{"id":1082,"date":"2021-05-12T01:31:14","date_gmt":"2021-05-12T00:31:14","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.teignrail.co.uk\/scouting\/?p=1082"},"modified":"2021-05-13T11:04:22","modified_gmt":"2021-05-13T10:04:22","slug":"54-east-devon","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.teignrail.co.uk\/scouting\/54-east-devon\/","title":{"rendered":"54 East Devon"},"content":{"rendered":"\n

Thanks are once again due to the railway’s friend, Szypko, rapidly becoming an honorary scout, this time for pointing out a wartime obscurity in Exeter.<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n

The Whipton Decontamination Centre was built towards the end of the war to deal with casualties of a poison gas attack . Both sides had had stocks of chemical weapons at the start of the war but none were used. Britain eventually had more than Germany, including deadly nerve agents. Perhaps it was thought that Germany would resort to them at the last, although quite how gas bombs could have been dropped on Exeter in late 1944, early 1945, is not known. Perhaps it was done in anticipation of The Cold War.<\/em><\/p>\n\n\n\n

The gas mask, evident in so many wartime photographs, was required to be carried by everyone; then, as now, the symbolism of the mask helped to foster fear of the enemy. The masks saved no lives but asbestos in the filters caused many premature deaths among the workers who manufactured them.<\/p>\n\n\n\n