Rank
Pte
Service No.
454579
Unit
45th Regiment, 59th Battalion,
26th Battalion (New Brunswick Regiment)
26th Battalion (New Brunswick Regiment)
Died
07 May, 1917
Age 35
Age 35
Buried
Wimereux Communal Cemetery, Pas de Calais, France - II K I
Remembrance:
First World War Book of Remembrance - Page 334
Additional Info
Thomas Styles was born 8 June 1880 in Fenelon Falls, ON. He was the 3rd child of Thomas and Janette (McDonald) Styles of Fenelon Falls and the first born son.
Prior to the war, Thomas was listed as a grocery store clerk on the 1901 Census and also served with the 45th Regiment. He enlisted in Lindsay on 27 May 1915 with the 59th Battalion and was subsequently transferred to the 26th Battalion.
On 29 April 1917, Thomas was admitted to the No 3 Stationary Hospital in Wimereux France with what was described as “confusional insanity and pneumonia”. This condition was described in the July 1944 edition of the Journal Of Mental Science: “This condition, in which severe confusion, disorientation, and restlessness are the principal features, appears to have been first clearly described by Bell (1845), who noted that about 2½ percent of the patients admitted to his asylum showed a particular syndrome: they were normal people who were admitted after about a week's acute illness; their appearance and speech suggested fever and delirium like a typhoid state; understanding was limited; they were apprehensive, with distressing but confused delusions; they disliked and suspected their food, and were not sensible enough to be thirsty; they tried to get out of bed, were sometimes violent, and struggled strongly when held. The course of the illness was rapidly downhill, but about a quarter of the patients suddenly made a complete and permanent recovery at the end of two to three weeks, the remainder dying in the same time. There were no specific post-mortem findings.”
There is some additional research that connects this condition to Shell Shock, which was very common and not always diagnosed effectively. Thomas Styles died on 7 May 1917 at No 8 Stationary Hospital in Wimereux, France and is buried in the Wimereux Communal Cemetery. He was 35 years old.
Attestation and other Documents (pdf, 38 pages - 15.5MB)
