Treating the trauma of the Great War

by Gregory Mathew Thomas

From the outset of World War I, French doctors faced an apparent epidemic of puzzling neurological and psychiatric illnesses among soldiers. As they attempted to understand the causes of these illnesses, doctors organized specialized centers near the front, where they submitted soldiers to swift, humiliating treatments and then returned them to duty. When the war ended, psychiatric reformers used the trauma of war to their advantage, promoting the perception of France as a traumatized nation in need of new psychiatric institutions that could accommodate a large and growing pool of psychologically wounded citizens. The author draws on the vast medical literature produced during and after the war, including veterans' journals, parliamentary debates, newspaper articles, and medical administrative reports, infusing his narrative with a vivid human element. Though psychiatrists ultimately failed to raise the status of their specialty, Thomas reveals how the war helped precipitate lasting ch