Veterans and their lives

[Roberta]

Since I've updated my signature, I'd like to put out the call for more anecdotal material or any books that would be applicable to my area of interest. I originally posted in Chit Chat, the topic being "Apres la Guerre." A response to either topic would be appreciated. What happened to them all? The war ended in 1918, but for those who returned, its effects lingered on. What were they?

Thanks to all Pals--

Roberta

[Will O'Brien]

Roberta, Sadly I know a great many struggled to cope after the war. For instance John Cunningham who won a VC on the Somme was convicted of beating up his wife, attacked another ex-soldier with a bottle, went to prision for non payment of debts & was ripped off by business partners. I don't know whether this can all be atributed to a trumatic war service, however i've never seen anything which would indicate that he was like this prior to the war.

Will

[Sue Light]

Roberta

I've just been reading the replies to your previous thread, and would like to add a more positive story. My great-aunt's husband was injured at Aveluy Wood in April 1918, at the age of nineteen - he suffered machine gun bullets to both legs which resulted in one being amputated, and then re-amputated, until he was left with just 1 and a half inches of stump. He spent many months at Netley Hospital being treated for infections and gangrene prior to his second operation, and was finally sent to Pavilion Hospital Brighton, and then on to Roehampton in February 1919. He went on to a successful career at the National Physical Laboratory, married in 1926, had a family, played bowls for his county, and died in his own bed in his eighties. He is the only man that I remember who was eager to relate stories of his time in the Army, but was honest about why he managed so well in later life. 'I was injured on my third day at the front - I never even had a chance to see a dead or wounded man before I was one myself.'

Perhaps physical injuries would have been better coped with after the war if the mental and emotional scars had not been so great.

Regards - Sue

[Roberta]

Sue and Will--

Thanks for the replies. One of my frustrations is that so little has been written on this matter. I realize that the time was a significantly less confessional one than the one we (or at least I, in the U.S., home of Oprah and Co.) inhabit; I'm also aware that many medical records are still under moratorium. Hence my call to the Pals. So much has been done on the nature of the war experience itself, from the psychological side to the nuts-and-bolts aspects--all worthy of attention. However, the aftereffect are equally important, and so little-studied.

Again, thanks, and keep 'em coming!

Roberta

[Annette Burgoyne]

Hi Roberta

A large number of them never talked about the war or how it effected them to family and fiends, my Dad said his uncle told him very little. But one day when Sid (my dad's uncle) came to visit, he wanted to go to Ludlow and find a old war time mate. After looking in many of the towns pubs they found him. They talked of their time in war, I guess they could talk to each another about it because they both under stood each other feelings.

Annette

[aliecoco]

Hi Roberta,

I am pleased that you have started this thread, as I am also interested in what happened to the soldiers after the war had ended.

Have you looked at the this website? www.aftermathww1.co.uk

I believe it is run by a guy called Mike Roden and it has some interesting little stories and articles. I have not looked on it recently but there might be some links to books on this subject.

Alie.

[Roberta]

My first reply went into the ethers. Ooops. (Chris, if it ended up with you somewhere, feel free to zap it.)

In any case, Annette, I think so many of us would rather speak about this important stuff with people we know understand, rather than taking the risk of not being understood by the uninitiated. How I wish I could have been a fly on the wall during those conversations!

And Alie, yes, I've checked out Aftermath, but the information dealt mainly with battle experiences, not life after 1918 (although I do need to check back). I emailed the webmaster to see if he knew of any printed sources I hadn't found, but no response. There are books out there on shellshock and its treatment, but nothing about the average guy/gal who just wanted to live life after the Armistice. Maybe one of us will get lucky and find some great source: if so, let's put our heads together!

All the best to you, and to all Pals,

Roberta

[Guest Simon Bull]

I recently discovered that the Lieutenant Colonel (E. G. Curtis who commanded the 4th Battalion Northamptonshire Regiment for much for the War) who unveiled our local war memorial (Little and Great Harrowden) committed suicide in 1924 by throwing himself under a train. The War Office accepted that this was at least partly due to the effects of war service and paid his widow a pension.

