First Mass Gas Attack in the Great War

Thursday, 22 April 1915

first mass use of chemical weapons

On April 22, 1915 at 5 p.m. a wave of asphyxiating gas released from cylinders embedded in the ground by German specialist troops smothered the Allied line on the northern end of the Ypres salient. The First Mass Gas Attack in the Great War caused panic and a struggle to survive a new form of weapon.

Shortly after the cylinders arrived, a young German soldier, Auguste Jaeger, deserted his post and provided the French army with a detailed account of the placing of “asphyxiating gas cylinders” and the distribution of packets of gauze to soldiers.

The plan, he reported: to release the gas as soon as winds favourable. The first to fall to the chlorine gas soldiers from the 45th Algerian Division. Two days later, Canadian soldiers would be clutching their throats, choking on the same asphyxiating gas.

The First Battle of Ypres

In reality, the (Second) Battle of Ypres the second time the ground fought over. The First Battle of Ypres had taken place in October 1914. The opposing forces had both attempted to outflank each other between the town of Ypres and the English Channel coast. On 22 April after much heavy artillery bombardment, the release of chlorine gas for the first time. The Germans attacked in force along the entire front.

The Second Battle of Ypres

The Second Battle of Ypres actually a series of battles. Including St. Julien, where Lance Corporal Frederick Fisher of the Black Watch Royal Highland Regiment of Canada, awarded the first Canadian Victoria Cross of the Great War.

The fighting became more intense and furious and between 22 April and 8 May 1915. The Germans continued to attack in force. The ensuing battles at Gravenstafel Ridge, Kitchener’s Wood, Mauser Ridge and Frezenberg would enter the annals of Canadian military history. At the Battle of Kitchener’s Wood alone, well over 1,000 men killed or wounded, no thanks to their rifles.

Ross Rifle

In the first real test of the Canadian built Ross rifle, tragically extolled as a fine weapon by Colonel Sam Hughes, Canada’s incompetent Minister of Defense. The rifle a miserable failure. The rifle bolt would jam repeatedly during rapid fire and jammed. No doubt the direct cause of many soldiers’ deaths. These pieces of trash quickly discarded and British Lee Enfield rifles picked up by Canadians from fallen British soldiers.

Chlorine Gas

The Second Battle of Ypres opened when 168 tons of chlorine gas released by the Germans at 5:00p.m. on April 22nd. Over a four-mile front, following a heavy bombardment that had started at 4:00p.m. The gas affected the lungs and the eyes causing respiration problems and blindness. Being denser than air it flowed downwards. Forcing French troops of the 45th and 78th Divisions to abandon their positions en masse. Leaving a 4,000 yard-wide gap in the front line.

A British officer described the effect of the gas on the French colonial soldiers:

“A panic-stricken rabble of Turcos and Zouaves with gray faces and protruding eyeballs, clutching their throats and choking as they ran, many of them dropping in their tracks and lying on the sodden earth with limbs convulsed and features distorted in death.”

Yellow-green cloud

The Canadians in the line to the right could discern a large yellow-green cloud over the French positions. Three German divisions swarmed forward past dead and panicked troops. The Canadians in disarray as many of their telephone lines cut in the shelling. Units began giving conflicting reports back to their headquarters, far behind the front. What was clear was that their left flank was wide open. What was not known was that the Germans had inexplicably stopped for the night after driving 3,000 yards into the French positions.

St. Julien

Early on, the 13th Battalion had strengthened positions around St. Julien under the initiative of their commanding officer. This small group was one of the few holding the entire left flank. To the southwest, the only unit between the Germans and the 3rd Brigade headquarters at Mouse Trap Farm was a battery of British 4.7-inch guns at Kitcheners’ Wood. Another battery 1,000 yards north of St. Julien engaged a large number of Germans over open sights at about 7:00p.m. that night. With the help of men from the 13th, 14th and 15th Battalions.

Able to move their guns back to safety. Lance Corporal Frederick Fisher of the 13th Battalion instrumental in this action, and killed the next day. He became the first Canadian awarded the Victoria Cross in the Great War.

10th Battalion

An hour later, the commander of the 3rd Brigade by now fully realized the delicate situation his left flank was in. He requested reinforcement from the 2nd Brigade and from the Division. The 10th Battalion, reserve unit for the 2nd Brigade, and the 16th Battalion, in reserve for the 3rd Brigade, tasked for an immediate counter-attack on Kitcheners’ Wood.

Kitcheners’ Wood

The name of this oak plantation derived from the French name, Bois-de-Cuisineres. A reference to the fact that French soldiers housed their field kitchens there. The 10th Battalion assembled and ready to go at 11:00 pm. The 16th Battalion arrived as they were forming, tasked to support the advance. Both battalions had over 800 men at the start line and formed up in waves of two companies each.

Neither unit had spent a single minute on training in night fighting. No reconnaissance had been conducted on the ground. No intelligence available on where exactly the enemy located or in what strength. And, no co-ordination between the two units as to what each would do once they had reached the woods. The order simply given to advance at quarter to midnight.

Leading waves

The leading waves of the 10th covered half the distance from the start line to the Wood. Running into a strong hedge interlaced with wire. No reconnaissance had been done prior and the battalion forced to break through the obstacle with rifle butts, bringing down fire from alerted German machine gunners about 200 yards distant.

Both battalions charged the last 200 yards to the wood, but the commanding officer of the 10th, Lieutenant-Colonel Boyle, mortally wounded in the opening moments of the firefight, hit five times in the groin by a German machine gun.

Hand-to-hand fighting

As the battalions crashed into the wood, having lost many senior officers in the charge, soldiers of both battalions thoroughly intermingled, and fell on the Germans with rifles, bayonets, and even rifle butts and bare hands. Algerian troops accompanying the Canadians led the attack towards the right, towards their former positions.

The Germans began to surrender, but many still shooting, and relatively few attackers and as a consequence, according to the battalion’s second in command “very few prisoners taken and many lives lost by the enemy forces.” The Canadians had hit the boundary of two regiments, the 2nd Prussian Guards and the 234th Bavarian Infantry, and taken one of their colonels prisoner.

You (fellows) fight like hell

By midnight, it was over, fifteen minutes after it had begun. A German prisoner paid the 10th the ultimate compliment, acknowledging to his guard “You fellows fight like hell” as he marched to the rear. Inside the wood, the 4.7-inch guns of the 2nd London Heavy Battery found – with the bodies of some of their crew lying intermingled with German bodies – lying abandoned after a ferocious fight.

24 April 1915

St. Julien Gas Attack

St. Julien the site of a brave stand of the Canadian 10th Battalion who endured a poison gas attack during the Second Battle of Ypres.

After six hours of fierce fighting during a courageous but costly counterattack at Kitchener’s Wood, near Ypres, Belgium, on the night of 22-23 April 1915, the 10th Battalion reduced in strength from 816 all ranks to 5 officers and 188 other ranks. Without a chance to rest or recover, the remnants of the battalion ordered to reinforce a company of the 7th Battalion, desperately trying to hold another position in the Ypres Salient.

In the early hours of 24 April, 1915 the Germans released poisonous chlorine gas for the second time in two days. Canadian battalions bore the brunt of the gas attack, commemorated every April since 1915 by the “Fighting Tenth”, and their successors, The Calgary Highlanders.

Contact CEFRG