The T. A. Gillespie Company Shell Loading Plant explosion, sometimes called the Morgan Munitions Depot explosion or similar titles, began at 7:36 pm EDT on Friday, October 4, 1918, at a

World War I World War I (28 July 1914 11 November 1918), often abbreviated as WWI, was one of the deadliest global conflicts in history. Belligerents included much of Europe, the Russian Empire, the United States, and the Ottoman Empire, with fightin ...

ammunition plant in the Morgan area of

Sayreville Sayreville is a borough in Middlesex County, New Jersey, United States. Sayreville is within the heart of the Raritan Valley region, located on the south banks of the Raritan River, and also located on the Raritan Bay. As of the 2010 United Sta ...

Middlesex County, New Jersey Middlesex County is located in central New Jersey, United States, extending inland from the Raritan Valley region to the northern portion of the Jersey Shore. As of the 2020 United States Census, the county's population was enumerated at 863,1 ...

, United States. The initial explosion, generally believed to be accidental, triggered a fire and subsequent series of explosions that continued for three days, totaling approximately six kilotons, killing about 100 people and injuring hundreds more. The facility, one of the largest in the world at the time, was destroyed along with more than 300 surrounding buildings, forcing the evacuation and reconstruction of Sayreville,

T. A. Gillespie

T. A. Gillespie Company, founded by Thomas Andrew Gillespie (1852–1926), was operating a subsidiary named the American Shell Company, loading

artillery shells A shell, in a military context, is a projectile whose payload contains an explosive, incendiary, or other chemical filling. Originally it was called a bombshell, but "shell" has come to be unambiguous in a military context. Modern usage so ...

for overseas military action during World War I. After the war, the company was renamed Gillespie Motor Company in 1919, merged to form Gillespie-Eden Corporation in 1920, and disappeared sometime after 1923. The initial Morgan explosion, according to the

US Army Corps of Engineers , colors = , anniversaries = 16 June (Organization Day) , battles = , battles_label = Wars , website = , commander1 = ...

, was in Building 6-1-1, at the present-day residential block bounded by Dusko, Gillen and Rota Drives. The full plant employed more than 6,000 workers in round-the-clock production.

Damages

Damage to the plant was estimated to be $18 million and the US government paid $300,000 in insurance to area residents ($300 million and $5 million in 2018 dollars, respectively). According to a 1919 government report, the explosion destroyed enough ammunition to supply the Western Front for six months, estimated at 12 million pounds (6 kilotons) of high explosives. The plant had started production three months earlier, and the war ended one month after the explosion. While hundreds of detonations were spread over three days, the totality of the event ranked as one of the largest man-made non-nuclear explosions in history. Some of the strongest individual blasts, from exploding storehouses or railcars of ammunition, broke windows as far away as

Manhattan Manhattan (), known regionally as the City, is the most densely populated and geographically smallest of the five boroughs of New York City. The borough is also coextensive with New York County, one of the original counties of the U.S. state ...

and

Asbury Park Asbury Park () is a beachfront city located on the Jersey Shore in Monmouth County in the U.S. state of New Jersey. It is part of the New York metropolitan area. As of the 2020 U.S. census, the city's population was 15,188

, more than distant. GillespieExplosion

Casualties

The death toll for the accident is unclear, as employment records were destroyed by the explosion and ammunition workers were individually uninsurable. The total is believed to be approximately 100 people, with hundreds more injured. Many victims disintegrated in the explosions and fires, and the unidentified remains of 14 to 18 workers were buried in a

mass grave A mass grave is a grave containing multiple human corpses, which may or may not be identified prior to burial. The United Nations has defined a criminal mass grave as a burial site containing three or more victims of execution, although an exact ...

off Ernston Road in what is now Old Bridge Township. The inscription reads: "In memory of the unidentified dead who gave their lives while in the service of the United States of America, at the Morgan Shell Loading Plant in the explosion of October 4–5, 1918." Government authorities declared

martial law Martial law is the imposition of direct military control of normal civil functions or suspension of civil law by a government, especially in response to an emergency where civil forces are overwhelmed, or in an occupied territory. Use Marti ...

following the accident and ordered the evacuation of

South Amboy South Amboy is a suburban city in Middlesex County, in the U.S. state of New Jersey, located on Raritan Bay. As of the 2020 United States Census, the city's population was 9,411.Perth Amboy Perth Amboy is a city in Middlesex County, New Jersey. Perth Amboy is part of the New York metropolitan area. As of the 2020 U.S. census, the city's population was 55,436. Perth Amboy has a Hispanic majority population. In the 2010 census, th ...

