Shell Shock and its Treatment at Dublin’s Richmond War Hospital, 1916-19 Brendan Kelly University College Dublin
Aug 17, 2015
Shell Shock and its Treatment at Dublin’s Richmond War Hospital, 1916-19
Brendan Kelly
University College Dublin
1. The Richmond Asylum (1814)
2. Shell shock
3. The Richmond War Hospital (1916)
4. Cases of shell shock
5. Treating shell shock
6. Legacy of the Richmond War Hospital
1. The Richmond Asylum (1814)
2. Shell shock
3. The Richmond War Hospital (1916)
4. Cases of shell shock
5. Treating shell shock
6. Legacy of the Richmond War Hospital
Hallaran’s 1810 textbook, along with evidence of increasing rates of insanity, prompted authorities to build the Richmond Asylum, 1814
1851.00 1861.00 1871.00 1881.00 1891.00
Year
4000.00
6000.00
8000.00
10000.00
12000.00
14000.00
16000.00
Number
Mental illness
Intellectual disability
Dr Richard Leper at St Patrick’s Hospital, reported that two admissions during ‘the height of the rebellion’ were ‘produced by shock and terror caused by the insurrection’ In one case, the army ambulance ‘was fired on whilst conveying the patient to the Hospital’
1. The Richmond Asylum (1814)
2. Shell shock
3. The Richmond War Hospital (1916)
4. Cases of shell shock
5. Treating shell shock
6. Legacy of the Richmond War Hospital
Battle of the SommeJuly – November 19161 million killed or seriously wounded
Major CS MyersCBR, FRS
1873-1946
Popularised the term ‘shell shock’
Lancet, 1915
1. The Richmond Asylum (1814)
2. Shell shock
3. The Richmond War Hospital (1916)
4. Cases of shell shock
5. Treating shell shock
6. Legacy of the Richmond War Hospital
Base Hospital No. 26France
Injured servicemen with nurses in the village hall in Shepreth, South Cambridgesshire, used as military hospital, 1915-19
Croydon
Discharged, ‘quite rational’, after five weeks
`Spent eight months as a prisoner of war
Craiglockart War Hospital, Edinburgh (1916-19)
Siegfried Sassoon, 1886-1967 Wilfred Owen, 1893-1918
Dr WHR Rivers, 1863-1922
1. The Richmond Asylum (1814)
2. Shell shock
3. The Richmond War Hospital (1916)
4. Cases of shell shock
5. Treating shell shock
6. Legacy of the Richmond War Hospital
Journal of Mental Science 1925; 71: 219-24
0.5% returned to military duty
1. The Richmond Asylum (1814)
2. Shell shock
3. The Richmond War Hospital (1916)
4. Cases of shell shock
5. Treating shell shock
6. Legacy of the Richmond War Hospital
War Neuroses: Netley Hospital (1917), part 4 of 5https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Ah2f9VabEYE
Journal of Mental Science 1917; 63: 297-9
Shower bath, Pennsylvania Hospital for the Insane, 1868
HydrotherapySt Elizabeth’s Asylum Washington DC
Ludwig Knorr
Antipyrine (pheanzone)
1. The Richmond Asylum (1814)
2. Shell shock
3. The Richmond War Hospital (1916)
4. Cases of shell shock
5. Treating shell shock
6. Legacy of the Richmond War Hospital
The legacy of the Richmond War Hospital to the Irishasylum system and efforts at reform during the 1900s
1 High discharge rates2 Better conditions
3 Patients not certified ‘insane’; RMS Donelan:
The legacy of the Richmond War Hospital to the Irishasylum system and efforts at reform during the 1900s
The broader effects of the network of war hospitalsthroughout Great Britain and Ireland, including theRichmond, on the identity and practice of psychiatry
The legacy of the Richmond War Hospital to the Irishasylum system and efforts at reform during the 1900s
The broader effects of the network of war hospitalsthroughout Great Britain and Ireland, including theRichmond, on the identity and practice of psychiatry
The legacy of the Richmond War Hospital to Ireland’smemory and commemoration of the First World War,and its psychological effect on Irish soldiers
1929
14 April 2014
Byrne says his abiding memory of growing up on Rialto Street was his father waking, screaming, in the middle of the night – terror that his son believes was caused by the trauma of the war
Irish Times, 5 April 2014
Great grandfatherSylvester Cummins
1914Royal Dublin Fusiliers
1916Battle of the Somme
‘Survived the war, but not its consequences’
‘Suicide by gas poisoning, there being no evidence to showstate of mind’