Success on the Somme and Italian fronts

News of the war hailed continued success on the Somme, a victory for the Italians, and in a few throw-away lines, a report of an early case of biological warfare.

“Saturday witnessed an important advance on the Somme front.

“The British captured Le Sars and advanced their line from 600 yards to 1000 yards.

Le Sars is astride the Albet-Bapaume road, and is three miles from the latter town.”

“Brilliant success for the Italian arms on the road to Trieste and in the Alps are announced.

“The troops of our Ally have smashed the Austrian line on the Carso and have in this area taken 5034 prisoners including 164 officers.

“To the south of Gorizia the Italians have also carried out a successful offensive. In the recent battles the Italians have taken since 6th August a total of 30,881 prisoners.”

Historically, there are isolated cases of what could be termed‘ biological’ warfare such as hurling diseased carcasses, human as well as animal, into besieged towns or castles, but if the following report was true - and not another case of black propaganda - it would be one of the earliest instances of deliberately engineered biological warfare. “Cases of high explosives and flasks containing a virus intended to propagate disease among both, men and horses have been found in the garden of the German Legation in Bukharest. The discovery was witnessed by a member of the United States Legation.”