THE letter, written by a Glasgow beat ARP (Air Raid Precautions) warden,was printed in this newspaper on September 7, 1939, just a few days after war had been declared. It warned that “on no account” should any part of the gas-masks with which the public had been issued be tampered with or removed.

“I have just been informed by a lady that friends had assured her that the rubber disc should be removed from inside the mouthpiece, and that if she did so, breathing would be easier”, the writer said. It was important that this misapprehension be corrected.

This was just one of a number of items in the Glasgow Herald that month about gas-masks, millions of which had been issued to the public.

Another letter-writer noted the latest wedding fashion: guests carrying gas-masks instead of flowers.

“We spend our evenings enveloped in gross darkness, sitting like rats in a hole – waiting”, the writer, ‘Rosalind’, added. “... We sit in the dark, worrying about the safety of our own miserable skins; and this not yet a week since the outbreak of war ... We have declared war, and in a good cause. Then let us fight”.

The Herald’s Editorial Diary said that when football started again, fans would not get into the enclosures unless they had their gas-masks with them. “Referees and the more thin-skinned players might like to insist that they also be made to wear them”, it added.

The Diary also referred to aggressive street-vendors who were peddling “ridiculously expensive” gas-mask containers.

An air-raid warden from Dundee was fined £2 at Perth Sheriff Court for running along a street in Stanley, Perthshire, shouting: “There’s an air raid! Get your gas-mask!” to general alarm. Admitting a breach of the peace, he said it was his duty to look after women and children. He had had some drink, he added, and he supposed that the fact that his duties were uppermost in his mind had caused the offence.

* More tomorrow

Read more: Herald Diary