In popular usage "basket case" refers to someone in a hopeless mental condition, but in origin it had a physical meaning. In the grim slang of the British army during World War I, it referred to a quadruple amputee; if a soldier had lost his arms and legs in combat he would have to be carried in a basket; thus, too impaired to function. This is one of several expressions that first became popular in World War I, or that entered American army slang from British English at that time.