," which sets instant fire to whatever it touches and which spreads flame in a manner so terrific that three or four such gravity-projectiles dropped from an aeroplane burned up the whole of a peaceful Dutch village in a few minutes.

Now, what is the fearsome stuff with which such bombs are loaded? A new chemical compound? Not at all. What they contain is simply the mixture of two of the most harmless things in the world--oxide of iron (which is simply iron rust) and powdered aluminum.

When these two innocent substances are mixed together the result is a compound truly infernal in its potentialities for mischief. It is not an explosive but if set on fire it burns with an intensity that is positively appalling. Nothing will put it out; no quantity of water has any effect upon the raging flames it engenders.

This is the material used for loading incendiary bombs. It is ignited in such projectiles by a mercury-fulminate cap that sets off a fuse containing powdered magnesium--the stuff photographers employ for flashlights.

THIN SHELLS OF STEEL.

These bombs are thin shells of steel or iron--mere containers for the mixture before described. They are so contrived that the fuse is instantly ignited when they strike.

Whereupon the shell is melted by the heat generated within it and a flood of fiercely burning metal is scattered in all directions. All of this seems rather extraordinary, and it is worth explaining.

Oxygen has an affinity for iron, readily combining with the latter--which is the reason why iron is liable to rust. This rust is a chemical compound of iron and oxygen; in other words, oxide of iron. But oxygen has a much greater affinity for aluminum. And so, when the two metals are powdered and mixed together and heat is applied the oxygen flies out of the iron rust and combines with the aluminum.

The process is started in the bomb by the burning magnesium. And then the oxygen passes out of the iron and into the aluminum so rapidly that an enormously high temperature is developed. It runs up to 3500 or 4000 degrees Fahrenheit--which means, of course, a tremendous combustion. The mixture of aluminum and iron burns like so much tinder--though such a way of putting it is absurdly feeble.

The present war has been conspicuously marked by reversions to ancient methods of fighting. In this line the incendiary bomb offers an excellent illustration. It is in effect merely an adaptation of an idea utilized by the Saracens--we should call them Turks nowadays--in their warfare with the Crusaders of the Middle Ages.

DREAD INSTRUMENT OF WAR.

The instrument of war most dreaded by the Crusaders, as they found it in the hands of the Turks, was the incendiary bomb--a projectile that flew through the air "like a fiery dragon" as they described it, and set fire to whatever it touched. Sometimes it was provided with iron barbs, by which it clung to buildings.

This was one of the ways in which the Saracens employed the celebrated "Greek fire"--an inflammable compound that is understood to have been a mixture of petroleum, saltpeter and pitch. The chief horror of it, from the Crusaders' point of view, was that it was unquenchable. Mere water had no effect upon it. Hence they were sure that it must be of diabolical origin.

But the up-to-date incendiary bomb is a great improvement on its original of the Middle Ages. The modern contrivance is thoroughly scientific, and it does its destructive business with certainty and dispatch.

No less effective are the gas bombs which were introduced by the German soldiers at Rheims, and which when exploding near the trenches occupied by the French and English threw off vapors and poisonous gases which killed or overwhelmed thousands of brave men. These devices used in violation of all rules of civilized warfare sent hundreds to the hospitals. Seventy-five victims were taken at one time from the trenches to the hospital at Zuydcoote, north of Dunkirk, where it was found that some of those who had inhaled the fumes turned a violet tinge.

Altogether it was estimated that from 3000 to 5000 men were affected by the gas fumes in this first onslaught and at least 10 per cent of those who were overcome succumbed to the deadly fumes. Many of those who inhaled the poisons expectorated blood and for days afterward were racked by terrible coughing. In many cases fever developed in a few days ending with pneumonia. When the men were not sufficiently poisoned to cause death they were so affected that their usefulness as soldiers was ended for all time. The poison made them confirmed invalids.