10 Darkest Details of the Infamous Lobotomy

A quiet desperation filled the “insane” asylums of the early 20th century. Among other factors, this was usually caused by mass overcrowding, gross understaffing, and a complete lack of effective treatments, which left patients with even more severe mental illnesses than the ones they came in with, all the while existing in a state of utter institutionalized despair. Into this void stepped a radical, new procedure called the lobotomy. Claimed to be a “miracle cure,” in reality, it was a brute-force surgical procedure that left a long trail of broken lives, destroyed minds, and ethical transgressions still debated to this day, in its long wake of human misery.

Please read on to discover the darkest details of this so-called “psychosurgery” that reveal, in stark and glaring detail, the truth of quite possibly the darkest chapter in the entire history of modern medicine—the infamous lobotomy…

Related: 10 Weirdest Medical Hoaxes in History

10 A Nobel Prize for Butchery

The lobotomy was not born from a sudden revelation. It was, in fact, the culmination of earlier, discredited experiments. Swiss physician Gottlieb Burckhardt, in 1888, was one of the first to attempt brain surgery on people with mental illness. He removed parts of the cerebral cortex in six patients, with one dying and another committing suicide. The medical community at the time condemned his work. Yet, years later, in 1935, a new variant of the procedure, called a “leucotomy,” was developed by Portuguese neurologist António Egas Moniz and his colleague, surgeon Pedro Almeida Lima. They drilled holes in the skull and injected alcohol to destroy nerve fibers.

Moniz’s work, presented as a way to sever “fixed ideas” and relieve psychological suffering, received international attention. The most shocking turn came in 1949 when Moniz was awarded the Nobel Prize in Physiology or Medicine for his discovery. The Nobel committee praised the procedure for its therapeutic value, lending it an air of legitimacy that fueled its widespread adoption.

Even more chilling, Moniz himself was later shot and paralyzed by one of his psychiatric patients. Despite this personal irony, his Nobel Prize remains controversial, and many historians today argue it was one of the prize’s darkest missteps.^[1]

9 The Ice Pick That Pierced the Mind

The most notorious figure in the history of the lobotomy is American physician Walter Freeman. Along with his partner, James Watts, he brought the procedure to the United States in 1936. Their initial method, known as the prefrontal lobotomy, was a complex surgical procedure. It required a trained neurosurgeon, sterile operating rooms, and significant time. Freeman found this too slow and inaccessible. He desired a more efficient, portable method.

Inspired by Italian doctor Amarro Fiamberti, Freeman devised a procedure he called the transorbital lobotomy. This innovation, which became his signature, was chillingly simple. Freeman used an instrument resembling an ice pick, which he named an “orbitoclast.” He would place his orbitoclast under the patient’s eyelid, up against the eye socket, and use a mallet to hammer it through the thin bone. The instrument was then swept back and forth within the brain to sever the nerve connections. This “ice pick lobotomy” transformed the procedure from a hospital surgery into a crude, office-based ordeal.

Freeman personally performed more than 4,000 lobotomies during his career. In some infamous demonstrations, he carried two orbitoclasts and operated on both eye sockets at once, shocking even his colleagues.^[2]

8 Blood on Kitchen Tables

Walter Freeman’s goal was to make the lobotomy as common as a dental extraction. His transorbital lobotomy did not require a neurosurgeon, a sterile operating room, or even anesthesia. He often used electroshock therapy to render the patient unconscious. This was followed by the swift, brutal insertion of the orbitoclast. He traveled across the United States in a custom-built van he called the “lobotomobile,” performing the procedure in mental institutions, asylums, and even private homes.

Freeman’s desire for speed and efficiency was staggering. He could complete a lobotomy in a matter of minutes. Photos from the era show him with his instruments, often without a mask or gloves, standing over an unconscious patient. The lack of sterile conditions and the crude nature of the tools made the procedure incredibly dangerous.

Accounts suggest that Freeman once killed a patient in 1951 when he paused mid-surgery to pose for a photograph and drove the orbitoclast too far into the brain. While stories like this are debated, they highlight the recklessness with which he approached his “treatment.”^[3]

7 From Depression to Disobedience: Everyone Was a Candidate

The lobotomy was initially proposed for people with severe, debilitating psychoses. Soon, its application spiraled out of control. Doctors began to use it for a wide range of conditions, some of which were not even mental illnesses. It was used to treat obsessive-compulsive disorder, severe depression, and even chronic pain.

Its use was extended to people with behavioral problems. Children with intellectual disabilities, rebellious teenagers, and individuals deemed difficult or non-compliant were all candidates for the procedure. The lobotomy was not intended to cure; it was intended to pacify. It turned agitated, distressed people into docile, compliant shadows of their former selves. The procedure was seen as a way to manage overcrowded asylums and make patients easier to control, irrespective of the deep and irreversible harm it caused.

