Transcripts For CSPAN2 Jennet Conant The Great Secret 20240711

I and delighted to welcome an accomplished author and the administrative director of the Manhattan Project and the author of New York Times bestsellers with the british spy ring and wartime washington and in tuxedo park speaking to her new book the great secret. Thank you for joining us. Also thank you to the museum for inviting me to be with you tonight my first zoom presentation. Bear with me. Now im thinking i should have had wine. Winston churchill had a way with words. Men occasionally stumble across the truth but most pick themselves up and hurry off as if nothing is happened Lieutenant Colonel Francis Alexander the remarkable humor of my book and in fact refused to leave the scene of a military disaster when churchill himself warned him to. And investigated and recognize the never before seen symptoms in a group of dying sailors to have lifesaving implications in the future. And then turns a chemical weapons report into a stepping stone and a tragedy into a medical triumph. To take you back to 1943 with the adriatic coast was bustling the position taken a capital with 150 miles to the north almost unscathed and then outside of town women and children were begging for blackmarket food and young couples strolled like in the old days and i. C. E. Cream vendors. And a critical Mediterranean Service hub and to supply just the americans and british armies which comprise the better part of the 500,000 and allied troops engaged in driving the germans out of italy. Chasing the skies over italy and the british control the port were so confident that marshalls announced it was all but immune from attack if they should attempt any significant in this area. The busy wartime import was teeming with activity but the american liberty ship and then 30 allied ships were cramming the harbor. And engines and landing strips you can see on the upper deck lights and huge cranes testing equipment. And then to unload the supplies for the next big push with the advance on rome. Now kids are making steady progress and then about 32 miles south of from the success of the advanced depended on the supply lines that they march northward. Because of the urgency to keep the incoming stream to go was needed most the blackout orders were suspended. All night long. Radar and as a result they achieved almost complete surprise as the incendiaries rained down on the harbor it turned night into day. They scrambled to shoot down the enemy but it was too late. There was virtually no opposition. They pulled out unchallenged by allied fighters although it lasted less than 20 minutes, the results were devastating. A tremendous roar came from the harbor and exploding ammunition tankers set huge rollin said hus of flames thousands of feet high a reporter for Time Magazine described a fiery panorama, eight ships were burning fiercely. The entire center of the harbor was covered with burning oil a ruptured fuel lines and thousands of gallons gushing into the harbor where it ignited into a giant sheet of flame and golfing the entire north side of the port. Like a prairie fire spread across the surface of the water before it forced them to jump, swim for safety. The cries of men yelling for help echoed in the harbor. News of the raid one of the worst catastrophes of the war was heavily censored. General Dwight Eisenhowers first communique from air force headquarters on december 4th stated damage was done. Adding insult to injury the first account came from the germans, a berlin propaganda broadcast over the missions spectacular success stating that it was so poorly protected german bombers had been able to pick up the allied ships like sitting ducks. The attack which the press dubbed a little pearl harbor shook the complacency of the allied forces who had been convinced of their superiority in the area. All told, they sunk 17 allied ships and destroyed more than 31,000 tons of vital cargo more than 1,000 american and british servicemen were killed outright and almost as many wounded in the untold number of civilians. Rumors founded officials were covering up in an embarrassing incident and there was talk of the secret weapon a rocket driven glide bomb. Congressional concern was underscored by eisenhowers announcement that he had asked a special Senate Subcommittee to investigate. The rear admiral responsible for the u. S. Merchant marine fleet angrily told Time Magazine youre going to hear more about that before you here last. But that was the last official word on the matter and the incident remained shrouded in mystery. In the crucial days that followed, the task of treating the gravely injured sailors would be made even more difficult by wartime secrecy and the determined efforts of the american and British Government to cover up the incident so as not to endanger preparations for the most important operation of the war, the allied invasion of germany occupied france planned for the spring. It would be almost 30 years before the world would learn the truth about what really took place on that fatal night and even today few are aware of the surprising consequences of the disaster and its impacts on the lives of millions of americans. Lieutenant colonel alexander was asleep in his headquarters. He was awake at the first rise of the telephone. The summons came in the middle of the night and there appeared to be a developing medical crisis. Too many men were dying too quickly of unexplained causes. The symptoms were unlike anything the military physicians had seen before and they had begun to suspect the germans had used in an unknown weapon perhaps poison gas. With a number of mysterious deaths increasing rapidly each day the british placed a red light call alerting air force headquarters in algiers allied headquarters. There was an urgent request for assistance. Alexander was dispatched immediately to the scene of the disaster. He looked young for a combat physician. 