Really bad case of anthrax.  Without needing to go into details, the bacteria, once active, cause extensive destruction of tissue in any part of the body affected.  The fatality rate of pulmonary anthrax in humans has been extimated to be as high as 92 per cent.  In any case, while the susceptibility of human individuals to the disease appears to be somewhat variable, a horrible, painful death was/is a probable result of the inhalation of active anthrax endospores - the intended effect of the anthrax bomb.  JR.

Anthrax - how it works; what it does (2).

This is a &quot;topical&quot; anthrax sore; it looks bad enough.  Anthrax is, essentially, a soil-borne disease of herbivores, normally ingested while feeding.  However, it can also infect topically (by touch), and in the breath.  Humans, in the distant past, generally contracted anthrax topically or (in the cases of professions such as farmers and tanners, who had a high level of contact with infected animals) through inhalation. 

The principle of the UK anthrax bomb was to enable the targets to inhale the anthrax endospores in aerosol form.  The experiments on Gruinard Island were successful in developing devices capable of producing this effect on a wide scale.  JR.

Anthrax - how it works; what it does (1).

One characteristic of anthrax is that its bacilli - in endospore form - is very long-lived.  Advice to Churchill in 1944 suggested that the potential of the anthrax bomb was so great that it must be used on Germany; and that extensive use could make German cities uninhabitable for up to 30 years.  On this advice, Churchill ordered his commanders to order the manufacture of 500,000 which, apparently, would have been done in the US.  Fortunately, these bombs (if manufactured) never had to be used.

Meanwhile, closer to home, anthrax pollution was causing problems.  Initial efforts to decontaminate Gruinard Island failed owing to the robust quality of the bacillus and its endospores.  Worse, anthrax endospores spread to the contiguous mainland, causing repeated anthrax outbreaks among livestock.  Eventually, (since 2000) following a public scandal, the island was (it is alleged) effectively decontaminated by the administration of huge doses of formaldehyde (embalming fluid), itself a deadly poison, and the warning signs were removed.  Today, the island is deemed safe.  For myself, I shall not be going to the area on my holidays any time soon.  Many sheep died for their country on that island, and they are still buried there.  Anthrax is, as I have remarked, a very persistent pestilence ...  JR.