Skip to content

Slow asphyxiation

Raemaekers, Louis, 1916, Chromolithograph
Slow asphyxiation
Slow asphyxiation
Slow asphyxiation
Share
Category
Library Item
Item no
33019
Title
Slow asphyxiation
Description
'Extract from a study of the effects of irritant gases used by the Germans at Langhemarck, by MM. les docteurs R. Dujarric de la Riviere and J. LeClercq:

We were able to observe at Calais a relatively important number (112) of soldiers who had been subjected to the action of irritant gases (bromine chlorine vapours) employed by the Germans at Langhemarck. A certain number of soldiers are not able to flee from the gaseous cloud; they lie vomiting blood. Others, utterly collapsed, drag themselves to the rear; they vomit and spit blood. At the moment of entering the hospital the greater number of the soldiers appear tired and depressed. Their eyes are watering, the lids swollen; in some cases there are sings of conjunctivitis. The cheekbones and the ears are a violet red; the lips are violet, the features drawn, the nose pinched. The patients appear asphyxiated and unable to breathe. They are shaken incessantly with violent and painful coughing. During theses attacks they compress their chest with their hands, so agonising is the pain in the muscles. Many of them complain of stitch in the side. There is abundant expectoration, reddish in colour, in some cases definitely bloody. Speech is painful and jerky. There is continual prostration. p. 177 " Les Violations de Lis de la Guerre par l'Allemange," I. Paris, 1915."'
Artist / maker
Date
1916
Size
32 x 26.5 cm
Location
Art and Design Library
Copyright
Louis Raemaekaers' drawings are reproduced by kind permission of the Louis Raemaekers Foundation.