Inventions that aid and protect the ability to breathe in the presence of gas, smoke or other poisonous fumes were being made before the first use of modern chemical weapons.
Modern chemical warfare began on April 22, 1915, when German soldiers first used chlorine gas to attack the French in Ypres. But long before 1915, miners, firemen and underwater divers all had a need for helmets that could provide breathable air. Early prototypes for gas masks were developed to meet those needs.
Early Fire Fighting and Diving Masks
In 1823, brothers John and Charles Deane patented a smoke protecting apparatus for firemen that was later modified for underwater divers. In 1819, Augustus Siebe marketed an early diving suit. Siebe's suit included a helmet in which air was pumped via a tube to the helmet and spent air escaped from another tube. The inventor founded Siebe, Gorman, and Co to develop and manufacture respirators for a variety of purposes and was later instrumental in developing defense respirators.
