A Physiologist's War: Captain T. Graham Brown RAMC (1915-1919)

During the five years before the outbreak of the First World War, Thomas Graham Brown (1882-1965) conducted research into the control of locomotion that gained him a deserved and long-lasting reputation as a neuroscientist and, in 1927, was recognized by election to the Fellowship of the Royal Society. In 1915, with the First World War raging, he agonized about continuing his research or joining the Royal Army Medical Corps (RAMC). Told by his father to seek a commission, he served two and half years in Macedonia with the British Salonika Force. Whilst in Greece, he kept a daily diary. The entries from June 1916 to May 1917 are extant. They are unpublished and provide the background to the narrative to follow. Casualties with traumatic injury to the brain and spinal cord afforded him the opportunity to carry out careful observations, particularly concerning sensory localization, which resulted in novel findings and his observations on shell shock led to him being called as an expert witness to the national inquiry into the nature and treatment of the condition. In 1920, Graham Brown was appointed to the Chair of Physiology in Cardiff, which he held until 1947.