FOUR YEARS ASLEEP

New Zealand Herald, Volume LXXIII, Issue 22320, 18 January 1936, Page 2 (Supplement)

FOUR YEARS ASLEEP

EX-SOLDIER'S STRANGE CASE AWAKENING IN HOSPITAL CHILDREN NOT RECOGNISED A happy man to-day living with his wife and family in their cottage at Folkestone, is Mr. Victor Cleave, yet he had been asleep for four years—four years of which he remembers nothing, four years from which he awoke suddenly, unable to recognise his own children. Mr. and Mrs. Cleave told the whole astonishing story for tho first time recently. Just before the Armistice Mr. Cleave, a sapper in the Royal Engineers, was terribly wounded. His head suffered most. When he was discharged from hospital he returned to Folkestone, and in spite of bad health, went to work as a collector for the Southern Railway. But after a few years he had a breakdown and was given an easier task, minding a level-crossing near Folkestone.

Then he began to fall asleep over his meals. Out walking, Mrs. Cleave would find her husband rigid and swaying—asleep. People laughed. The family joked about "Lazybones Daddy." Rut it ceased to bo a joke when Mr. Cleave fell asleep at his work. They took him to the Ministry of Pensions Hospital at Cosham. His bouts of sleepiness grew worse. "It is the reaction of shellshock," said one doctor. "Neurasthenia. His nerves aro going to sleep," said another. He was taken to a Kent hospital. and soon after his admittance he fell asleep. _ • He lay rigid. He neither moved nor spoke. His face had the pallor of death,

but the beating of his heart went on. ! "It is only a matter of time," said doctors. "We can hold out no hope to you." But he did not die. He went on sleeping. The amazed doctors shaved the rigid face, fed the sleeping man with milk, and injected nourishment into his body. For four years Mrs. Cleave and her children paid visits to the still figure, praying each time that he might speak or move. Then one day Mrs. Cleave, received a summons from the hospital. "Come at once Your husband has spoken." Victor Cleave had awakened, struggled weakly to rise, and said, "Hullo 1 Where am I?"

They led his wife half-fainting into the room. "Darling!" she cried, and fell on the bed and kissed him. He knew her at once. Then they brought him his children. He did not recognise them.

Mr. Cleave recovered steadily. About a month ago he stood before a medical board. They pronounced that he was now out of their hands, that he needed only the care of a local doctor. So he is back home little the worse for his long sleep. Mr. Cleave is 40 years old. He looks younger but for his tired eyes. He said:

"When I awoke it seemed as though 1 was in a new world. 1 do not remember anything of those years I was asleep. T felt like a dead man coming to life. It was amazing. I did not recognise the children

"Of my four years asleep I hare not a single memory. I had no dreams, no thoughts, no feelings. It is a blank — a huge gap in my life. When I first camo out of hospital I had to remain in a bathchair all day. My wife wheeled me about and looked after me. She is a wonderful woman."