← Autodidact Archive · Original Dissent · Hereward
Thread ID: 4573 | Posts: 4 | Started: 2003-01-22
2003-01-22 21:23 | User Profile
[url=http://www.theherald.co.uk/news/archive/20-1-19103-0-16-37.html]http://www.theherald.co.uk/news/archive/20...03-0-16-37.html[/url]
Scottish naval hero wanted to use chemical warfare against Napoleon GEORGE MAIR CHEMICAL warfare was invented by a 19th century Scottish naval hero, more than a century before the mustard gas attacks of the first world war, experts will reveal for the first time in a new documentary this week.
Fife born Sir Thomas Cochrane - whom Napoleon named the Sea Wolf - devised a secret plan to end the Napoleonic Wars by sending clouds of deadly sulphur dioxide into French ports, according to the BBC 2 documentary which is scheduled to be broadcast on Friday.
Dissolved in water, sulphur dioxide makes sulphuric acid, and when breathed-in the gas mixes with the moisture in the lungs and throat, fatally bathing the internal organs with corrosive vitriol.
But Sir Thomas' idea was vetoed by the British admiralty, who saw the plan as "inhumane" and, more significantly, were terrified that the French would use the same tactics to attack Britain.
The 6ft 5in red-haired Scot - on who CS Forrester, the author, later based his Horatio Hornblower character - came up with the scheme in 1805, only months before the Battle of Trafalgar.
He submitted documents to the British government outlining methods of sending clouds of poisonous sulphur dioxide into French naval bases.
Professor Andrew Lambert a historian at London's King's College, said: " The admiralty and the British government reacted with some scepticism. At first they didn't believe it would work, and then when the great scientist Michael Farraday pointed out that it would work, they decided that it was inhumane and, more seriously, that the French might do it back to us."
Lord Cochrane, 10th Earl of Dundonald, was born in Culross, Fife and joined the navy aged 17.
2003-01-22 21:49 | User Profile
Ach, the man raised a Hell of a stink in his long life, did he not?
[url=http://militaryhistory.about.com/library/prm/blnapoleonicwars3.htm?iam=sherlock_abc]http://militaryhistory.about.com/library/p...am=sherlock_abc[/url]
Reminds me of the days I was tied up at a dock in Santos, Brazil, next to a Dutch freighter full of Limberger cheese.
2003-01-23 01:57 | User Profile
If only Napoleon Bonaparte were here today, he would be recognised as the true hero he was.. I despise when people equate Napoleon with Adolf Hitler, there is absolutely no connection at all. Napoloeon fought to set men free, all men. Napoleon was a REAL MAN, fighting literally for REAL FREEDOM. He is a hero..
2003-01-23 08:13 | User Profile
Ed,
**Ach, the man raised a Hell of a stink in his long life, did he not? **
No pun intended. :lol:
It makes you kind of wonder about the "upper classes," doesn` it? First, Anthrax "cakes" for cattle, then you read something like this.