Chemical Agents of Opportunity for Terrorism: TICs & TIMs

Chemical Agents of Opportunity for Terrorism
Training Support Package
Participant Guide
Slide 40
Chemical Agents of Opportunity for Terrorism:
TICs & TIMs
Modern History
• 1676: a group of men led by Captain John Smith were sent
to Jamestown, Virginia to quell the Bacon rebellion.
• Gathered the plant now
known as “Jamestown
weed” (or Jimsonweed),
Datura stramonium , for a
salad.
Module Two - The Clinical Neurotoxicology of Chemical Terrorism
40
An example of a mass poisoning with an anticholinergic compound occurred in
Jamestown Virginia in 1676 during a colonial uprising known as Bacon’s rebellion.
Of great toxicological interest, the British soldiers who were sent by the Colonial
government to put down the rebellion ate a salad which mistakenly included
Jimsonweed as one of its ingredients. The jimsonweed plant’s leaves (depicted an this
slide) look like a more typical salad leaf (arugula), with scalloped edges and dark green
color, and this is probably how the error occurred.
Jimson weed contains the anticholinergic chemicals atropine and scopolamine. The
picture on the slide also displays the characteristic tubular flower (not present in
arugula).
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