, whose combined populations totaled approximately 62,000. Evacuated and homeless persons were more susceptible to the severe

influenza pandemic An influenza pandemic is an epidemic of an influenza virus that spreads across a large region (either multiple continents or worldwide) and infects a large proportion of the population. There have been six major influenza epidemics in the last ...

that struck a few weeks later, and the area's death toll from the outbreak was high.

Coast Guard involvement

Among many others involved in rescue operations were

US Coast Guard The United States Coast Guard (USCG) is the maritime security, search and rescue, and maritime law enforcement, law enforcement military branch, service branch of the United States Armed Forces and one of the country's eight Uniformed services ...

smen stationed across the Raritan River in Perth Amboy. Twelve received

Navy Cross The Navy Cross is the United States Navy and United States Marine Corps' second-highest military decoration awarded for sailors and marines who distinguish themselves for extraordinary heroism in combat with an armed enemy force. The medal is eq ...

es for their heroic actions in the aftermath of the explosion, and two died in the effort. The award citations indicate that during the conflagration, they risked death when they moved a train loaded with

TNT Trinitrotoluene (), more commonly known as TNT, more specifically 2,4,6-trinitrotoluene, and by its preferred IUPAC name 2-methyl-1,3,5-trinitrobenzene, is a chemical compound with the formula C6H2(NO2)3CH3. TNT is occasionally used as a reagen ...

that was threatened by the fire. One Navy Cross recipient was Joseph Stika, who later became a vice admiral.

Legacy

The explosions scattered thousands of shells and components over a wide area, more than in radius. Nearly a century later, unexploded ordnance from the facility was still being found in the surrounding area. On June 7, 2007, ordnance was discovered at Samsel Upper Elementary School while workers were grading an area for a playground.

Explosive Ordnance Disposal Bomb disposal is an explosives engineering profession using the process by which hazardous explosive devices are rendered safe. ''Bomb disposal'' is an all-encompassing term to describe the separate, but interrelated functions in the militar ...

specialists from the US Army were called in to remove the material. Previously, in 1994 and again in 1997, the discovery of shells near Sayreville's Dwight D. Eisenhower Elementary School spurred cleanup operations by the

US Army Corps of Engineers , colors = , anniversaries = 16 June (Organization Day) , battles = , battles_label = Wars , website = , commander1 = ...

, which collected and disposed of a combined total of 5,080 pieces of ordnance. Local historians Frank Yusko and Randall Gabrielan compiled detailed histories about the explosions for a 1994 television documentary and a 2012 book, respectively. The sports teams of

Sayreville War Memorial High School Sayreville War Memorial High School (SWMHS) is a four-year state school, public Secondary education in the United States, high school located in the Parlin, New Jersey, Parlin section of Sayreville, New Jersey, Sayreville, in Middlesex County, N ...

are named the Sayreville Bombers, recalling the town's World War I ammunition plants and many

World War II World War II or the Second World War, often abbreviated as WWII or WW2, was a world war that lasted from 1939 to 1945. It involved the vast majority of the world's countries—including all of the great powers—forming two opposin ...

veterans..

References

{{reflist

External links

* Library of Congress collections: *
"Chronicling America: Morgan Ammunition Depot Explosion"
(1918) – historic newspaper coverage *
"Rotogravure Picture Section"
(1918) – eight photos from the immediate aftermath
"HD Stock Video Footage – Homeless people and scenes of destruction"
(1918)
"Damages to private property at Gillespie plant"
(1919) – from US Army Ordnance Department
"Rediscovering the Ruins of a Catastrophic WWI Explosion Everyone Forgot"
(2014) – including photos from then and now Industrial fires and explosions in the United States Deaths by explosive device October 1918 events 1918 industrial disasters Explosions in 1918 Explosions in New Jersey 1918 fires in the United States 1918 in New Jersey Sayreville, New Jersey United States home front during World War I Unidentified decedents in the United States Buildings and structures demolished in 1918