I felt that this was a very sad illustration of how the effects of the War lingered on. Curtis lived in Great Harrowden during the War, thus his death also creates the paradoxical situation that it is at least strongly arguable that the man who unveiled a War Memorial ought to have his name recorded on it!

Simon Bull

[Hedley Malloch]

It was my experience that in the 60s when there were quite veterans around that many refused to talk about their experiences. This was a reaction I encountered many times. What is interesting are the changing interpretations that are put on this silence. At first I put this down to self-effacing modesty. Recent historians, especially of the Haig Revisonist school tend to adopt a 'gung-ho' attitude to it; their silence means that the trench experience was not as bad as we think, silence means acquiesence, consent and even agreement. Those people who did articulate opposition and horror were, on the whole, a bunch of effete public school boy (probably homosexual) poets who were totally unrepresentative of a stoical Tommy Atkins.

My view, for what it is worth, is that for many the silence was a form of trauma; silence was the way to cope with an horrific experience which could not be shared with outsiders. Oxbridge classic graduates wrote about it; the product of the local council school kept schtum.

[Annette Burgoyne]

Yes some would have been silent due to trauma, may of these chaps may have end up institutions, talking about ones bad experiences helps the mind get over it and not talking about in would have sent a few mad. Some were silent because, what is the point talking to people who do not have a clue about being under fire or seeing a mate torn to shreds or living like an animal in mud. Like I said in a earlier post, my dads uncle (Sid) told him little about the war, the only comment he made to my dad directly was, as they walked along an old railway line on a dark night (going to the pub), Sid said “see that bloke there, if this was the Somme he would be dead by now”, it took a few seconds before my dad could see a chap walking towards them smoking a fag. But when Sid met his mate who had shared many a some experience, they both talked openly about what they had done, and told my dad a few of their tales (sadly my dad could only remember some of what was said that day but what he did remember was very interesting).

Too quote Roberta

How I wish I could have been a fly on the wall during those conversations

me too

Annette

[john w.]

It seems a fact of most wars... not just WW1, my dad refused to say much about his experiences in WW2. I would wholeheartedly agree that the refusal was a way of building walls to combat the feelings over their experiences.

John

[Neil Burns]

Hi Roberta,

Although not confessional in nature you may want to track down some of the Veteran's publications in the US. Most divisions had a quarterly or annual paper that would allow vets to share stories and keep in touch. The Digital Bookshelf sells unit histories on CD-Rom and some contain early issues of Veterans publications. There may also have been a similar newsletter type publication put our by your local American Legion again there will be no way to judge the lasting effects of the trauma of war but you may at least trace the external lives of vets.

Good luck and take care,

Neil

[Kate Wills]

Those people who did articulate opposition and horror were, on the whole, a bunch of effete public school boy (probably homosexual) poets who were totally unrepresentative of a stoical Tommy Atkins.

I'm sure my colleague Margi Blunden (one of Edmund's four daughters) would be interested to read this assessment. Likewise 'superstud' Robert Graves.

I do get very annoyed with such sweeping generalisations. I find very little that was effete in the military bearing of Siegfried 'Mad Jack' Sassoon, to cite but one example. I think it inevitable that men who had received a high standard of education and who were destined to spend their lives in professions which demanded considerable intellect and articulation were bound to contribute a disproportiante number of classic war memoirs. Also, you seem to forget that Sassoon, Owen and their ilk showed enormous concern for their men (and I do NOT mean of the homosexual variety).

The product of the local council school did not necessarily 'keep schtum'. Every time I recieve a book catalogue from Turner Donovan, for example, I find yet more titles I have never encountered before, many of them by ordinary men who were rankers, or began life in the ranks. To my mind, one of the great pities of modern history is that the PC and tape recorder were not invented until the late 1900s. Think of the colossal number of war memoirs from all walks of life that such facilities could have produced.

Yes, I agree many participants said little; perhaps because they could not convey the true might of their experieces with limited articulation, perhaps because they had little to say in the first place. But, as the product of a local council school myself, one thing I have learnt is that we cannot rely on generalisations to prove whole truths.

