Inducing Unconsciousness Through Inhalants

Factual Questions
1

I’m writing a short story and have found myself stuck on a particular detail. Naturally, I thought immediately of tapping into the massive wealth of brilliance floating around this place like the pollen that is currently settling on my car, rendering its once pearly black surface a dull yellow. But I digress.

At one point in this story, the antagonist seeks to kidnap a young fellow for financial gain. I’ve gotten them into a place where they’re rather secluded, and the young guy doesn’t know the evil man is around. The unseemly man withdraws from his coat pocket a flask and a rag, douses it with the fluid in the flask, holds it over the young guy’s mouth and nose, and renders him unconscious. Yes, I know it’s a bit trite, but the story is supposed to read as though it’s a concept for one of those old, overacted radio shows. You know, all Sam Spade kitschy, the kind of thing you visualize in black and white.

The stuff in the flask and the rag over the face is what I’m concerned about. I’m stuck on using that particular device for two reasons: one, the imagery it conjures up really captures the feeling I’m trying to create, at least in my mind; and two, it does our evil guy no good to cause serious physical harm to his subject, so a blackjack to the back of the head is right out. However, I’ve really got no idea how the whole rag thing would realistically play out.

First, the fluid in the flask. I think it would be most appropriate for it to be either chloroform or ether. Earlier in the story, there is a lengthy bit detailing how meticulous the antagonist is about setting the whole thing up to be foolproof and how well his tracks are covered. Given that, I am not comfortable just saying that he “got ether/chloroform.” I’ve never tried to purchase either of these myself, so my first question is this: how easy or difficult would it be for your average person with no extraordinary connections or financial means to procure either substance? I’d love to know specifically how one would have gone about getting either one in the late 20’s, as that fits the time frame of my story, but that seems a very esoteric question to ask and so I’m happy to hear any sort of information you may have. Alternatively, if it wasn’t readily available, would it have been possible for a person to make either ether or chloroform at home?

Secondly, and perhaps this should have gone firstly, but which choice would be most appropriate? Specifically, which would render the young guy unconscious fastest and for the longest period? Which would be most effective in the dosage provided by a flask and a rag? And which would be the safest in the short- (and to satisfy my own curiosity, long-) term?

If there’s an alternative I’m missing, feel free to speak up. I am looking for some sort of device that will allow our antagonist to render his subject unconscious for thirty minutes to an hour, although repeated applications of the device aren’t out of the question. I really do like the old-timey imagery of the rag over the mouth, but I am very much open to suggestions.

2

He could have made it himself. Try putting ‘how to make chloroform’ into your favourite search engine.

3

I think you would have to repeatedly apply it if you wanted the kid to be out for half an hour.

Based on this it does not seem to be impossible for criminals to get chloroform at times close to when you are writing. Maybe he got it from an industrial supply house. Ether, being explosive, is harder to work with, although it was used as a drug of abuse in England (it was swallowed, IIRC from Licit and Illicit Drugs, Consumer’s Union, 1970).

Or just have him use a sleeper hold. It’s just as quick as anesthetic, and easier to come by.

Regards,
Shodan

4

I’m not sure about the ether off of the top of my head, but chloroform doesn’t render you unconscious for an exceptionally long time, and repeated use can be permanently damaging. One of John Wayne Gacy’s victims that lived was subjected to repeated facefuls of chloroform, and suffered severe facial burns and permanent liver damage.

5

That article is very interesting – your Google Fu is strong, my friend!

Quartz, I didn’t realize that chloroform was so easily synthesized at home. My worry is that the home chemistry set would leave enough acetone and bleach behind to cause chemical burns. The same point that pravnik raises, actually. The young man being ransomed is something of a “pretty boy,” and his face being burned to a crisp is somewhat incongruent with the rest of the story.

I didn’t know that about Gacy’s living victim. Hmm…it’s looking like the rag over the face element might not pan out as well as I had hoped. Darn :frowning:

I like the sleeper hold idea as well, Shodan. That’s definitely a viable alternative, although I’d still love to find a way to make the original idea work if anyone has a workaround regarding the dangers of physical harm. I mean, I know that sneaking up behind someone and sticking a chemical-laced rag in their face isn’t something you’d normally hear a doctor advocating, but you know what I mean.

6

Bear in mind that Gacy chloroformed him over and over and over over the couse of several hours. How long do you need the character out? He could probably chloroform him and keep him out long enough to throw him in the trunk of a car without much long-term damage.

7

Thirty minutes, an hour at most. Long enough to put him out, set him in a wheelchair, take him to the nearby car, place him in the backseat, make a ten minute drive back home, and bring him inside. It could probably be reduced to fifteen minutes, but less than that would strain credulity.

8

He could zap him with more chloroform once or twice in the car ride when he began to regain consciousness, Gacy did exactly that to his victim. He’d likely have some chemical burns on his face and be very nauseous. The burns might be lessened if he was very careful not get the stuff directly on his face and just made him inhale the vapors through the rag.

