HUNDREDS of servicemen were subjected to unethical chemical experiments at Porton Down before the Second World War and throughout the Cold War which placed them in uncontrollable danger, an official report concluded yesterday.

The Ministry of Defence is expecting to pay out thousands of pounds in compensation to the former servicemen who volunteered for what many thought were experiments to treat the common cold.

A major study by Sir Ian Kennedy, an authority on ethics, has highlighted five sets of experiments which he has decided breached ethical standards. Professor Kennedy was asked by the MoD to review the secret experiments carried out at the Wiltshire chemical defence research establishment.

Leading Aircraftman Ronald Maddison, a 20-year-old human guinea pig used in tests of sarin nerve agent, died foaming at the mouth after having the deadly liquid dripped on to a patch on his arm in May 1953.

Ken Earle, now 70, another volunteer who was subjected to the same amount of sarin nerve agent (200mg) as Mr Maddison, said he would be seeking compensation but insisted his main desire was to get the MoD to apologise.

He said: “The scientists were trying to find out what dose of sarin would kill 50 per cent of the population and in Ronald Maddison’s case they found it was 200mg. I was given the same dose but survived. But I have had health problems for the last 30 years.”

Alan Care, a lawyer acting for many of the Porton Down volunteers, said he was preparing compensation claims to present to the MoD. The family of Mr Maddison received compensation of £100,000. Those on Mr Care’s list are expected to be eligible for several thousand pounds each.

Professor Kennedy did not reject the grounds for the experiments, since they began when Britain was facing another war and Porton Down had to find antidotes to virulent forms of chemical warfare agents.

However, in examining the ethics behind the tests and whether the volunteers were properly informed of the substances being used in them, he concluded: “Researchers were operating at the edge of their knowledge when exposing human volunteers to various trials.”

In a statement, the MoD said: “Much has changed in law and ethics in the half century since many of these experiments.”

FIVE EXPERIMENTS

1942 Volunteers exposed to mustard gas vapour “in the scrotal region”

1945 Trial of indeterminate substance from captured German shells

1951-53 Liquid nerve agent on bare skin

1951 Nerve agent GD in which the lethal dose was not known

1958 Nerve agent VX which involved the use of lethal dose

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