5foot eight and skinny, only 29, his hair was thinning at the temples and that lend him the only authority he could claim. He was popular with the troops though some said his gentle bedside manner was best suited to a pediatrician. But he was tougher than he liked. Hed been through the invasion of north africa under the Major General patton and despite his quiet modesty, hed proven himself to be confident, determined and resourceful. His superiors knew he had a good head on his shoulders. He could have sat out the war in a stateside hospital but the desire to serve ran deep in his family. They fled famine and persecution in europe for the United States in the 1880s and they were forever grateful for the opportunities afforded to them. His father was a popular Family Doctor in new jersey and it was his one ambition to follow in his fathers footsteps. He had excelled and entered the academy at 15 and a standout he was allowed to advance directly to medical school and graduate at the top of his class in 1935. He earned his md at columbia. After completing his residency he went back home and hung out next to his father full of pride but in the spring of 1940s as hitler began his march across europe, alexander volunteered for duty. He noted he would be available at any time and he was called up in november and spend time with the 16th infantry regiment stationed at Gunpowder Creek in maryland not far from the arsenal that also happened to be home to the Chemical Warfare service. Before long he decided to contact with an Innovative New design hed come up with with spectacles that could fit inside the face piece of a gas mask. He was very nearsighted and flunked his first physical. When the army dr. Went back he was pretty fearful of there was an attack during the war he would have to choose between wearing his glasses and the gas mask because they were left over from the previous war and it didnt fit over the glasses so he came up with a new design. He underwent a crash course in the hurried pace of the war he became a newly minted expert in the field and conducted all kinds of experiments on animals to evaluate toxic agents and develop new forms of treatment and protective gear for soldiers. After pearl harbor he started traveling around the country to different training camps. He was promoted to the director of the Chemical Warfare Service Medical Research Laboratory and so when he was concerned about the threats they might watch a gas attack in europe he requested a doctor with a Chemical Warfare background and Young Alexander was sent to the allied force headquarters so now at 5 p. M. On december seven, 1943, five days after the attack, his plane touched down on the batter airfield and waiting was a group of senior british doctors. He could see they were immediately agitated and he was taken to the hospital. The situation was grim. All the equipment had been sunken in the air raid. However it was going to compound the tragedy. This place had taken a beating and the wall walls scattered le hail and had knocked out the power so they were working by lamplight. Hundreds and hundreds suffering from shock, burns and exposure almost all of them were covered in thick black crude oil. They were knocking together as fast as he could. The town ran out of caskets own only the first few hours. With so many patients needing urgent attention there was no time to get most out of their dirty clothes so the nurses did what they could. They received the standard treatment for the time a shot of morphine, blankets to keep them warm and strong sweet tea than they were left to rest. If you complained of burns but that was attributed and they were discounted at the time. Most laid there quietly aware that they would be given priority. They observed that they complained of being thirsty. Overnight the majority of the cases had developed blisters as big as balloons. This led to the doctors to think that it might be the poisonous fumes perhaps the explosives but six hours after the attacks they began complaining of severe eye pain. The headquarters send notification that there was a possibility of an exposure but the information was vague and unconfirmed. The hundreds of patients with unusual symptoms were to be classified dermatitis not yet diagnosed pending further instructions. Given the casualties that first night the non urgent cases were sent away most of them still in their white uniforms. The next morning they returned clearly needing treatment. They were in a horrible state and what made it worse is so many were conscious throughout the ordeal. A young goner couldnt understand why his vision was become blurry with each passing hour. Thats when the rumors about the poison gas started to spread. He remembered feeling uneasy when a group confiscated all the clothes, shoes, belts, uniforms, everything. There was no explanation given. That created a panic. The first occurred at 18 hours after the attack within two days there were 14. Alexander noted the downward spiral of the patients. It appeared in a matter of minutes and would become. The british doctors were mystified. The symptoms didnt fit any of those in the