Munitionettes
Munitionettes were British women employed in munitions factories during the time of the First World War. History Early in the war, the United Kingdom's munitions industry found itself having difficulty producing the amount of weapons and ammunition needed by the country's armed forces. In response to the crisis, known as the Shell Crisis of 1915, the British government passed the Munitions of War Act 1915 to increase government oversight and regulation of the industry. The newly created Ministry of Munitions regulated wages, hours and employment conditions in munitions factories. It also forced the factories to admit more women as employees, because so many of the nation's men were engaged in fighting in the war and male labour was in short supply. Historian Angela Woollacott has estimated that approximately one million women were working in munitions industries by mid 1918. She suggests that a greater number of women worked in munitions than in the Voluntary Aid Detachment, ... [...More Info...]       [...Related Items...]     OR:     [Wikipedia]   [Google]   [Baidu]   |
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Shell Crisis Of 1915
The Shell Crisis of 1915 was a shortage of artillery shells on the front lines in the First World War that led to a political crisis in the United Kingdom. Previous military experience led to an over-reliance on shrapnel to attack infantry in the open, which was negated by the resort to trench warfare, for which high-explosive shells were better suited. At the start of the war there was a revolution in doctrine: instead of the idea that artillery was a useful support for infantry attacks, the new doctrine held that heavy guns alone would control the battlefield. Because of the stable lines on the Western Front, it was easy to build railway lines that delivered all the shells the factories could produce. The 'shell scandal' emerged in 1915 because the high rate of fire over a long period was not anticipated and the stock of shells became depleted. The inciting incident was the disastrous Battle of Aubers, which reportedly had been stymied by a lack of shells. The shortage was w ... [...More Info...]       [...Related Items...]     OR:     [Wikipedia]   [Google]   [Baidu]   |
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Gretna Green
Gretna Green is a parish in the southern Subdivisions of Scotland, council area of Dumfries and Galloway, Scotland, close to the town of Gretna, Scotland, Gretna, on the Scottish side of the English-Scottish border. It is accessed from the A74(M) and M74 motorways, A74(M) motorway. Historically Gretna Green was on the Glasgow-Carlisle road, a significant early toll road between England and Scotland. Gretna Green railway station serves both Gretna Green and Gretna.1:50,000 OS map 85 The Quintinshill rail disaster, the worst rail crash in British history, in which over 220 died, occurred near Gretna Green in 1915. Gretna Green is most famous for its "runaway marriages". History Etymology Gretna means "(place at the) gravelly hill", from Old English ''greot'' "Gritstone, grit" (in the dative form greoten (which is where the -n comes from) and ''hoh'' "hill-spur". The Lochmaben Stone is a megalith standing in a field, nearly west of the Sark mouth on the Solway Firth, three hu ... [...More Info...]       [...Related Items...]     OR:     [Wikipedia]   [Google]   [Baidu]   |
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National Shell Filling Factory, Chilwell
The National Shell Filling Factory, Chilwell, was a World War I United Kingdom Government-owned Filling Factories, explosives filling factory. Its formal title was National Filling Factory No. 6. It was located near Chilwell, at that time a village, in Nottinghamshire on the main road from Nottingham to Ashby de la Zouch. During the Great War it filled some 19 million Shell (projectile), shells with high explosives. Foundation of the Shell Filling Factory The factory was created as a result of the Shell Crisis of 1915. At the beginning of World War I shells were filled with Picric acid, Lyddite, but this needed imported raw materials, and so trinitrotoluene (TNT) was adopted. TNT was expensive to make and was in short supply, so Amatol, a mixture of various proportions of TNT and Ammonium nitrate, was adopted instead. On 20 August 1915 Godfrey Chetwynd, 8th Viscount Chetwynd, was given the task of designing, building and superintending the running of a factory to fill large-ca ... [...More Info...]       [...Related Items...]     OR:     [Wikipedia]   [Google]   [Baidu]   |
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Silvertown Explosion
The Silvertown explosion occurred in Silvertown in County Borough of West Ham, West Ham, Essex (now part of the London Borough of Newham) on Friday 19 January 1917 at 6:52 p.m. The blast occurred at a munitions factory that was manufacturing explosives for United Kingdom of Great Britain and Ireland, Britain's First World War military effort. Approximately 50 tonnes of trinitrotoluene exploded, killing 73 people and injuring 400 more, as well as causing substantial damage in the local area. This was not the first, last, largest, or the most deadly explosion at a munitions facility in Britain during the war; an Faversham explosives industry, explosion at Faversham involving of TNT killed 105 in 1916, and the National Shell Filling Factory, Chilwell, exploded in 1918, killing 137. Operations The factory was built in 1893 on the south side (River Thames side) of North Woolwich Road, nearly opposite Mill Road) by Brunner Mond, a forerunner of Imperial Chemical Industries ... [...More Info...]       [...Related Items...]     OR:     [Wikipedia]   [Google]   [Baidu]   |
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Barnbow
Barnbow was a small settlement situated near the city of Leeds in the township and parish of Barwick in Elmet. The site is noted as the location of a munitions factory founded during the First World War. It was officially known as National Filling Factory No. 1. In 1916 a massive explosion killed 35 of the women who worked there. Etymology The name ''Barnbow'' is first attested in the period 1185–93 in the unique form ''Barnesburc'' and in the form ''Barnebu'', which is more representative of later attestations. The name comes from the Old Norse personal name ''Bjarni'' and the word ''bú'' ('homestead, estate'). Thus, when coined, the name meant 'Bjarni's homestead'. However, the name was by the thirteenth century sometime reinterpreted as including the word ''bow'' (from Old Norse ''bogi'' and/or Old English ''boga''), which influenced its present form. Barnbow munitions factory After the declaration of war with Germany in August 1914, there was suddenly an urgent need for l ... [...More Info...]       [...Related Items...]     OR:     [Wikipedia]   [Google]   [Baidu]   |
