| Horror and Thriller Poetry posted February 9, 2014 | Chapters: |
...21 22 -23- 24... 
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Microscopic horrors lurk in the deepest, darkest corners...
A chapter in the book A Picture's Worth a Thousand Poems
Silent Sentinels
by Dean Kuch
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Poem of the Month contest entry
 Recognized |
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Leviticus 26:24-25 Then will I also walk contrary unto you, and will punish you yet seven times for your sins. 25 And I will bring a sword upon you, that shall avenge the quarrel of my covenant: and when ye are gathered together within your cities, I will send the pestilence among you; and ye shall be delivered into the hand of the enemy.
The use of biological agents is almost as old as organized warfare itself. One of the earliest uses of biological weapons occurred in the 6th century BC when the Assyrians poisoned enemy wells with rye ergot. Ergot is a parasitic fungus that produces hallucinations and a narrowing of the blood vessels which can lead to the development of gangrene in the extremities.
In 1422, at the battle of Karlstejn, the invading Lithuanians led by Coribut threw the bodies of plague-stricken soldiers, dead cows and 2000 cartloads of excrement into the ranks of enemy troops. In 1485 the Spanish supplied their French enemies near Naples with wine laced with blood from lepers.
During the American Civil War, Dr. Luke Blackburn, the future governor of Kentucky, attempted to infect clothing with smallpox and yellow fever which he then sold to Union troops. General Johnson, retreating through Mississippi with the Confederates in 1863, tried to poison water supplies by dumping dead animals into the wells and ponds that they passed. The same year, U.S. Army General Order No. 100 stated that "The use of poison in any manner, be it to poison wells, or food, or arms, is wholly excluded from modern warfare."
In 1978, a Bulgarian exile named Georgi Markov was waiting at a bus stop in London, England when he felt a sharp pain in the calf of his leg. Someone had scratched him with the end of what appeared to be an umbrella. Several days later he died. A tiny pellet extracted from his body was found to have been deliberately filled with ricin. It later emerged that the Bulgarian government, using Soviet supplied technology, had assassinated him.
Today, there are untold horrors being manufactured in labs all across the globe, waiting to be unleashed upon an unsuspecting enemy or population.
We've all heard of the incidents happening in Syria, Uganda, and elsewhere in the world.
Who will be next? Could it be us...could it, perhaps, be you?
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and 2 member cents. The use of biological agents is almost as old as organized warfare itself. One of the earliest uses of biological weapons occurred in the 6th century BC when the Assyrians poisoned enemy wells with rye ergot. Ergot is a parasitic fungus that produces hallucinations and a narrowing of the blood vessels which can lead to the development of gangrene in the extremities.
In 1422, at the battle of Karlstejn, the invading Lithuanians led by Coribut threw the bodies of plague-stricken soldiers, dead cows and 2000 cartloads of excrement into the ranks of enemy troops. In 1485 the Spanish supplied their French enemies near Naples with wine laced with blood from lepers.
During the American Civil War, Dr. Luke Blackburn, the future governor of Kentucky, attempted to infect clothing with smallpox and yellow fever which he then sold to Union troops. General Johnson, retreating through Mississippi with the Confederates in 1863, tried to poison water supplies by dumping dead animals into the wells and ponds that they passed. The same year, U.S. Army General Order No. 100 stated that "The use of poison in any manner, be it to poison wells, or food, or arms, is wholly excluded from modern warfare."
In 1978, a Bulgarian exile named Georgi Markov was waiting at a bus stop in London, England when he felt a sharp pain in the calf of his leg. Someone had scratched him with the end of what appeared to be an umbrella. Several days later he died. A tiny pellet extracted from his body was found to have been deliberately filled with ricin. It later emerged that the Bulgarian government, using Soviet supplied technology, had assassinated him.
Today, there are untold horrors being manufactured in labs all across the globe, waiting to be unleashed upon an unsuspecting enemy or population.
We've all heard of the incidents happening in Syria, Uganda, and elsewhere in the world.
Who will be next? Could it be us...could it, perhaps, be you?
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