This particular bomb killed one man, wounded several, and shocked
all of us. Two of the men managed to "swing" a "blighty" case out
of it. I could have done the same if I had been wise enough.

I think I ought to say a word right here about the psychology of
the Tommy in swinging a "blighty" case.

It is the one first, last, and always ambition of the Tommy to get
back to Blighty. Usually he isn't "out there" because he wants to
be but because he has to be. He is a patriot all right. His love of
Blighty shows that. He will fight like a bag of wildcats when he
gets where the fighting is, but he isn't going around looking for
trouble. He knows that his officers will find that for him
a-plenty.

When he gets letters from home and knows that the wife or the
"nippers" or the old mother is sick, he wants to go home. And so he
puts in his time hoping for a wound that will be "cushy" enough not
to discommode him much and that will be bad enough to swing
Blighty on. Sometimes when he wants very much to get back he
stretches his conscience to the limit--and it is pretty elastic
anyhow--and he fakes all sorts of illness. The M.O. is usually a
bit too clever for Tommy, however, and out and out fakes seldom get
by. Sometimes they do, and in the most unexpected cases.

I had a man named Isadore Epstein in my section who was
instrumental in getting Blighty for himself and one other. Issy was
a tailor by trade. He was no fighting man and didn't pretend to be,
and he didn't care who knew it. He was wild to get a "blighty one"
or shell shock, or anything that would take him home.