Military Lunatics
127 Akt. IX.?
“Whatever may be the causes of the unpopularity of the Army amongst the lower orders, soldiering cannot be regarded as an unhealthy calling. The classes from which recruits are ordi- narily drawn are perhaps amongst the very lowest in the com- munity, and the authorities, in their efforts to render the service attractive, have the prejudice of ignorance to contend with. As a matter of fact, however, the Army should now be reasonably reckoned in the first class of vocations. The soldier may not indeed possess the same liberty of action as does the labourer of civil life, and his weekly wages may not be of equal amount; but, in return for binding himself to serve for a period of years, the soldier gains advantages entirely without the reach of civil workmen, and of a nature too the most highly prized by the lower orders. Clubs and societies, it is true, exist to some extent, which give relief to their members in case of sickness, and unions have been formed which enable the work- men to drive bargains with their masters ; but in no calling but the Army is a man equally well paid in sickness as in health, and in no other is he tended, when he falls ill, with the same amount of care. Indeed, even from the pecuniary point of view, it is doubtful whether soldiering does not contrast favourably with any civil occupation, for very few workmen can at the end of the week, when they have provided themselves with the bare necessaries of existence, put aside a sum to invest in the savings bank ; and a well-conducted soldier, after he has paid for his clothing and his food (both of which are of the best), may generally put a shilling or two into the regimental bank. The civilian, as a rule, has just too little to meet his requirements, and the soldier has slightly more than enough; and as the comforts or discomforts of existence may be mea- sured by the sufficiency or insufficiency of income, the soldier stands certainly in the better position ; added to this is a provision for old age, in the shape of a permanent pension of from ?20 to ?40 a year; so, taking all things into consideration, the soldier’s position is not unenviable, and it is plain that it can only be the prejudice of the multitude that renders recruit- getting so difficult, and causes the Government of the day so much anxiety lest the numbers of the Army should fall below those voted by Parliament.
If a soldier, however, can congratulate himself upon being sufficiently paid, upon being well fed, lodged, and clothed, and even amused, lie should be specially grateful for the care that is taken of his health. Soldiers are, as a rule, healthy, and perhaps of all diseases, those which are the least prevalent amongst them are affections of the mind. It may be?indeed no doubt it is?that the habits of a military life do not en- gender insanity, and probably those that may be predisposed to maladies of the nature cannot act more wisely than to enter the service. Military doctors may not be accepted as ranking in the highest class of the medical profession ; but they are generally intelligent, painstaking, and conscientious men, and fully equal to the performance of the ordinary duties entrusted to them.
Military lunatics must be divided into two classes?namely, officers and men. Concerning the officers there is little to be said. Insanity, unfortunately, is a disease as prevalent in the superior grades of the service as it is amongst people of a corresponding social position in civil life. It is attributable to similar causes, and is subjected to the same treatment. At one time the War Office had under its immediate patronage an asylum for the reception of lunatic officers. These officers were of course entitled to some allowance, either of the nature of half-pay or pension, and this money was set apart for their maintenance. Generally, however, an officer becoming insane had friends anxious to have the care of him, and the War Office recognising the fact that in maintaining an asylum it was legislating for a minority, removed, after a time, its military patients from the institution under its special patronage, and distributed them in ordinary establishments. The rule, there- fore, now is, that if an officer becomes a lunatic and possesses no representatives in whose charge he can be placed, the Secretary of State for War assumes the position, and uses his discretion as to the place of the patient’s detention. The Indian Government, however, retains the old system, and maintains an asylum at Ealing for Indian officers. Here the traditions of the mess room are in some degree preserved, and the inmates are consequently less isolated from the class to which they have belonged than if they had been placed in private asylums. It would apparently have been easy for the War Office and India Office to come to some arrangement by which insane officers belonging to the imperial?that is, the British ?establishment, should have been admitted into the Indian institution. Whether or not any steps have been taken by .either office with this view we are unable to state ; but it is certain that the War Office does not avail itself of any privilege that the India Office may have been willing to extend to it, and that officers who have/become insane in Her Majesty’s service are deprived of the advantages which have been very properly secured for those of the Indian Army. The want of accord between the two departments is all the more inex- plicable, for the great majcjrity of cases of insanity in the com- missioned ranks are sent home from India. A large imperial army is maintained in that country beyond the local forces, and the same class of causes?mostly exposure to the sun, or intemperance?are responsible for the cases that occur. Red tape, however, is triumphant; and, because the same officials do not control the destinies of both services, it seems impossible that there can be any unity f;if action between them.
