Albert Frederick King, 1st KRRC

[Phil Wood]

On 4 Apr 1918 the following item was printed in the Newbury Weekly News:

 

Mr and Mrs King, of 18, Westbourne-terrace, Newbury, have been officially informed of the death of their son, Rifleman A K King, King’s Royal Rifle Corps, who received a gas shell wound on March 14^th and died in Rouen Military Hospital on March 22^nd. He joined the Army in 1915, and went to France two years ago. His age was 22. There are seven daughters, and he was the only boy. The father has worked at Elliott’s Joinery Works for forty years.

 

Nothing unusual in that, the paper printed several little obits like this in most issues through the war, errors were common (Mr & Mrs King's son was Albert Frederick, not A K).  What is unusual is that he was not dead - okay, a case of mistaken identity, problem solved.  But -  the article includes the correct cause of his death - which occured at a different hospital (Havre) five days after this was printed. 

[MBrockway]

Phil - I agree: it looks like a simple error.  If there's anything specific you'd like checked on King, let me know and I'll do my best to help, but it'll be after the Xmas break now.

Mark

 

[Phil Wood]

The problem is working out where the error lies.

 

I have:

 

1.  A K King son of Mr & Mrs King, 18 Westbourne Terrace, Newbury (their only son was Albert Frederick) died in Rouen as a result of injuries caused by a gas shell on 22 March 1918 - parents notified 'officially'.

 

2. A F King, 18 Westbourne Terrace, Newbury, died in 2nd Gen Hosp Havre as a result of injuries caused by a gas shell on 9 April 1918. CWGC, Soldiers' Effects, Soldiers Who Died.

 

He was in Rouen on 14 March - 5th Gen Hosp having been admitted to 'Field' - presumably a field Ambulance on 13 March - 'Adm gas'.

 

His headstone in in Le Havre.

 

I fear that the hospital in Rouen may have mixed up records - he was transferred to Havre, but the WO were notified he had died.  

 

I wonder what his parents felt when they found out they had been given advance notice of his passing? 

 

[Phil Wood]

Albert King was gassed on 13 March 1918 - he was not the only one:

 

War Diary, 1^st Battalion, King’s Royal Rifle Corps – 13 March 1918

Villers-Plouich    At 1am an intense bombardment with gas shells and HE started on FARM RAVINE and VILLERS PLOUICH. Although men wore their gas masks for 6 hours, as soon as they took them off they were gassed. The whole battalion was affected though in the front line Companies only about 4 men in each had to be evacuated. But both the support companies, and the personnel of Bn HQs were badly affected, and by noon scarcely a man of them could see. The Commanding Officer, who in the morning had gone round the line, returned to find the whole road lined with blind and vomiting men, with eyes streaming and swollen. Most of Bn HQrs, and every officer and man of “B” and “D” Coys had to be led or carried out of the line. There was some gas shelling in the evening, but it was nothing like so heavy. Casualties: 7 Officers and 270 OR gassed.

 

I find this entry remarkable - did they not know about mustard gas?  Did two whole companies just take off their gas masks without noticing others suffering?

Edited 28 December , 2017 by Phil Wood

[MBrockway]

I guess they must all have been really stupid.

 

Got home this morning and was about to transcribe that entry for you.  Subsequent entries give the reasons for the battalion's records for March getting disorganised.  Seeing you already have the war diary, that's saved me a job. 

 

Good luck with your researches.

 

Mark

 

Edited 28 December , 2017 by MBrockway

[Phil Wood]

Thanks Mark.

 

The following entries also lament the lack of experienced NCOs etc - yet I am left wondering about the quality of the NCOs they had shipped off to hospital!

 

 

 

[MBrockway]

By extension, I assume your position is that the seven officers who were also gassed, must also have been very poor quality.

 

My grandfather, A/Cpl in 16/KRRC, was gassed in Dec 1916.  Before the Yellow Cross mustard gas period, but perhaps you can understand why I am not going to debate this matter.

 

You're entitled to your opinion.  Good luck with your researches.

 

Mark

 

[MBrockway]

Note also that the German gas shelling campaign on 10-14 Mar 1918 in the Cambrai villages sector caused a total of 4,500 casualties.   Presumably all the other battalions suffering these losses also had defective NCO leadership?

 

 

[Phil Wood]

I was over flippant with my comments on NCOs - no offence meant - sorry.

 

But 4,500 casualties from gassing in 4 days?  Was this normal?  If not what was it that was different enough for so many to fall victim?  Did the gas masks fail? Was it a new form of gas? Did they really take their masks off at the same time? I have to doubt that.  Were the units concerned undertrained in gas casualty prevention? I can't help feel that this was the case - or were this level of casualties normal and inevitable?

 

It seems such an avoidable incident - though holding positions saturated with mustard gas must have been a real problem (which is why, of course, it was such a popular gas).

