An officer of high rank deserts his command in a crisis: alienists’ report.
Case 1. (Briand, February, 1915.)
M. X. was an officer ranking high in the French army, having military duties of a critical nature and of great importance (social reasons forbid Briand’s giving informatory details). Suffice it to say that he was brought before court-martial for abandoning his post at the very moment when his presence was most urgently required. He turned tail, without taking the most elementary military precautions.
M. X. was passed up to alienists. He was not a case of Shell-shock unless of the anticipatory sort. He was somatically run-down and of lowered morale and now 65 years of age. The campaign had been fatiguing.
The alienists decided that the officer had not been responsible for his non-military acts. He had been, they found, in a state of mental confusion at the time of desertion, such that amnesia for his duties and heedlessness of consequences had allowed him to leave the front without looking behind him or securing substitution. This state of mental confusion had been preceded by overwork and several nights of insomnia.
Moreover he was palpably arteriosclerotic. Blood pressure was high. The history was one of slight shocks and a mild hemiplegia. The confusion at the front was only the most recent of a series of transitory attacks of confusion. At the time of examination this high officer was actually in a state of mild dementia.
M. X. was an old colonial man, malarial, and had been a victim of syphilis.