PTSD throughout History

[stx]

I'm looking for any books or articles that anyone has heard of that relate to post traumatic stress disorder thoughout history, especially the Civil War. I've already found a book called Shook Over Hell that pertains to this, but I need more, and I think I have an article from Living Historian Magazine, but anything will help.

Thanks for your help

[Benedict]

Re: PTSD throughout History

I would be very intersted as well!

If you have access to www.jstor.com , you should check it out - it has a lot of periodicals' articles.

[BrettKIllinois]

Re: PTSD throughout History

We (the professor and I) came up with a theory in my 200 level US History course that the temperance/prohibition movement really took off in the 1870s as a response to civil war vets self medicating with alcohal. The correlation that seemed obvious to me was research I found on Capt Tazewell Co. E 55th IL, leaving his wife and kids and starting new families, and original wifes claiming her husband was a drunk when trying to claim pensions against the 2nd or even 3rd wife also trying to claim pensions on behalf of the vet. The temperance movement often claimed that it was alcohal that was making men up and leave their families.
The interesting thing about civil war vets and ww2 vets is their peer group... many men of similar age had similar traumatic experiences. I think this mutual understanding found itself centered around the all powerful G.A.R. and later in the VFW... Vets today don't have the luxury of a strong social support network unless they stay in the military, and even there mental problems are still seen as a weakness, I do not doubt that this tradition dates back to the civil war.
So instead of talking about or working through it, there is the bottle...

Sorry for the scatterbrain thoughts but I really think that PTSD from the civil war contributed to alcohalism which contributed to strengthing the temperance movement.... Prohibition was passed as the soldiers from WWI were on the boats coming home...

[Dale Beasley]

Re: PTSD throughout History

And Brett,

The bottle is a great place to begin.

[BrettKIllinois]

Re: PTSD throughout History

It's always been there.... hmmm an idea for another group... period booze discussion... apple jack to shine and all points in between.

[Hank Trent]

Re: PTSD throughout History

We (the professor and I) came up with a theory in my 200 level US History course that the temperance/prohibition movement really took off in the 1870s as a response to civil war vets self medicating with alcohal.

Out of curiosity, have you looked at other times temperance movements increased, and looked for similar correlations? For example, there was a huge upswing in the 1850s (Maine laws), which slackened in the 1860s. Any theory on why temperance became such a focus then?

On the main topic, I'd also look at the vagabond/tramp era that came after the war as a symptom of the same thing. For example:

The custom has grown up in the United States during the last thirty years. [This is the 1890s.] Before the Civil War there were comparatively few tramps in America, and practically no railroad tramps. After the war there suddenly appeared on the scene a large class of men who had become so enamoured of camp life that they found it impossible to return to quiet living, and they took to wandering about the country. Source.

Hank Trent
hanktrent@voyager.net

[lukegilly13]

Re: PTSD throughout History

On my ggggrandfather's pension papers (58th VA Vol Inf. Co. E.) he complains of headaches and heart races caused by stress.
Also, my ggggrandfather on the other side served as in the 64th VA after working his way up from a scrub (Ira Creech). Family tradition puts him sleeping with a pistol the rest of his life and basically becoming a "mean ol' miser" (my great grandmother's actual words at age 100...not sure if she was speaking from experience and memory or from memory of story but she did overlap a few years next door to him). Story has it that even his wife would not stay in the same room with him because "he was mean as hell" (again quoting my grandmother).
Now, referencing my personal brain and highly valued opinion (at least by me)....
The same things that causes PTSD now were there then. Now whether "johnny came marching home" and went to a Dr. and the Dr. used the term PTSD I dont' know....not sure when that phrase was termed. This is one thing I feel comforted in saying....the causes were definatly there. The men were human (just as soldiers are now)....anyone who endures what soldiers do and see what soldiers have to see are entitled to some post traumatic stress....whether a disorder develops is up to the terminology of a dr. diagnosis....
My opinion, they deserve a few beers! All we can do is hope they can move on and we (as a country) should take care of them if they can't...again, they've earned it!

