Conscripted African drivers wearing their newly-issued gas masks, Kenya, 1939 (c)

Photograph, World War Two, East Africa, 1939 (c).

Although gas-masks were issued to all combatants and many civilians, poison gas was never used during the East African campaign. However, the threat was real enough as the Italians had already used gas against Abyssinian forces during their invasion of 1935-1936.

From an album of 608 photographs compiled by Colin Campbell of the King's African Rifles.