White is shell shocked so the whole work is left with me.
Enemy heavily shell our battery positions at Vimy.
Enemy ‘plane brings down one of our machines of Bristol type, old pattern. It falls near Vimy. I rush over & help observer out of machine & bandage severe gash in left cheek. His name is Lt. Mercer. The pilot is untouched but shaken. Machine a total wreck. Struck large tree in descent.
*Shellshock was the blanket term applied by contemporaries to those soldiers who broke down under the strain of war…. (It) was often held by medical professionals to be the result of physical damage to the brain by the shock of exploding shells. Military authorities often saw its symptoms as expressions of cowardice or lack of moral character. Its true cause, prolonged exposure to the stress of combat, would not be fully understood or effectively treated during the war.