[Will O'Brien]

Roberta - I have remembered another little snipet that was told about an ex-serviceman after the war. It's nothing big or harrowing but made me think how war effects people in small strange little ways. - The information was related to me by way of my Junior school teacher many many moons ago when I would have been about 10 yrs old. The teacher told the class that his father had fought in WWI. I realise that we were told a very sanitised version of what happened during the war (as we were only 10) but the thing which sticks with me the most is he told us his father wouldn't eat corned beef after the war & his aversion to it was so strong that he wouldn't let my teachers mother have it in the house.

Will

[Roberta]

Dear All,

I'm very gratified that you're all responding to this thread: all your thoughts are insightful and fascinating!

One of the works that brought this issue to my attention was Lawrence Langer's *Holocaust Testimonies: the Ruins of Memory,* which I had to read twice, and more in some places, to comprehend. Among other things, he speaks of survivors' silence, in the context of Holocaust survivors, of course, and basing his remarks on the Yale video collection--a different medium from the written word or the audio recording. He mentions that trying to relate the experience would be like someone going to Mars and then coming back to tell us all (a la Prufrock) about things that don't exist on Earth. Language and vocabulary become meaningless: "thirst" to someone who spent three days or more locked in a cattle car bound for Auschwitz does not have the same meaning as it does for those of us who did not live that.

The same could be said of trench warfare. Why all the sky imagery? Imagine life in the trenches where all you could see that was sort of untouched by destruction (forget smoke and flares) was the sky, the only potential relief in the subterranean landscape (cf. Paul Fussell, *The Great War and Modern Memory*). Can any of us see the same sky as they did, except through the eyes of their poetic imagination (to mix a metaphor or two)?

Up there with the irony of the officer who dedicated the war memorial and then needing to be inscribed on it, post-suicide, is the notion, of even asking what the effects were on the men. It's a sort of Keatsian negative capability, proving a negative mathematical proof: how can anyone say what life would've been like if something *hadn't* happened?

That's why I keep searching for individual voices--that's why I thank you all for yours.

Roberta

[Hedley Malloch]

I do get very annoyed with such sweeping generalisations. I find very little that was effete in the military bearing of Siegfried 'Mad Jack' Sassoon, ... (snip) ... Also, you seem to forget that Sassoon, Owen and their ilk showed enormous concern for their men (and I do NOT mean of the homosexual variety). .

The product of the local council school did not necessarily 'keep schtum'... (snip) ..I have learnt is that we cannot rely on generalisations to prove whole truths.

Kate,

What I offered was my view of how some Haig Revisonists dismissed the writings of Sassoon, Owen etc. I am not saying that I agree with them - far from it.

Of course not all products of the local council school kept quiet. Thank goodness they didn't. Equally, not all Oxbrdige graduates wrote about it. We are looking at a general pattern rather than trying to explain particular cases. Of course generalisations are not the whole truth - but they are an excellent starting point.

Hedley

[Kate Wills]

"God shoot and strafe you boy" screamed the schoolmaster at an unresponsive pupil, but his anger soon quelled. He became very apologetic and proferred small sums of money to the startled boys. Many of the teachers carried shrapnel in their bodies and suffered continual pain.

"Our ears were assailed by middle aged rage, which often made us embarrased to be in our parents company..." continues John Mortimer in his autobiography, which he is currently reading on Radio 4.

[michaeldr]

"A Quiet Life - a marine in the Great War" by Pat Francis tells the story of her father John Edward Watson

He lost an eye in battle but unfortunately and unbeknown to anyone, a small piece of bone was either missed by the doctors or subsequently broke off from the eye socket and years later (1942) this fragment entered his brain and killed him. The Death Certificate gave the cause of death as "Cardiac Failure due to stratus epilepticus due to a head wound received on active service in 1917."

Pat asks "Who knows for how many years that small piece of bone had been pressing against the front of his brain, affecting his moods. Was a lighter, easier temprement killed at Passchendaele?" and a little later she adds "What saddens me most is the seeming lack of fulfilment and joy in his life."

Pat's book is very well researched and highly recommended

Regards

Michael D.R.