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Explosives
An explosive (or explosive material) is a reactive substance that contains a great amount of potential energy that can produce an explosion if released suddenly, usually accompanied by the production of light, heat, sound, and pressure. An explosive charge is a measured quantity of explosive material, which may either be composed solely of one ingredient or be a mixture containing at least two substances. The potential energy stored in an explosive material may, for example, be: * chemical energy, such as nitroglycerin or Dust explosion, grain dust * pressure, pressurized gas compressor, gas, such as a gas cylinder, aerosol can, or boiling liquid expanding vapor explosion * nuclear weapon, nuclear energy, such as in the fissile isotopes uranium-235 and plutonium-239 Explosive materials may be categorized by the speed at which they expand. Materials that detonate (the front of the chemical reaction moves faster through the material than the speed of sound) are said to be "high ... [...More Info...]       [...Related Items...]     OR:     [Wikipedia]   [Google]   [Baidu]   |
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Oak Panel From York Minster's Five Sisters Windows Listing Female Munitions Workers' That Died In WWI
An oak is a hardwood tree or shrub in the genus ''Quercus'' of the beech family. They have spirally arranged leaves, often with lobed edges, and a nut called an acorn, borne within a cup. The genus is widely distributed in the Northern Hemisphere; it includes some 500 species, both deciduous and evergreen. Fossil oaks date back to the Middle Eocene. Molecular phylogeny shows that the genus is divided into Old World and New World clades, but many oak species hybridise freely, making the genus's history difficult to resolve. Ecologically, oaks are keystone species in habitats from Mediterranean semi-desert to subtropical rainforest. They live in association with many kinds of fungi including truffles. Oaks support more than 950 species of caterpillar, many kinds of gall wasp which form distinctive galls (roundish woody lumps such as the oak apple), and a large number of pests and diseases. Oak leaves and acorns contain enough tannin to be toxic to cattle, but pigs are able to d ... [...More Info...]       [...Related Items...]     OR:     [Wikipedia]   [Google]   [Baidu]   |
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Nitric Acid
Nitric acid is an inorganic compound with the formula . It is a highly corrosive mineral acid. The compound is colorless, but samples tend to acquire a yellow cast over time due to decomposition into nitrogen oxide, oxides of nitrogen. Most commercially available nitric acid has a concentration of 68% in water. When the solution contains more than 86% , it is referred to as ''fuming nitric acid''. Depending on the amount of nitrogen dioxide present, fuming nitric acid is further characterized as red fuming nitric acid at concentrations above 86%, or white fuming nitric acid at concentrations above 95%. Nitric acid is the primary reagent used for nitration – the addition of a nitro group, typically to an organic molecule. While some resulting nitro compounds are shock- and thermally-sensitive explosives, a few are stable enough to be used in munitions and demolition, while others are still more stable and used as synthetic dyes and medicines (e.g. metronidazole). Nitric acid is ... [...More Info...]       [...Related Items...]     OR:     [Wikipedia]   [Google]   [Baidu]   |
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Trinitrotoluene
Troponin T (shortened TnT or TropT) is a part of the troponin complex, which are proteins integral to the contraction of skeletal and heart muscles. They are expressed in skeletal and cardiac myocytes. Troponin T binds to tropomyosin and helps position it on actin, and together with the rest of the troponin complex, modulates contraction of striated muscle. The cardiac subtype of troponin T is especially useful in the laboratory diagnosis of heart attack because it is released into the blood-stream when damage to heart muscle occurs. It was discovered by the German physician Hugo A. Katus at the University of Heidelberg, who also developed the troponin T assay. Subtypes * Slow skeletal troponin T1, TNNT1 (19q13.4, ) * Cardiac troponin T2, TNNT2 (1q32, ) * Fast skeletal troponin T3, TNNT3 (11p15.5, ) Reference values The 99th percentile cutoff for cardiac troponin T (cTnT) is 0.01 ng/mL. The reference range for the high sensitivity troponin T is a normal 52 ng/L. Backgr ... [...More Info...]       [...Related Items...]     OR:     [Wikipedia]   [Google]   [Baidu]   |
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Rebecca West
Dame Cecily Isabel Fairfield (21 December 1892 – 15 March 1983), known as Rebecca West, or Dame Rebecca West, was a British author, journalist, literary critic and travel writer. An author who wrote in many genres, West reviewed books for ''The Times'', the '' New York Herald Tribune'', ''The Sunday Telegraph'' and ''The New Republic'', and she was a correspondent for '' The Bookman''. Her major works include '' Black Lamb and Grey Falcon'' (1941), on the history and culture of Yugoslavia; ''A Train of Powder'' (1955), her coverage of the Nuremberg trials, published originally in ''The New Yorker''; ''The Meaning of Treason'' (first published as a magazine article in 1945 and then expanded to the book in 1947), later ''The New Meaning of Treason'' (1964), a study of the trial of American-born fascist William Joyce and others; '' The Return of the Soldier'' (1918), a modernist World War I novel; and the "Aubrey trilogy" of autobiographical novels, ''The Fountain Overfl ... [...More Info...]       [...Related Items...]     OR:     [Wikipedia]   [Google]   [Baidu]   |