On Anzac Day in particular I remember my grandfather. He went ashore at Gallipoli exactly 108 years ago today. He did not last long before he was evacuated to England and, after a stay in hospital, back to Australia. He was a very disturbed man when he returned. My father, who was born in 1931, remembers him screaming in his sleep as his nightmares overcame him. And those nightmares continued until at least 1956 when my father left home to marry my mother. Who knows what he experienced? All we know are the awful results.
My father died recently and I am trying to write his eulogy. Clearly his life was effected by his father’s problems and I want to acknowledge that as accurately as I can. So I need some help please.
My grandfather’s service records reveal that he was evacuated from Gallipoli because he suffered from “sciatica”. And that’s what he was treated for in England. My family have always believed that he suffered from what we would now call severe PTSD and that the diagnosis of sciatica was one given by doctors who wanted to disguise his true condition as an act of kindness to him.
Is anyone here able to shed any light on the likelihood that this is true? Was a diagnosis of sciatica used during WWI to disguise the real problem from which a soldier suffered, perhaps so as to protect the soldier from accusations of desertion? I would be very grateful for any assistance please.
I apologise for writing on a non aviation subject in this forum, but trust you will forgive me.
Lest we forget.