case histories. They could find no similarities in the textbooks or the manuals issued by the Chemical Warfare service. If the toxic agent was mustard gas, so named the unpleasant odor then complications should have been more prominent but they were not. As alexander walked towards he examined the patients, lifted blankets, studied their burns with extraordinary delicacy he re probed the skin, spoke with each man asking how he had come by his injuries, which ship was he on, how did he come to be rescued, did he receive first aid, what about when he got to the hospital. One after another told of being caught in the firestorm and the pandemonium that followed, somehow making it to the hospital. There they waited for as long as 24 hours in their white uniforms before receiving treatment. Drawing back the covers on one patient, he studied the burns on the otherwise healthy body. The sailors that had been aboard in the harbor when they flew over he heard a loud boom and felt liquid land on his neck. A picture of the injuries shown in alexanders report. He observed the outline of the red skin with ointment delineating where he had been sprayed as if it had been imprinted on his flesh. The burns he had seen on other patients were varied but he could distinguish between chemical burns and those caused by fire and heat. Certain patterns were present depending how the individual had been exposed. It appeared they had been thrown overboard and were burned extensively over 90 of their bodies while those in the boats had superficial burns wherever the toxic had hit them. Some men that sat possibly in lifeboats had local burns and a few lucky souls who taken upon themselves to wipe off the mixture had only minor injuries. As he made his round it was increasingly clear to alexander most of the patients exposed for chemical agent. Hed noticed something from the first moment he entered the hospital. It was some odor that kept nagging away at him and he could pick it up at various places and rooms and it stood out from the usual smells of urine and disinfectant and burned flesh. The odor implanted itself in his mind he wrote in his diary was mustard gas. It had been five days since the initial exposure is aroun founde was any chance of saving the lives laying in bed and the countless civilians that he knew he needed to act very swiftly. He decided to question the hospital director and put the question to him. He had his own suspicions so he asked i feel these men may have been exposed to mustard in some manner. Do you have any idea how this may have happened. None, came the hospital directors reply. As the Chemical Warfare consulted him alexander was clear to the highest degree he knew the allies had begun stockpiling poison gas in the mediterranean in case germany with its back to the wall resorted to Chemical Warfare but he was skeptical they would have shipped mustard shells to a busy port so close to the local population and then allowed the toxic car go to sit there is a prime target for the enemy strike. He couldnt afford to rule it out. He tried again. Have you checked with the port authorities and shipping mass, could they have been carrying mustard. He was told again and again that they did not have the information and that it was not possible. But alexander had his doubts. It sounded to him like the british were trying to manage the investigation. He didnt believe he was getting the full story or their full cooperation. The burden of proof he realized rested on him. He ordered a series of tests for those that were still alive and insisted on a series of careful complete autopsies of those who died under mysterious circumstances. He ordered samples of the water collected and analyzed and he borrowed personnel from displaced American Hospital units and put them to work gathering data, performing tests on tissue samples and compiling pathology reports. Suspecting the british officials were dodging his questions, alexander visited the navy house, the british headquarters and again demanded to be told that there was mustard gas at the harbor and again he was absolutely denied. He left unconvinced. What he needed was proof but he also knew something else. This was a new horror that he wrote, not the menace that he had studied. This was mustard gas poisoning through a different guise than that recognized from world war i. The first thing the next morning alexander scouted the harbor he wanted to do his own investigation with as little interference as possible. He picked his way through the rubble and surveyed the twisted metal. He looked at the burnedout vessels that had been some of them towed out to sea and some of them could still be seen, masks broken poking above the water. Still smoldering close by and the ashes stung his nostrils. The dark water in the harbor looked sinister. One sailor recalled the floating oil had been a foot thick on the surface after the raid. It ias a mixture of highoctane gasoline and fuel from two dozen allied ships and alexander suspected mustard gas. But he didnt know what else might be in there. He had to do more tests. He knew that they had been carrying shells and a new secret weapon. He couldnt be sure what was in the chemicals to. He also couldnt be sure that it wasnt a german gas attack. He reasoned that liquid mustard in most cases would be transformed into tiny droplets resembling a vapor. It would have contaminated the ships in the harbor and included the vessels that still remained afloat and drenched the men on the box below even those not on the water would