 

The battalion took over the line from the 1st R Berks - who also suffered around 270 casualties to the prolonged gas attack (which was mixed with HE) - so the battalion must have been aware of the ongoing situation (or there was a serious comminucation issue with the handover).  The R Berks report steady casualties, the KRRC diary implies that all was well for 6 hours and then they took their masks off. I suspect it is my reading of the diary that is wrong.  The Berks bombardment was for 3 or 4 hours - the KRRC bombardment was of (according to the Bde diary) was 2 hours - so six hours in masks would seem reasonable - if the men then began taking them off and going about their work then many could (I guess) suffer from gradual exposure to lower levels of gas (which seems to be the R Berks experience), as the R Berks diary describes 'the gas hung about in dangerous strenghs throughout the whole night' (the bombardment having finished around 2330).

 

99 Bde HQ diary mentions the gas shelling, but doesn't comment on casualties - seemingly accepting them as normal? Though they do appear ignorant of the 1 KRRC casualties - according to the strength report covering 10-16 Mar the KRRC had no officer casualties and only 34 ORs left (3 killed, 14 sick, 17 transferred to MGC). It does show the R Berks losses to gas (interestingly one OR left on leave to Canada - I didn't realise that would happen in British units).

 

I haven't managed to find a 2nd Div HQ diary - events of prior to the 21st being pretty much ignored (seemingly).

 

I was hoping to find some comment on the gas attacks, perhaps some suggestions of what they did wrong, what could be done differently in order to reduce the casualty rate - no such luck!

 

[WhiteStarLine]

The 11th AIF Brigade documents a report from the brigade gas officer describing a similar campaign at Villers-Bretonneux in June 1918 when a battalion and brigade headquarters were targeted with 26,000 mustard gas shells over 4 days, interspersed with phosgene, lachrymatory gas and HE.  Casualties were similar (680 in 3rd AIF Division).  A similar campaign caused 1500 casualties in 5th AIF Division in the same location).  By then the brigades were well trained in the use of gas and conversely in defence from gas attacks.  However, the German artillery mixed up the artillery rounds for maximum effects.

 

The mustard gas lingered in the valleys and forests for days, sugar cubes left out crumbled away and potatoes shrivelled.  It was not realistic to operate with a mask on for very long periods.  There were tasks such as operating a switchboard where the mask had to be removed.  Filters had to be changed and eyepieces cleaned.  Some of the sneezing gas made men remove the mask to sneeze.  Men who removed the SBR to change the filter were affected and men who removed the mask to sneeze were overcome.  One unfortunate body of men died when the gas sergeant smelt the air, did not detect the odourless gas and declared the all clear.  Men line up in groups of 20, with a sighted man at the front and rear, to be guided to the first aid post.  As the day warmed up, gas that hovered at ground level rose and a fresh round of men were affected.  The saturation was such that apparently it was still dangerous to cut a tree down in l'Abbe forest until the 1960s.

 

By the way, the brigade gas officer who helped the 11th AIF Brigade avoid worse casualty rates was an industrial chemist by trade.  His analysis appears in the June 1918 unit war diary of the 11th AIF Brigade and is an insightful read.  As is the comments from a gas NCO from another brigade that sitting or lying in gas soaked grass with gas soaked uniforms is not the best approach, as shown in this photo from May 1918 near Villers Bretonneux.

 

 

On the positive side, the lessons learned from frequent gas exposure were such that by late 1918, any man who was overcome by gas except as a result of a direct strike (gas shell explodes right next to him) was described in the unit war diary as 'a self-inflicted wound'.

 

Bill

 

[MBrockway]

Thank you Bill - I was too cross to give the calm explanation you have provided.

 

Phil - read the OH Medical Services Diseases of the War, Vol. II, Chapters VII-XIV for a complete picture on gassings.  The 4,500 casualty figure from the 10-14 Mar 1918 Cambrai villages campaign comes from there.  The British estimated that 150,000 gas shells must have been fired in those four days.  Thankfully the mortality rate was only about 1%.  The German goal was clearly to incapacitate and cause a switchover of the troops garrisoning the area that would be the main focus of the 21 Mar Operation Michael offensive as well as contaminating battery positions.

 

1/KRRC were an experienced and battle-hardened battalion who were familiar with gas. This German attack was predominately using the Yellow Cross mustard gas shell and deliberately avoided the agents that had instant effect and were easily detectable.  Thus after six hours it is easy to see how the men could initially fail to appreciate that they were still in danger.  The full symptoms typically appear only an hour or two after exposure.  Thus the first to dare, six hours in, to remove his SBR to test the air would not necessarily detect that mustard gas was still present in dangerous concentrations.

 

Previous German gas campaigns since the introduction of mustard gas in mid 1917 had generally mixed Yellow Cross with shells containing other agents.

