Shell-shock MUTES observed, then DREAMED OF: MUTISM developed the SECOND NIGHT after shell explosion.
Case 265. (Mann, June, 1915.)
A volunteer of 20 was made unconscious for a short time by a shell explosion, but was still fully able to speak when brought to the field hospital.
In the second night after the explosion, however, he dreamed that he had lost his speech. In the ward, meantime, he had seen a number of shell-shock mutes. Following this dream of aphasia, came several weeks of mutism, which then cleared up. According to Mann, this is experimental proof of the psychogenic origin of a mutism.