have inhaled significant doses of the noxious vapor as it spread across the harbor some of it is sinking and burning and mixing on the surface and some evaporating in the clouds of smoke and flame. Alexander could find no evidence of the contamination. When he questioned the personnel they seemed surprised and shook their heads. Thats impossible theres no mustard here. When he spoke to the british port authorities they continued to state categorically that there was no mustard in the area but undeterred, he described in detail the burns he had seen and he insisted there was no way those injuries could have been sustained by anything than Chemical Exposure. At that point the port authorities began to waver and change their story. They began to say perhaps there was mustard gas in the harbor but it could only have come from the germans. Shocked by this sudden aboutface, alexander reconsidered. He needed more studies and the ramifications of the charge that hitler in a desperate gamble had risked a gas offensive but in the end after reviewing all the evidence he discounted it as unlikely coming after the authorities denial of so much he thought it was to meet of an explanation of what had happened which he now suspected was something much more complicated. Over the next two days he poured over the clinical records and autopsy reports. In the reports he wrote to take a journey into the nightmare of the effects of the chemical contamination. He came to an overwhelming conclusion the consequences could be seen on most of the victims. The Chemical Exposure was apparent. He wasnt sure how to proceed when he received the stunning news. They found the fractured gas shells and tests were performed on site and revealed traces. The ordinance officers from the air force identified the casings as belonging to a 100pound mustard gas bomb. German mustard gas bombs were marked with a distinctive yellow cross. The bombs were definitely american. His instincts had been right all along. One of the ships in the harvard had been carrying mustard gas. The shipment most likely for the stock pilot 75 miles away in order to improve the u. S. Ability to retaliate in the event of a german gas attack. Alexander knew that the bombs were fragile and would have been fractured by the explosions in the raid. Using a sketch of the harbor that he had prepared as a part of his investigation, he plotted the positions of the ships and by correlating them with a number of mustard gas from each ship he was able to pinpoint the american liberty ship as the epicenter of the explosion. Alexander found it hard to believe that the british officials didnt know of the secret cargo. The circumstances now demanded further investigation and he would have to explore the extent to which the military authorities covered up the gas by failing to alert the hospital staff to the risk of contamination they greatly added to the number of fatalities but in the immediate moment his first concern was the patients now that he knew the suspicions were confirmed, he advised the hospital staff how to treat the patients for the exposure and tried to reduce the number of deaths over the next couple of days. Instead of bringing matters to a close, he discovered it had come from their own supply and made a difficult job that much more complicated. If they were going to accuse it could have grave political implications. The Previous Year president roosevelt issued a warning that would be followed by the fullest possible retaliation. Churchill echoed his remarks with the source alexander knew could be horrendous if they drew the faulty conclusion that germans deployed chemical weapons it could provoke hitler into launching an attack and then they would have an allout chemical war. Adding to the anxiety the daily death toll was rising rapidly. He decided he had to notify officials of what his findings were. The allied corridors announced they laid with dermatitis due to mustard gas. They are unusual. He had awaited the reply. He sent to both of the american president and british pre minister informing them the nature of the casualties and the almost certain origin. Roosevelt accepted the findings and responded please keep me informed. Alexander was speechless. He admired churchill but realized that he had to question the leaders command decision. He realized churchill was mostly concerned if he acknowledged there was poison gas in the area and the germans retaliated, the first place they would be dropping would be on england so he sent a second telegram and cited the findings at much greater length stating beyond any doubt they were due to mustard but he was informed churchill maintained the symptoms do not sound like mustard gas. His instructions for the same to the doctor that examined the patients. Unsure how a lonely american medical officer was supposed to respond, alexander appealed for advice. The officer advised him one did not argue with the prime minister. After a sleepless night, he returned to the hospital determined to prove his diagnosis was correct. Churchill was undoubtedly brilliant and had an uncanny instinct for the fact hed put his finger on the most important question about the victims. Why would the toxic effect is so much more serious than ever in recorded history far more patients were dying than on the battlefields of world war i with a fatality rate of around 2 , the death rate was six times higher and climbing. The difference he believed was from the unprecedented contact being immersed in the water and then left to sit. The individuals