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Jordans Dictionary of Civil Defence was published in 1951. Edited by Carlton Wallace (Associate Fellow, Institute of Civil Defence), the dictionary contains entries relating to all aspects of Civil Defence, including:
- Agents of Warfare
- Atomic Warfare
- Fire and Fire-fighting
- First Aid
- Gas and Gas Warfare
- Precautions and Protection
- Rescue Operations
Only 80 per cent of the dictionary's original entries are reproduced here; those relating to First Aid have largely been omitted to avoid confusion. This is because first aid procedures change with time, and what was done 50 years ago may no longer be seen as the safest way to treat a casualty. Care must also be taken with regard to those entries that deal with rescue procedures, particularly those that describe the moving of casualties. Such entries are included solely for historical purposes. I cannot be held responsible for any damage or injury caused by attempting to use such procedures! All entires in the database in the 'First Aid' or 'Rescue Operations' catagories are appended with a reminder - it looks incongruous in many cases, but it's there for a reason!
A Note on Copyright
Because it was published in 1951, Jordans Dictionary of Civil Defence is still in copyright. However, I have been unable to trace the copyright holder, despite consulting Willing's Press Guide, searching the Internet, and posting on several message boards. If you are the copyright holder, or can put me in touch with the copyright holder, please let me know, and I will either remove these pages or acknowledge the copyright holder's ownership accordingly.
I have made the following enhancements to the dictionary from its original print version:
- Made it fully text-searchable
- Cross-referenced entries with hyperlinks
- Added extra illustrations, both from contemporary literature and of artefacts from my collection
However, I hope that Jordans Dictionary will be premitted to remain online, as it is an interesting and informative resource for the British Civil Defence organisation in the post-war era, which is often overlooked.
Jordans portrays the Civil Defence Organisation developed and refined from its troubled beginnings to a properly trained, equipped and uniformed service ready to take on the worst that modern warfare could produce. Just compare Jordans of 1951 with the cigarette cards of 1938 - the difference is staggering!
Such development over just thirteen short years was an incredible achievement, given that by 1951 the new threats of biological and atomic weaponry had been added to the list of dangers Civil Defence teams had to be able to cope with.
Had the unthinkable happened, then the organisation would not have been perfect - it couldn't possibly be in the face of largely hitherto unknown possibilities. However, Jordans describes the civil defence organisation that Britain was envisaging in the years leading up to World War Two.
I have to admit that I find the period of A.R.P./Civil Defence of 1935-39 the most interesting, as it covers a period of expectation, fear and paranoia followed by bitter experience. The post-1945 era was again a period of expectation, but nuclear/biological/chemical attack never materialised, and so the modifications to the organisation in the light of wartime experience and extrapolation were never (thankfully) put to the test.