Question for Mr. Beasley,
In your experience with medical activity in combat...could desertion be a result of PTSD? For instance, if a soldier sees or does something horrible...beyond the imagination of folks who have never been "there".....and the fellow just can't take it anymore and he bolts....he fails to report back from leave (pardon my lack of knowledge to ways a modern soldier could skip duty) or something....have you ever seen PTSD argued as a reason to avoid a dishonorable discharge or PTSD diagnosed as a reason for discharge? Reasoning: If so, then one could argue that desertions (not before a battle) post major battle or within the duration could be the result of fear and anxiety caused by too much time in the s***....and indeed, although not termed...could be PTSD in soldiers who had not yet been discharged.

[Hank Trent]

Re: PTSD throughout History

On the topic of desertion, here's a transcription of a letter that Patrick Lewis sent me recently, talking about a man I portrayed last summer in 1869, the former Colonel S D Bruce. One thing that puzzled me about Bruce was that he apparently suffered from heart problems in his forties, yet went on to lead a full, active life, not suffering any apparent disability until a stroke shortly before he died in 1902. In the days before modern medicine, that seemed remarkable, but this letter explains it.

While I don't think this would fit the DSM-IV definition of post-traumatic stress, since it happened too close to the inciting incident, it's an example of how a stress-caused reaction was spoken about in the period. And it also points out the complexity and irony of defining behavior using two different models: moral (cowardice) vs. medical (anxiety reaction), both of which apply. It was written by Col. Buckner, about Col. Bruce, after Shiloh:

Our Col [Bruce] has gone home *sick*. Genl Nelson says *threatened *with sickness – and that it was strange that he was never *threatened * until the day of the fight. He also says that we will not come back any more, and may other things going to show his slight opinion of him. Among other things he remarked in speaking of him "that he lost his head during the fight" & would stare at the enemy like a foolish man not having presence of mind enough to comprehend any order given. Nelson has no hesitation in saying that he rendered us no assistance during the fight & was of no account as a commander. For myself I believe him & have for some time believe him to be a coward and the fact that he left his brigade about 11 oclock in the morning of the fight, & did not return until that night after the fight was over & we were in Camp, and then only stayed a few minutes, but went to the landing and went on board a steamboat & went to Savannah & did not return until the next day about noon, although we expected a fight at day on Sunday morning are in my opinion facts sufficient to cashier him if brought to light. All this may not be cowardice, but I would not like to have so acted: Where he went when he left the field I dont know, but I have heard from various sources that he went to a hospital in the rear. Of course I would not have any thing that I might say repeated, but my opinion is firmly made up about him. And on Sunday night we marched up on the bank where the enemy lay not three hundred yards from us, expecting on the morrow to make the most desperate struggle ever made by human beings with every prospect of a defeat. I told Hanson that I knew he (B) was a fool and no gentleman and believed him to be a coward. Whether I was correct in my opinion may be determined by others.

Hank Trent
hanktrent@voyager.net

[Dale Beasley]

Re: PTSD throughout History

Luke, I am not really sure of your question.

This past week I had to take a kid to the VA for 30 days in-house treatment. This kid that I taught in Boy Scouts who just got back a year ago, had a total brain shutdown. He had a total blank look on his face, much the same look I saw from the boys that we treated who had just gotten off the front. He just wanted to put a "gun in his mouth" and he would not say another word.

I am not sure on the treatment, but he needs a rebooting., of such.

[Elaine Kessinger]

