Sutton Oak

If the British were to begin manufacturing nerve gas, they would need a new factory. The mustard gas plant, at Sutton Oak, Lancashire, was thought to be too near human habitation for it to be used safely for the manufacture of the highly poisonous nerve agents. It was razed to the ground, and later became the site of a gypsy encampment. 

The plant at Nancekuke on the beautiful Cornish coast manufactured 15 tons of GB, all of which was supposedly used for research there and at Porton. The factory had been designed as a pilot plant , as Sutton Oak had been a pilot plant for the manufacture of mustard gas. In the event, the British, unlike their American allies, never developed a full scale nerve gas manufacturing plant, a decision often represented as one akin to unilateral disarmament. In truth there was no need to expand facilities because the British had proved to their satisfaction that the system worked. In times of crisis it would be necessary only to use the experience of Nancekuke to build a larger plant to produce the nerve gas necessary for future weapons. 

Suffield testing range, 94-5. 73. t74 Supply, Ministry of, 112-13, 114 Sutton, Graham, 69, 70 Sutton Oak, 50, 179 Sverdlovsk, 220-2 Sweden, 162... 

Close liaison between Porton s scientists and expert networks elsewhere in Britain and overseas, essential in maintaining a first-class research facility, was to be assured through the Chemical Warfare Committee, which was broadly representative of the wider scientific, military, and business community. To ensure the coordinated production of toxic agents, including those for testing purposes at Porton, the committee recommended the creation of a state-controlled factory for chemical warfare products at Sutton Oak, near St Helens in Lancashire, which later became the Chemical Defence Research Establishment. A representative of Porton liaised with members of the committee about planned field trials. It was this coordinated approach to chemical warfare through an external body of experts and stakeholders that other nations, the United States and Canada especially, began to emulate. 

Meanwhile, at Raubkammer, Porton Group pursued the liquidation and destruction of German experimental facilities designed for chemical warfare production and research purposes. Apart from temporary difficulties in dismantling the production plant and re-erecting it at Sutton Oak, which... 

A. Fairley, Report on the test of Sutton Oak personnel to determine their degree of sensitivity to mustard gas, Porton Report 993,1932, UK National Archive Number WO 189/4156. 

A study of the sensitivity of workers at the Sutton Oak manufacturing plant used a wider range of challenge doses and defined the dose response range for the E-, E, E+ and E++ responses described previously. What is clear from the dose response curves that can be produced from these data (Figure 5.3), and were reproduced in all subsequent work, was that only the E- or trace effects produced a complete dose response curve defining 0 and 100% responses. The more severe reactions erythema/vesication (E+ and E++) were not produced in all subjects even at the highest dose used (20 pg). 

Figure 5,3 Comparison of dose response curves for reactions (indicated on the graph and described in the text) to SM applied to the skin in 10 pi of benzene in a group of workers from the Sutton Oak manufacturing plant. All curves fitted using the equation PR = 1/(1 + logJose) x...

John W. Olesik The Ohio State University, Columbus, O/z/o Stephen J. Ray Indiana University, Bloomington, Indiana Mark Rehkamper Universitaet Muenster, Muenster, Germany Lee R. Riciputi Oak Ridge National Laboratory, Oak Ridge, Tennessee David H. Smith Oak Ridge National Laboratory, Oak Ridge, Tennessee Karen L. Sutton University of Cincinnati, Cincinnati, Ohio Clifford H. Watson University of Florida, Gainesville, Florida... 

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