A BULLET-STOPPING JACKET.

Taranaki Daily News, 4 August 1916, Page 2

A BULLET-STOPPING JACKET.

AN INGENIOUS INVENTION. In an endeavor to reduce the number of casualties sustained by armies in modern trench warfare we have already witnessed a reversion to the use of armor, and the adoption by the British and French armies of the steel helmet lias already been justified by the results. The present Anglo-French offensive along the Somme suggests the great advantage to be derived from a further protection for the body as well as the head at a time when men have to leave the trenches to advance. In this regard.it is interesting to note that inventors claim to have produced an efficient bul-let-stopping jacket.. "As long ago as December." writes a correspondent in the Naval and Military Record, "an ingenious invention was submitted to the War Office and Admiralty, which thoso departments are 'still considering.' Tired 0i waiting, the inventors of the Cliemico body shield a few days ago gave a demonstration of their invention to a large company of the Press, service men'and others in Fleet Street, and very soon no doubt people will' be sending sets of them to their brothers and friends at the front. Instead of the chain mail ot old the new shield looks like a thickly-pad-ded waistcoat, is quite flexible, owl weislis only It consists of numerous overlapping (laps of linen chemically treated and covered with linen The etVcct is not on'.v a direct 'stop' foi the bullet, but dellection from its course thus reducing the concussion At the demonstration a powerful trooper of tlu 3r<l Dragoon Guards, just returned fron the front, tried in vain to piece it witl a bayonet.. It gives complete protectioi against cold steel. The 'shield was tlici iired at with a Colt revolver at foil yards' distance.' It stopped the firs bullets completely, but then one or twi others got through. This was attribut ed, quite fairly, I think, to che fact tlia the sack of bran upon which it was fixei to represent the human body, had be come indented, and had failed to ofi'e the necessary support. As soon as th 'backing' was strengthened the tes proved successful. . . . There seemei little doubt that it would stop bullet and pieces of shrapnel and burstin. grenades under all ordinary circum st^ncea."