Edward Harrison (chemist)

Born in Camberwell,[1] Harrison, at the age of 14, was apprenticed to a pharmacist, at the end of which he was awarded the Royal Pharmaceutical Society's Jacob Bell Scholarship.

At the outbreak of World War I, Harrison tried to enlist in the British army, but was rejected on account of his age (47 at the time), but was accepted as a corporal into a "sportsman's battalion" in 1915.

[2] Harrison produced the large box respirator, the first serviceable British gas mask,[3][4] which he and his team perfected by using themselves as test subjects and exposing themselves to poisonous gases in sealed rooms.

In a letter to his widow, the Minister of Munitions, Winston Churchill, wrote "It is in large measure to him that our troops have been given effectual protection from the German poisonous gases",[6] and that he would have been promoted to Brigadier-General in charge of all chemical warfare.

The completed memorial, sculpted by Ernest Gillick, was unveiled on 16 November 1922; it was later relocated in 1967 when the Society moved to the East Wing of Burlington House.