to all intensive purposes were dipped into a solution wrapped in blankets and allowed a prolonged period for absorption, he wrote. He made himself a new sense. He was warned if he didnt stop insisting on the diagnosis of mustard gas he risked a courtmartial it fell sharply off. He noted the white blood cells found importance to the system were the first to disappear. What he saw made the hair on the back of his neck stand on end. He had seen these before but never in humans. In march 1942 when he was training at edgewood, they had received samples of german nitrogen mustard gas and had began experimenting it. The studies recorded bizarre effects and to their astonishment the blood cell count dropped to zero. No one had ever seen such rapid destruction of the accompanying deterioration. They researched the literature but could find no reports. It was a shocking kind of reduction and they had never seen anything that had the same effect. The first in pulte was they had a bad batch but when they repeated them time and again, the results were the same. After exposure it rapidly disappeared. Alexander was fascinated by the impact on the body because of the dramatic effects he couldnt help but wonder about the possibility of using the compound directly. If it attacks white blood cells perhaps it could be used to control leukemia the most common type of cancer in children with its unrestrained white blood cell growth and by using different dosages destroyed some but not all of the cancer cells without hurting the patients. But when he proposed the ambitious set of experiments, he was told by his chief and then the National Researc national rl that that was not the job. There wasnt enough time or money to pursue. They were in the business of national events. He was ordered to put the project aside and returned to his work, treatment and decontamination. Miracle cures would have to wait until after the war. But now sitting in a Military Hospital 6,000 miles away not even two years later he held up his hands. It did selectively destroy blood cells. It had taken a freak accident to verify the phenomenon demonstrated. It added up to the same conditions. I remembered thinking if mustard could do this what could it do with a person with leukemia. He couldnt save the worst of the casualties he knew but perhaps he could make it count for something. It was a one in a million chance and landed him the few that knew of the potential in the middle of a disaster. It was an unthinkable chance to perform a pioneering investigation into the biological effect. He ran down the hall yelling for more blood tests and made sure to take special care hoping that they would make it across the journey. He needed to be scrupulous in gathering the evidence, as much data as possible in the short time he had left. He wanted his insight into the effects to be entered into the medical record with ann an onlie towards seeing whether the substance could be used not to destroy but to heal. On december 207th, 1943, alexander submitted his preliminary report on his tenday investigation of the catastrophe. In the report there were 617 victims who suffered from gas exposure. Of those he documented 83 that clearly died of poison gas. There were many others whose records would never be found. These were the first and only poison gas casualties of world war ii. His report was immediately classified. There was no chance that they could use it as an excuse to launch the gas offensive. Any mention of mustard gas was stricken from the official record. There is a slide here of one of dozens and dozens of cables that went back and forth between the headquarters censoring any mentioning in the records. It was even stricken from the patients medical charts. Alexanders name was removed along with his diagnosis of toxic exposure. It was replaced with a generic terminology for combat casualties burns due to enemy action. It was by logistical constraints combined and the threat of massive retaliatory gas strikes. Ironically however they had known all along about the source of the poison gas in the harbor. Naznazis buys in the port had suspected that they were shipping gas. After the airstrike they send their own diver down and found the casings that confirmed the weapon was american. A popular berlin propaganda radio host even taunted the allies a few days after. I see you are getting gassed by our own poison gas. British officials never acknowledged the report but garnered high praise from the advisors. An exceptional job alexander had done or knew the conditions but told him the accommodatio accoms withheld for the fear of offending the pre minister. The officer most impressed with alexanders report was his boss, colonel of the medical vision of the Workers Service who hailed his meticulous investigations as so complete and such value to medicine it was almost a landmark. He was eager to explore the toxic agents potential and he believed the data appointed a way towards a promising new chemical targeting white blood cells that could be used as a weapon. In his civilian life he was the head of the Memorial Hospital and was the biggest Cancer Hospital in the world at the time. He sees the information provided. His ambitious plan for the hospital now converged and crystallized into a Single Mission to exploit the military research and find a chemical that could selectively kill cancer cells. Armed with a repor the report ae results of a topsecret study that demonstrated for the first time that a regimen of nitrogen and tiny carefully calibrated doses could result in human tumor regression to develop the experimental treatment known today as chemotherapy. He persuaded two men that made a fortune during the war and the heads of General Motors to endow the institute to grading together scientists. Tuesday august 7th 1945 the day the world learned the bomb had been dropped on japan they announced their plan for the institute for cancer research. World war ii was over but the war on cancer had just begun. The official secrecy surrounding the disaster continued for decades. The military refused to acknowledge the effects of most exposure on hundreds of surviving sailors, navy personnel, doctors, nurses and civilians resulting in years of suffering, controversy and lawsuits from medical compensation in both the United States and in britain. 