Re: PTSD throughout History

Some thoughts...but first, the experiences that led to them: My mother's mother was a nurse during WWII with the army, when she returned from service she helped to expand the mental health section (specifically "re-adjustment" section) in her area, and worked there as a mental health nurse for over 30 years. My mother found her way into social work as a community organizer, and one of the groups she was most proud of helping, held closest to her heart, was the Viet'Nam era vets who were living with PTSD and the loved ones who were trying to understand. I grew up overhearing discussions of treatments, without disclosing names they would speak of cases, & ect.
...some things were noticed about the gents as they returned: 1)they were reluctant to speak of their experiences with people who had not shared their experiences. That could be why the vets sought other vets, rather than a father, uncle, mother, or wife...and this hurt the families very much and led to distrust, arguments, and turning from society and social network , "you can't know what inhumane things I was asked/forced to do, you weren't there, and if you were there and understand, you're a crazy as I am, and I don't want anything to do with crazy people..."
2)they exhibited complusive behavior with saftey, checking the doors and windows several times, sitting with backs to the walls so "no one can sneak up on them", insisting on caller ID but listing themselves as "Unknown Caller", grilling the clerk about why they need the survey info... "what's the food for, Gramps, it's a 2 hour drive to Auntie's? well, you never know how long you'll really be gone."
3)the men who returned from war were different from the men who left, and the women they returned to were different from the women they left. This was the subject of countless discussions, much heart-break, from the families... the soldier spent the whole war dreaming of the innocent, witty, beautiful, happy families they left, not realizing the families have stepped up to fill the roles the men have left, the caos of the economy has made sacrifice nesseccary, the sheer magnitude of the "death lists" have killed the happiness... "no innocence here, aren't you proud of your strong heroine?" ...and the reality of the war vet the families got back versus the hero they expected back is a shock too. "if you knew the things I've done, you wouldn't call me any hero" "you're a little girl/lady, I'm not supposed to talk about stuff like that or use that language around a girl/lady"
All these we heard after every war, from every vet... I'm sure some folks will find letters from our era detailing similar experiences...
So you know, pre-WWI the clinical term was often malingering (although malingering has a different definition now), in G'ma's era shell-shock, then by Mom's era PTSD. Maybe this book will help:

http://search.barnesandnoble.com/Flashback/Penny-Coleman/e/9780807050408/?itm=8

there's another out there by a woman who was a nurse in Viet Nam, who worked with PTSD when she returned, but I can't remember the title.:(
Anyways..I'm sorry about the novella, I hope it was helpful in some way. ...and when our heros in Iraq start coming back to us, try to be open to who they are now, not who they were when they left us, and help is out there, make use of it, you aren't alone.

[Becky Morgan]

Re: PTSD throughout History

I can't find the citation at the moment, but one of my great-great-uncles, James Franklin Ste(a)dman, of Lancaster, Ohio, probably the J.F. Steadman listed in the 3rd Ohio, showed marked symptoms of some mental illness after his return from the war. He eventually committed suicide after publishing a pamphlet making a number of odd statements about the reasons for and conduct of the war. He may have been another victim of "blue mass", or it may have been PTSD, or both.

[BrettKIllinois]

Re: PTSD throughout History

I'd love to read the pamphlet

[MickCole]

Re: PTSD throughout History

Not directly relevant to Mr. Lincoln's War, but I highly recommend "Achilles in Vietnam" by Jonathan Shay as background reading for better understanding PTSD. Also, a study of photographs of Civil War soldiers known to have been in combat may be helpful. I have often noted a difference of expression between those who have not been in combat and those who have, perhaps most notably the 1000-yard that is one of the symptoms of my own struggles with PTSD. I can certainly relate to the heavy drinking mentioned in some posts in this thread, as I was one of those who drank heavily after my own return from flying a few hundred combat missions in Vietnam. As described by my VA psychologist, I was almost certainly self-medicating, and not an alcoholic, as I can now have one or two drinks without any temptation to drink more.
Mick Cole
37th VA Co. E

[stx]

Re: PTSD throughout History

Thanks for all of the great information. I have an uncle who suffers from PTSD after serving in Vietnam and when I was younger I was always very perplexed by it, I didn't really understand it and this led me to want to do some research on it. I find the connection to the temperance movement also very thought provocking and I thank you for bringing it up. Thanks again to anyone who provided information.

[Becky Morgan]

Re: PTSD throughout History

I'd love to read the pamphlet

I might...or might not, judging by the excerpts the Rev. Melvin Stedman had in his genealogy (which I have but can't find at the moment either!) Supposedly, the historical society in Lancaster has/had a copy circa 1990. I haven't been out there to see whether they still have it or not.