Charles Symonds Sir Charles Putnam Symonds KBE CB ( 11 April 1890 – 7 December 1978 ) was an English neurologist . His initial medical training was at Guy ' s Hospital , followed by specialised training at the National Hospital for Neurology and Neurosurgery . Contributions to neurology by Symonds include a highly accurate description of subarachnoid haemorrhage in 1924 , and idiopathic intracranial hypertension ( which he termed " otitic hydrocephalus " ) in 1931 . He served in both the First and Second World War s , initially in the ranks as a motorcycle despatch rider on the Western Front . After being wounded and invalided back to the United Kingdom , he completed his basic medical training and served as a medical officer , both on the front lines , and attached to the Royal Flying Corps at Farnborough . In the mid - 1930s he became a civilian consultant to the Royal Air Force and on the outbreak of the Second World War was commissioned as a group captain . By the end of the war he held the acting rank of air vice marshal and had been knight ed . Early life . Symonds was born in London on 11 April 1890 to the Canadian - born Sir Charters Symonds , surgeon to Guy ' s Hospital , and his wife , Fanny Marie ( née Shaw ) . Symonds was educated at Rugby School and then proceeded to New College , Oxford on a classics scholarship . He soon changed his degree course to medicine , and took a second class honours degree in physiology in 1912 . He then continued his medical training at Guy ' s on a scholarship . First World War . On the outbreak of the First World war Symonds left his medical studies and joined the British Army , serving as a despatch rider in the motorcycle section of the Royal Engineers . Attached to the 1st Division ( sources are unclear if this was 1st Infantry Division or 1st Cavalry Division ) , he saw action at the Retreat from Mons , then in the battles of Marne and Aisne . He was wounded at the start of the Race to the Sea in September 1914 , and was awarded the médaille militaire , and then returned to his medical studies at Guy ' s . He qualified as a Member of the Royal College of Surgeons ( MRCS ) and Licentiate of the Royal College of Physicians ( LRCP ) early in 1915 , and was then commissioned into the Royal Army Medical Corps . He was initially attached to the Royal Flying Corps at Farnborough , gaining his first experience of aviation medicine . In this role he also regularly visited Aldershot where he worked with Edgar Adrian , a neurologist , and this was when he decided to specialise in neurology himself . He married Janet ( née Palmer ) , daughter of Edward Bagnall Poulton in 1915 , they were to have two sons , one of whom was the political satirist Richard Symonds . After his MRCP in 1916 he returned to France with 101 Field Ambulance and medical officer to 1st battalion , the Middlesex Regiment , and was promoted temporary captain on 8 May 1916 , He resigned his commission on the grounds of ill - health contracted on active service on 2 February 1919 . Inter - war years . Symonds completed his medical studies in 1919 , gaining his MB BCh and also his Oxford MA and DM . He was then appointed to the National Hospital for Neurology and Neurosurgery and in 1920 to Guy ' s as assistant physician for nervous diseases . His first wife died in 1919 . In 1920 he received a Radcliffe travelling fellowship , which he used to travel to the United States , studying psychiatry with Adolf Meyer at Johns Hopkins Hospital , Baltimore and neurosurgery with Harvey Cushing at the Peter Bent Brigham Hospital , Boston . In America he met and married his second wife Edythe Eva ( née Dorton ) , with whom he had two sons . He contributed the neurological section to " Practice of Medicine " ( 12th edn , 1922 ed . Sir Frederick Taylor ) . In Boston , he described subarachnoid haemorrhage in 1924 , in which year he was elected a Fellow of the Royal College of Physicians ( FRCP ) . He returned to the National Hospital in London in 1926 , and was also appointed consultant in neurology to the Royal National Throat , Nose and Ear Hospital . From his observations of patients in these hospitals he published his description of what he named " otitic hydrocephalus " in 1931 . The condition is now known as idiopathic intracranial hypertension . Second World War . Having been appointed a civilian consultant in neurology to the RAF in 1934 , he was commissioned as a group captain on 11 September 1939 , just after the outbreak of the Second World War . He initially worked on the RAF medical boards at the RAF ' s Central Medical Establishment , RAF Halton , and organised the establishment of the Military Hospital for Head Injuries at St Hugh ' s College , Oxford in partnership with Hugh Cairns . As the war progressed , much of his work centred on a condition called " flying stress " , with Denis Williams he analysed over 3000 case studies leading to the report " Clinical and Statistical Study of Neurosis Precipitated by Flying Duties " for which Symonds was awarded the 1949 Raymond F . Longacre award , administered by the U . S . Aerospace Medical Association ( AsMA ) , for scientific contribution to aviation medicine . He was appointed Companion of the Order of the Bath ( CB ) in the 1944 New Year Honours , by which time he was an acting air commodore and on 16 January he was promoted acting air vice marshal . He retired from the RAF in 1945 , and was appointed Knight Commander of the Order of the British Empire ( KBE ) in the 1946 New Year Honours . Later life . Symonds then returned to hospital practice , publishing more important papers , and becoming a highly regarded teacher . In 1952 he was appointed Sir Arthur Sims Commonwealth travelling professor for 1953 visiting Canada , Australia , and New Zealand . This was followed by appointments as visiting professor in San Francisco , and at the Montreal Neurological Institute . He was visiting neurologist at John Hopkins ; an honorary member of both the American Neurological Association and the New York Neurological Association ; corresponding member of the Société de Neurologie de Paris ; president of both the neurological and psychiatric sections of the Royal Society of Medicine ( RSM ) ; and an honorary fellow of the Royal College of Physicians of Edinburgh . In 1954 he gave the Harveian Oration at the Royal College of Physicians on 18 October and in 1956 was elected president on the Association of British Neurologists . He retired from practice in 1963 , moving to Ham , Wiltshire and was elected an honorary fellow of the RSM in 1964 . In retirement he enjoyed bird - watching and fly - fishing . He continued to publish , in particular a 1970 edition of his own papers entitled " Studies in Neurology " . He died in Totteridge , north London on 7 December 1978 .