1961 alexander volunteered to help the National Academy of sciences to conduct a study of the survivors of the attack but the project stalled when identifying victims proved too difficult. All the records said burns to enemy action. They couldnt tell who had been poisoned and who had been blasted. In the epilogue i explain in detail how the truth about the incident finally emerged. It was no thanks to churchill who continued to deny in his voluminous world war ii memoir. Eisenhower was a little more forthcoming in his 1948 memoir but stated only one of the ships was loaded with a small quantity and the wind was offshore that day and it caused no casualties. The early attempts to correct the record were not altogether successful as they didnt have access to all the classified documents. Many of those accounts were deeply flawed. I found that even to this day it persists and if you go online tonight for example and try to search for photos of the disaster you will find many gruesome pictures unfortunately many of them are mislabeled and not of the air raid but a horrendous accident when another liberty ship exploded so it goes to show the whole incident remains modeled by misinformation even in todays digital universe. Alexander was discharged from the Chemical Warfare service in june of 1945 and returned home. He turned down roads and instead kept his promise to his father to continue their Family Practice in park ridge new jersey. He wanted to settle down and raise a family in the home town where he had deep roots. He went on to become a cardiologist and highly respected director of medicine for 18 years at bergen pines county hospital. He never spoke of his wartime exploits but took a quiet pride in his unique contribution to medicine. He didnt mind that the details of the investigation remained and shrouded in secrecy. In the story full of twists and turns i will not reveal the final twist and unexpected series of events that led to him finally being honored by the army in 198845 years after the fact the work in saving lives and for having a profound impact and being a catalyst for the development of chemotherapy. Sadly he died on december 6th, 1991 of a malignant melanoma skin cancer he diagnosed himself. But over the years he watched with interest the trials and tribulations many from the ranks of the Chemical Warfare service as they struggled to turn a potent chemical weapon into a chemotherapy agent for the treatment of cancer. He had to mobilize an army of mice and men for the trial and error of the most beneficial derivatives of nitrogen to target the cells without doing too much damage to the patient. The first nitrogen extract to ed safe enough for clinical use was quickly approved by the fda in 1949. Sloankettering doctors had their First Progress treating adults with acute leukemia. In the early years the remissions were few and fleeting and the nausea and vomiting caused by the treatment were terrible. Progress was slow and painful and there were many setbacks but he lived to see his wartime Research Lead to the creation of a new class of chemotherapy drugs many of which succeeded prolonging the life of patients that are still in wide use. By 1953, the new medicine were shown to produce remissions in children with acute leukemia the most common childhood cancer. Today the use of the combination chemotherapy more than 90 of the children can be cured of the once fatal disease. Nonhodgkins lymphoma also a fatal disease in adults has a more than 90 cure rate. These triumphs led the American Cancer Society to credit the disaster with initiating the modern age of cancer chemotherapy. I believe that in the midst of this terrible pandemic and in the race for a vaccine and a cure, alexanders story is a reminder of how powerful the act of a single doctor with a key and i can be. At the end of the book i write on the 60th anniversary of the first cancer chemotherapy trial, doctor jules hirsch of Rockefeller University hospital paid tribute to doctor alexander and the journal of the american medical association. He reminded the readers of the disaster and the inquisitive investigator who sifted through and extracted a jam, something potentially useful for the abatement of human disease. Thank you for the fascinating presentation. So important. Ive spent much of my career working on the First World War and powerful and disturbing experience i had walking on the western front and seeing these canisters and they are still very dangerous. Sometimes people step on them and get splashed. They still keep surfacing and dozens of italian fishermen have been sent to the emergency room with burdens on their arms from bringing them up. Theyve got to be aware of that danger. They have whole groups studying it still to