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The first pads were made from wood pulp bandages by nurses in France. It was very absorbent, and cheap enough to throw away afterwards. Commercial manufacturers borrowed this idea and the first disposable pads were available for purchase came as early as 1888 – called the Southball pad.
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The first large-scale use of lethal poison gas on the battlefield was by the Germans on 22 April 1915 during the Battle of Second Ypres.
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Despite this, use of fire in a World War I battle predated flamethrower use, with a petrol spray being ignited by an incendiary bomb in the Argonne-Meuse sector in October 1914. The flamethrower was first used in World War I on February 26, 1915, when it was briefly used against the French outside Verdun.
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First Depth Charges. The first depth charges were developed by the British in World War I for use against German submarines or U-boats, beginning in late 1915. They were steel canisters, the size of an oil drum, filled with TNT explosives.
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The first use of tanks on the battlefield was the use of British Mark I tanks at the Battle of Flers-Courcelette (part of the Battle of the Somme) on 15 September 1916, with mixed results; many broke down, but nearly a third succeeded in breaking through