9

Thought of this: if he chloroforms him once at point A, again right before he gets him in the car, and again right after he gets him out, each time taking great care not to get it directly on his face, he might believably be able to get him from point A to point B without his coming completely to consciousness and without burning him too badly.

10

How about dichloromethane? More easily obtainable than chloroform, and just about as unconsciousness-producing, AFAIK.

11

I have done a HUGE amount of research on ways to safely render people unconscious, for much the same reasons as you.

I came to the conclusion that it would be almost impossible to chloroform an adult against their will unless you had them tied up or incapacitated first. From:

James Young Simpson, “On a New Anæsthetic Agent, More Efficient than Sulphuric Ether.”:

“Its action is much more rapid and complete, and generally more persistent. I have almost always seen from ten to twenty inspirations suffice – sometimes fewer.”
That’s at least half a minute breathing the stuff, by a calm, willing subject! Someone fighting back, full of adrenaline and trying not to breath it, could take a lot longer. OTOH, the link above has a few actual case histories of using chloroform, including one (successful) example on an unwilling child, so you could decide your dastardly bad guy got lucky.

Personally I went with Shodan’s sleeper hold, the exact version he linked to! It compresses the carotid arteries and puts someone out in a few seconds, very safely. I’ve seen it used in judo. Recovery time is very quick, usually less than half a minute, and the victim sometimes doesn’t even realise what happened and has to be told they were choked out! So you could use a sleeper hold in your story and then have them chloroformed afterwards to keep them under for longer.

The unexpected blow to the head is both trite and dangerous but it IS possible to knock someone out that way, as anybody who watched the Six Nations rugby this year can attest. The important thing is that the the head should be accelerated by a blow, rapidly and preferably unexpectedly, so the brain collides with the inside of the skull. Using hard objects like clubs or bottles can cause fatal skull fracture without even knocking out the victim, especially if the blow is delivered downward onto the crown. But a rubber coated cosh or a sandbag striking the back of the head has a high chance of success, and probably won’t even leave much of a bruise.

12

When I was in high school in the 90s, chloroform was one of the chemicals stocked in the chemistry lab’s supply room. It would be easy for anyone with access to a school (e.g., a student or a teacher) to procure some. Heck, we used to smuggle out jars full of it all the time. (We stopped doing so when we realized it was a pretty boring drug. Oh, and when one of us put it in a plastic bottle instead of a glass one, put it the bottle his jacket pocket, and later discovered that the chloroform had melted the plastic into his jacket, ruining it.)

Perhaps your villain works as a school teacher or janitor, or perhaps he knows some miscreant students he bribed into stealing some chloroform when the teacher wasn’t looking?

13

As someone who’s actually willingly inhaled it, I agree that it takes a while for it to have any effect, but I think that as long as you can overpower your victim for 30 to 60 seconds you will have no problem inducing unconsciousness. Most large men could easily hold down a small woman for long enough to force them to inhale enough chloroform. You’d even have a chance against an equally matched opponent if you took them by surprise and/or threatened them with violence if they resisted, or if you had some experience in some grappling martial art like wrestling.

14

Strangely, I’d somehow formed the impression that the OP’s story was about a man kidnapping a woman, and it was only on re-reading that I realised it wasn’t so.

I don’t entirely disagree with you, except to say that if you’ve ever attempted to induce a sibling or member of your peer group to inhale your sock aroma, you’d know it’s quite difficult to do for more than a second or two! If you’re capable of physically overwhelming your victim, fair enough. But if you’re counting on the chloroform to incapacitate a victim you couldn’t otherwise overwhelm, you’re going to be disappointed.

15

Right. Chloroform isn’t really suitable for overpowering a victim; it’s to make transportation or other manipulation of an already-overpowered victim easier.

16

An extremely salient point that I should have considered! Playing “Mr. Sockface” with Lady Soul is always a difficult endeavor; the similarity should have occurred to me.

Noting that the sleeper hold linked upthread by Shodan seems capable of rendering a subject unconscious for thirty seconds-ish, and that that seems to be the time frame necessary to cause unconsciousness through chloroform inhalation, I’m thinking that a combination of the two (like matt mentioned and psychonaut implied) is the best approach. It even adds to the character in a way – he’s a meticulous, detail-oriented fellow. Demonstrating his knowledge of anatomy by using the sleeper hold, his care in arranging a soaked rag so that the fluids don’t burn the skin and just the vapors affect his subject, and his forethought by combining the two develops the character even more than my original idea would have. You guys are the best!

Thanks for your help, everyone. I appreciate it!

17

You do have the question of where an American of the 1920’s would have learned a sleeper hold. Fortunately, there’s an answer: catch wrestling.

18

Excellent catch, pravnik! That hadn’t even occurred to me, and it’s going to make a lovely historical touch!

19

Maybe your villain was in Great Britain, and learned it from one of my heroes, Yukio Tani.

Regards,
Shodan

20

Taser? Out long enough to put hand and leg cuffs on.