this day. In this case it came out in a different way than it would have been a deliberative attack on the western front. I was wondering as you were talking to the many thousands when they would get burned by the mustard gas the effects were pretty immediate maybe not instantaneous but they felt them within a short time of exposure whether burning within their uniforms are under their helmet and that doesnt seem to have been the case this time if many of them were in their uniforms not noticing it. Why was that . If you inhale it directly, you immediately have the effects. Most of the men that were close enough to do that probably died of their other wounds but those that swam to safety were covered in this crude oil, and that mixture when they were wrapped in blankets and kept warm it was slowly absorbed so than they had to slowly penetrate their organs and it was a slow Legal Process and one of the tragedies alexander pointed out in the report is had the proper steps been followed which is what the military protocol calls for them they all would have been hosed down and probably would have almost all survived but because of the enormous secrecy and in the chaos that ensued, it was never sounded and another thousand probably died unnecessarily. Would it be safe to say that if scientists looked back or medical professionals looked back, which i imagine they could have done at those whod been exposed during world war i there were still so many that lived past the war they would have found many dying over the long term from the same effect. After world war i its interesting they started to do all these studies. They were so despised after world war i that it became such a hated the subject nobody wanted to look into it let alone its medical effects. Nobody wanted to talk about it. They were sort of almost on the brink of discovering some of its effects on cancer but there was no interest in that line of research so all of a sudden combined with a study they made people go back to some of those things and go wait a minute we are seeing it was effective and they looked at it with a new eye. And it would make me think just as you have shown here that these casualties were covered up and forgotten and this is another area yet in which they were forgotten from the First World War and would have died within a few years after from ms. A at as attributed causes. I go into some length in the book there were hundreds and hundreds remember 20, 21yearsold exposed to mustard gas and lived but the medical charts they would spend their life suffering from skin cancer, bronchial illness, asthma, glaucoma you name it, all kinds of terrible diseases and they not only had them multiply diagnosed but they couldnt receive proper treatment because there was no recognition there was a gas attack and it took these lawsuits in the late 80s in england and 1991 in america before the information was confirmed by the government and acknowledged that the medical compensation was due. By then most of the veterans were dead or very old so it was really criminal what was done. They suffered twice. I was so interested in your description of the thought process after this disaster and his beginning to suspect what was happening. I was a little bit surprised though that he didnt immediately react to the assumption it must have been any action which you would think at the time that your first thought would be the germans have deployed poison gas and later when you look at the evidence you see that couldnt have been true but it seems to have been a while before he considered that a possibility. I think he would have been told that right away. The fact that he was told this is some kind of a weird set of casualties we are not sure, look into it, it was a very murky situation. He knew right away something complicated was going on. It wasnt obvious though so the other thing is it was clear to him almost immediately he had done a lot of studying what it would look like and the damage would have been much more extensive so it was bizarre that even though it was hundreds of cases it was only these men the workers on the docks didnt seem to be affected, so it was a very puzzling complicated situation. That is one of the great things about your book is how you bring the personality and i dont know if heroism is a strong word to the forefront and what a shame it was and that not only was it not commended but it was covered up. We are at the top of the hour so i will end with this. How did you come about the subject of the story what was your initial interest in the story . My grandfather was one of the directors and his particular responsibility was for all chemical weapons the largest of course being the atom bomb but responsible for the poison gas, so when i was writing my last book which was a biography called the man of the hour, i was looking through the papers and found reference to this group of poison gas casualties and i was aware so i became kind of intrigued. I was also intrigued he went on the board of Sloan Kettering so i did more research and i stumbled upon the disaster and notified the family of my interest and they said we have all the diaries and records and telegrams basically and therefore it was clear to me that i had to write the book. Thats one of the reasons you are such a popular and successful author. You are to be commended for this one, two max. Tomac. Thank you for your presentation. All three of the great secret the classified world war ii disaster that launched the world on cancer. We are so delighted to be