大象传媒

I must have been around eight years old and able to read, for I recall vividly how a board outside a paper shop frightened me into running home shouting hysterically. "They're coming, they're coming and will drop from the sky to gas us all and we will all die."

My mother pacified me with: "Don't be silly nothing like that will ever happen".
My great aunt suggested that perhaps I had read the headlines of a magazine being advertised.

This was 1939 when rumours were whispered and kept from children and I soon forgot the scare. That is, until I was taken to the library, usually my favourite reading centre. Like a repeating nightmare the words from the billboard rang true. "Gas" was the most important word registered in my mind. A confusion of people with crying, screaming children milled outside this collection point.

We had come to be fitted and to collect our gas masks. No wonder there was screaming. The hateful smell of rubber was bad enough, but to have them forced upon me was a torture I couldn't avoid.

"Now stand still, don't be silly, it's for your own safety." my mother implied. I was shown how to put it on correctly. First the face was settled into the mould of the mask, then the straps were tightened over the head so they wouldn't twist. Any rubber tucked in under the chin had to be eased out. Panic struck as the mask window steamed up and breathing became a frightening task. I wrenched the thing from my head glad to be free.

"You should see what my brother who was gassed in the trenches is like now.
You must get used to it, it could save your life." a well meaning elderly lady said. I was not impressed and I didn't know what she meant about- the trenches.

Very young children were encouraged to put on the yellow and blue masks. "Look just like Mickey Mouse" their parents said. Babies were locked into a tank like compartment of cylindrical rubber with a curved window at the front and a filter bellow attachment at the side. No wonder we were scared by these grotesque apparatuses.

I was instructed to carry my mask with me at all times, even to bed. If I arrived at school without it, I was sent home to collect it. Fashionable gas mask cases appeared in the shops. I kept my lunch in mine along with ointment and blister dressings.

Our class was given periods of gas drill that was hilariuos as we couldn't hear the teacher's instructions, and with steamed up masks we blundered giggling into each other. There were regular class and school competitions.

Questions
1. How would you know if there was a gas attack?
2. What could gas smell like/
3. What if you were deaf?
4. What should you do if your skin was in contact with gas?

Answers
1. A warning rattle would be heard when a gas attack was taking place.
2. Gas could smell of pear drops, musty hay or geraniums. (I had never seen hay.)
3. tops of pillar boxes were painted with a checmical that changed colour during a gas attack.
4. Gas blisters should be dabbed in water, then number Two ointment (from a chemist) must be patted on the affected part.

We also had lessons wearing the smelly things.

Newspapers showed pictures of smiling people safetly wearing their gas masks. I never experienced this happy state and vowed I would rather die than put a rubber tank over my face!

September 1939 and I was evacuated along with the dreaded item. Although it was expected for me to take it with me no matter where I went, I soon lost it when my country hosts laughted at me for being scared.

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