6
General Ferry, in his article Ce qui s'est passé sur l'Yser, states "We immediately
informed General Aimé, Chief of the 21st Brigade, on duty in the sector, and
instructed him
1. To reduce, for the time being, the number of troops then accumulated in the front
lineto avoid loss of men if the intended attack should take place.
2. To try and locate, and destroy with his artillery, the batteries of said bottles.
To despatch an officer to the 28th (British) Division, at Ypres, and the Canadian Brigade
at Boesinghewhich was to move up to the sector that nightto be on the greatest alert
and to take the necessary measures at hand to prevent the inhaling of gas.
General Ferry's reference to "la brigade Canadienne a Boesinghe" is not clear.
The first Canadian brigade to move up to the sector was the 2nd C. I. Bde.Head
quarters of which were at Steenvoorde until the line was occupied, when move was
made to Wieltje.
General Putz, in sending the information to Second Army, told the liaison officer
that he did not believe it, and considered Jaeger had been sent over with the intention
to deceive.
In the V Corps*—immediately to the right of the FrenchGeneral Plumer
passed on the warning to his divisional commanders "for what it is worth."
A staff officer of the 2nd Canadian Infantry Brigade, who had received the
warning at 6 p.m. on the evening of the 15th, wrote on 16th April"Last night we
got ready to receive a German attack. Divisional Headquarters notified us that the
Germans intended to attack with tubes of poisonous gasbut it didn't materialise."
The reaction seems to have been summed up in the one word Disbelief. At
any rate, because the attack did not take place almost immediately the subject was
all but forgotten.
One factor must, however, be conceded to the High Command, viz., they were
greatly handicapped by not knowing the nature of the gas the enemy proposed to
employ, and, as a Canadian diarist states "There was, it is true, knowledge on our
part that the enemy was about to use some poisonous gas, but no one knew what
would be the effects of that gas, nor how he would follow it up."
About the end of March, the War Office asked Sir William Ramsay's committee
to consider what gases might possibly be used, and what would be the best means
of protection. But before the committee reported, the cloud attack of April 22nd
was made. Sir William Ramsay, on having the circumstances explained to him over
the telephone, with the suggestion that the gas was probably chlorine, repaired to
the War Office with sample mouth-pads* of flannel soaked in hyposulphite of soda.
On 26th April, Lord Kitchener asked Dr. John Scott Haldane, F.R.S.brother
of Lord Haldaneto proceed to France and investigate the nature of the gas that
had been used. Dr. Haldane, thereupon, proceeded to Bailleul and, accompanied by
Sir Wilmot Parker Herringham Consulting Physician to the British forces in
Franceexamined men from the Canadian batallions who were at No. 2 Casualty
Clearing Hospital suffering from the effects of gas.
Two days later the War Office issued an appeal through the Press for a half
million respirators.
The Official History of the Canadian Forces in the Great War 1914-1919The Medical
Services, p. 299, contains the following "In the diary of the assistant medical director of the
1st Division, Colonel G. L. Foster, an ominous entry appears under date of April 15 'Attended
consultation of officers of V. Corps, with D.M.S. Second Army presiding. Rumour that this
evening the enemy will attack our lines, using an asphyxiating gas to overcome our men in
the trenches'."
*J. Grant Ramsay, Principal of the Institute of Hygiene, devised the first effective respirator
used by British and Canadian troops.
Lieut.-Col. G. Nasmith, of the Canadian Mobile Laboratory, on 23rd April, 1915, wrote to
G.H.Q. direct, to save time, advising that he had diagnosed the gas as chlorine and bromide and
suggested the use of a pad soaked in hyposulphite of soda to protect the men.
