Notes on the Psychological Effects of War Conditions on the Civilian Population (1)

Shortly after the Munich crisis of 1938 a voluntary Committee was set up in London to consider the organization of emergency mental services in the event of an outbreak of war. A majority of the members were psychiatrists, many of whom were not primarily concerned with the theory and practice of medical psychology. Nevertheless the various Schools and Institutes of clinical psychology were adequately represented and on the whole the Committee worked with remarkable harmony and efficiency. It was soon apparent, however, that its deliberations were governed by three major preoccupations: first, with the possibility of an overwhelming air-attack on London; second, with the likelihood of panic developing amongst the civilian population; and third, with the prospect of an epidemic of shell-shock similar in type to that observed in the Army during the war of 1914–18.

On looking back, these preoccupations are quite understandable. The majority of those present had served as psychiatric specialists in the Armies of 1918 or in the Ministry of Pensions that developed afterwards. In many instances their first and last contact with the psycho-neuroses had been with war-neuroses and pension-neuroses. Hence their views on organization were influenced by the standards of the ex-service medical officer. Indeed the prospect of a Blitzkrieg seemed to arouse a certain military zest which was soon apparent in the outlines given to the projected defence organization. On the one hand, they set themselves the task of coping with a 'blitz' that might cause tens of thousands of casualties for days or possibly weeks on end in London alone and, on the other, they were dominated by the obsession that a civilian population can be treated like so many Army Divisions strung out in battle-formation. Patterns of defence organizations took shape which were reminiscent of the old 'line defences' in France. Instead of lines, however, there were to be First-Aid Posts in the heart