Cotton on the Battlefield

Levin Daily Chronicle, 12 February 1918, Page 1

Cotton on the Battlefield

("Manchester Guardian," Sept.. "(5.) A twelve inch gun disposes of half a bale of cotton with every shot fired. A machine gun operating will use a bale in three minutes. In a naval battle, like the one oil' Jutland, from five to six thousand pounds a minute are consumed by each active warship. It takes more than twenty thousand bales a year to provide absorbent cotton to staunch and bind the wounds or t.lie injured. The change of apparel for all the troops now engaged in war represents more than a thousand bales. One hundred thousand bales will be required to equip the proposed aeroplane fleet, if cotton, as may be necessary, supplants linen for wings. The U.S.A. is now turning nearly a million bales a year into explosives alone.