 

[Edit: this next is wrong - it was based on the OH 1917 volume, which is in error - see below] The first mustard gas attack had been at Nieuport on 10/11 Jul 1917  against 2/KRRC and 1/Northants in the front line in the dunes across the River Yser and other elements of 1st Division on the other bank in Nieuport itself, as part of the Battle of the Dunes/Operation Strandfest.  There was good interchange of battle information inside the regiment, particularly between the four Regular battalions.

 

[Edit: In fact only Green Cross (trichlormethyl-chloroformate, aka diphosgene) and Blue Cross (diphenyl chloroarsine) shells were used on 10/11 Jul at Nieuport - see Medical Services - Diseases of the War, Vol. II., pp.291-2.

 

See Simon Jones's excellent blog on Chemical Warfare here, particularly :

https://simonjoneshistorian.com/2014/02/04/yellow-cross-the-advent-of-mustard-gas-in-1917/

... particularly Footnote #2 where he cites W. Volkart, Die Gasschlacht in Flandern im Herbst 1917, (E S Mittler & Sohn, Berlin, 1957) p.46.

 

The main OH volume covering July 1917 - Military Operations France & Belgium 1917, Vol.II - mistakenly states Yellow Cross mustard gas was first used at Nieuport on 11 Jul 1917 (pp.137-8, fn.4).  The German accounts referenced by Simon Jones make it clear only Blue Cross and Green Cross shell were used in the Operation Strandfest bombardments, which is line with the outline in the OH Medical Services volume.

 

The first use of Yellow Cross (ββ-dichlor-ethyl-sulphide, aka mustard gas) shell against the British was at Ypres on 12-13 July (ibid., p.292) and then almost daily there for the rest of the month.  Yellow Cross was then used at Nieuport on 21-22 July - presumably to disrupt preparations for any Allied counter-attack to retake the beach head east of the Yser lost to the Germans during Operation Strandfest.  Edit ends]

 

 

As a boy I was given my KRRC grandfather's WW2 Home Guard gas mask as a toy - to me it became a midget submarine frogman's mask: I was reading Above Us The Waves at the time!  The longest I could bear it for was 15-20 minutes.  I cannot conceive what wearing the similar SBR for six hours must have been like.

Edited 15 November , 2018 by MBrockway
Error in British OH about first use of mustard gas corrected

[kenf48]

In the curious way of the forum on another thread a few days ago we were discussing a large number of gas casualties to the 10th North Staffordshire (Pioneers) on 11 May 1918.

 

The war diary noted, "great difficulty was experienced in wearing the box respirators".  So not so much unprepared, but in the opinion of the diarist poor kit. Unfortunately does not go into detail as to the 'great difficulty'.

 

Ken

Edited 29 December , 2017 by kenf48

[MBrockway]

Ken,

The 11/12 May 1918 attack at FONQUEVILLERS is discussed in the OH Medical Services Diseases of the War, Vol. II,  pp.313-314.  In the period 05-18 May 1918 there were 6,142 gas casualties admitted to medical facilities and 373 deaths (Table XIV on p.309).  The bulk of these were split between the Fonquevillers attack and an attack at LE TIR ANGLAIS in the Second Army area on 10/11 May.  The majority of the fatalities being for the former.  OH suggests gas casualties from Fonquevillers were over 2,000 with ~181 fatalities.

 

The OH mentions there was a court of enquiry held into the Fonquevillers attack.  No reference unfortunately, but it may be in the Third Army material.  If you can turn this up, it is likely to be very relevant to your researches on 10/N Staffs.

 

OH also has some interesting discussion into the impact of the ambient temperature on the type and number of casualties between the March and May attacks.

 

All these chapters in the OH make grim reading and make one very, very thankful that gas warfare did not become a significant element in WW2.

 

Mark

 

 

 

[kenf48]

Thanks Mark, I’ll link this on the other thread

 

Ken

[Phil Wood]

Thanks for the reference Mark - very interesting.

[MBrockway]

This Notice about gas precautions from GOC Third Army issued 15 May 1918 was directly prompted by the high casualties from the various recent German mustard gas bombardment campaigns.

 

It is very relevant to our discussions here.  It mentions for example that "practically all the casualties in a recent bombardment were due to eye symptoms" implying that while respiration was protected, leakage through insufficiently tightened masks had effected the eyes.

 

 

It would be interesting to see a copy of the pamphlet S.S. 212 "Yellow Cross Gas Shells and the measures to be taken to counteract their effects" mentioned in Para #2

 

Mark

 

[kenf48]

Thanks for posting Mark, very interesting 

 

Ken 

[Phil Wood]

Interesting that this is in response to the May attack, I wonder if similar conclusions were made after the March attack on the Cambrai salient? Or was such analysis lost in the ensuing storm?