By the late 1940s, more than 40,000 lobotomies had been performed in the United States alone. Shockingly, a portion of those were carried out on children as young as 12.^[4]

6 Rosemary Kennedy’s Stolen Life

One of the most tragic and well-documented cases is that of Rosemary Kennedy. As the eldest daughter of Joseph and Rose Kennedy, Rosemary was believed to have a mild intellectual disability and was prone to mood swings. At age 23, her father, concerned that her behavior could damage the family’s political standing, arranged for her to have a lobotomy in 1941.

Walter Freeman and James Watts performed the procedure. Instead of rendering her unconscious, they had her count backward and sing “God Bless America” while they operated. The doctors continued until she became incoherent. The procedure was a catastrophe. Rosemary was left with severe cognitive impairment, unable to speak intelligibly or walk. Her family isolated her from the public, and her condition was kept secret for decades. Her life, full of promise, was destroyed by an unethical procedure performed in the name of social control.

She spent the remainder of her life hidden away in institutions, only occasionally visited by family. Her fate later inspired her sister Eunice Kennedy Shriver to champion the Special Olympics, creating one positive legacy from an otherwise heartbreaking story.^[5]

5 Side Effects Worse Than Death

While a lobotomy was considered a “success” if the patient became calmer and less agitated, the reality of the side effects was grim. The procedure often resulted in a significant loss of personality. Patients were left apathetic, passive, and without initiative. Many experienced poor concentration and a general flattening of their emotional responses. They became emotionally detached from their families and from life itself.

The physical consequences were also severe. Patients suffered from chronic headaches, seizures, and an inability to care for themselves. They had to be re-taught basic functions such as eating and using the bathroom. The mortality rate for the procedure was significant; an estimated 5% of patients died as a direct result of the surgery. Given Freeman’s thousands of lobotomies, this likely meant hundreds of deaths.

In one notorious case, a patient named Helen Mortensen—Freeman’s last lobotomy—died from a cerebral hemorrhage in 1967, cementing the procedure’s grisly reputation.^[6]

4 Science Without Proof, Surgery Without Mercy

From the start, the lobotomy was based on a flawed hypothesis. Moniz believed that severing connections in the brain could disrupt “fixed ideas.” This was purely speculative. There was no scientific evidence to support this claim, nor was there any long-term study to prove its efficacy. The short-term calming effects were often misinterpreted as a “cure.”

Critics, including many doctors, warned against the procedure from the beginning. They argued that it was unethical to perform a permanent, destructive brain surgery without proper clinical trials or a true understanding of its effects. Their concerns were largely dismissed as the lobotomy gained popularity, fueled by desperation and a desire for an easy solution to a complex problem. The Nobel Prize Moniz received lent the procedure an undeserved credibility, stifling dissent and encouraging its use.

By the early 1950s, however, studies were already showing that many patients relapsed or experienced severe long-term disability, undermining claims of success.^[7]

3 Hollow Shells: The Self Erased

The most tragic detail of the lobotomy is not the physical harm, but the destruction of a person’s identity. The procedure did not cure; it erased. It turned complex, emotional, and unique individuals into docile, listless shells. One patient, after her lobotomy, told her sister, “I am an empty vessel.”

A patient named Howard Dully was lobotomized as a child at his stepmother’s insistence. She found him rebellious and difficult. The procedure left him with fragmented memories and a lifelong sense of emptiness. He would spend decades grappling with the aftermath, later writing the memoir My Lobotomy to reclaim his stolen past. The lobotomy was a surgical obliteration of the self, a permanent and irreversible loss of the essence of who a person was.

Psychiatrists now consider the lobotomy an early example of how medical interventions can cause “iatrogenic harm”—damage created by the treatment itself.^[8]

2 Sixty Thousand Scars Before the End

The lobotomy’s popularity began to wane in the 1950s. The introduction of antipsychotic medications, such as chlorpromazine (Thorazine), offered a safer and more effective alternative. These drugs, while not without side effects, did not require invasive surgery and did not result in irreversible brain damage. As more information became public about the horrific side effects and failures of the lobotomy, the practice fell out of favor.

By the late 1960s, the lobotomy was largely abandoned in the United States and Europe. In 1967, Walter Freeman performed his final lobotomy after a patient died from a cerebral hemorrhage. He was subsequently banned from performing surgery.

Estimates suggest that as many as 60,000 lobotomies were performed in the U.S. before the practice disappeared—a staggering number for a treatment now regarded as barbaric.^[9]

1 A Legacy of Medical Cruelty

The lobotomy remains a cautionary tale in medical history. Its widespread adoption highlights the ethical failures of the medical community at the time. The procedure was performed on people who could not give informed consent, including children and those with severe mental incapacities. It was used as a tool of social control rather than a therapeutic intervention.

The legacy of the lobotomy serves as a stark reminder of the importance of patient rights, scientific rigor, and ethical oversight in medicine. It underscores the dangers of pursuing a “quick fix” for complex human problems. The people who were subjected to this procedure lost their identities, their autonomy, and their lives, leaving behind a dark and somber legacy that medicine should never forget.

Today, modern neurosurgery and psychiatric ethics explicitly cite lobotomy as a historical example of what happens when medicine moves faster than morality.^[10]