Although the War Office does not deem it necessary to make special provision for the officers, it follows a different system in dealing with the men. When a soldier falls sick, every effort is made to attribute his illnesjs to another cause than insanity; and, if possible, the regimental authorities will discharge a lunatic who may be suffering from some ordinary inability as an invalid. This desire on iAie part of commanding officers to shirk responsibility has often resulted in great scandals; and from time to time the Press ‘lias taken up cases in which insane men have been sent adrift from the barracks to find billets where best they might. This system was indeed at one time directly encouraged by the legal authorities at the War Office, who held that the Government had no responsibility with regard to lunatics, who should be supported by the parishes of their domicile. This view was so far upheld that, after a futile effort to persuade the Parochial Board at Woolwich to accept into the workhouse several insane soldiers who were natives of that district, notice was given to the vestry clerk that the patients would be set at liberty in the High Street of the town at a certain hour on a given day, and calling upon that functionary to provide qualified persons to take charge of the men. Although the vestry clerk or his representatives did not put in an appearance, the announcement had the effect of collecting a great crowd to see what would be the result of this extra- ordinary threat. The masterly policy of inaction, however, triumphed, and the parish authorities, having ignored the mili- tary mandate, had the satisfaction of knowing that the escort had to conduct the patients back to the infirmary, from which they were in due course, we believe, removed to Grove Hall Asylum at Bow.
Grove Hall Asylum is specially maintained under official patronage for the reception of military patients; and here, when all other resources have been tried and failed, the soldier who is suffering from mania at length finds shelter. Of the ex- cellent manner in which the institution has been organised it is needless to speak. Its superintendents have been in two generations gentlemen of great discretion and experience, and the medical staff of the Asylum is composed of professional men of admitted ability. One of the best proofs of the successful treatment of the patients is the large percentage discharged either sufficiently well to be handed over to their friends, or entirely cured.
Admission to Grove Hall takes place through Net ley Hos- pital, to which place insane invalics are in the first instance sent. This arrangement is the result of fhe great majority of military lunatics being men who have been sent home from India. Latterly, however, Netley Hospital has been constituted by the War Office as a general invaliG discharge depot, and con- sequently, in the ordinary course, all soldiers who become non-effective through sickness are Torwarded to this institution. The presence of the Army Medical School at Netley Hospital of course offered facilities for the fulfilment of the formal steps which are necessary in depriving r, man of his liberty; and it was therefore ruled that soldiers becoming insane at home as well as at foreign stations should be transferred to Netley Hospital as a preliminary step to their confinement at Bow. The number of admissions of military patients of the non- commissioned ranks varies annually; but at no time can it be held, taking into consideratioL the fact that the imperial military establishment numbers 150,000 men, to be large. The average number, however, may not be taken to be much in excess of sixty cases a year; and no1 doubt official returns would show in many years the number of admissions to have been below this estimate. It is a point strongly in favour of the healthi- ness of a soldier’s calling, that insanity has such a limited existence amongst the rank and file. Much has been written about the diseases that are contracted from exposure on night duty, and the dread effects of the moral contamination to which the soldier is subjected. Drunkenness, unfortunately, is a crime as common in the Army as in civil life; but in the military and naval services, and perhaps in the services alone, an it be held that legislation directed towards sobriety has been in a measure successful. Soldiers will get drunk, and do, like other persons, but the indulgence is fraught with more personal and pecuniary inconvenience than in the case of the civilian toper. A civilian, so long as he is neither violent nor incapable, is left much to his own devices: indeed, scarcely does the law interfere in the incapable phase of inebriety; but a soldier has only to be ordinarily and harmlessly drunk to be punished, and to be violently drunk to be made an example of. As insanity is so often due, especially among men, to excessive drinking, it may be assumed that military discipline forms no ineffectual check to inebriety leading to this lamentable result, and that whatever legal right a civilian may have to drink himself mad (alas! how often is it exercised), the soldier is at least controlled and subjected to restraints which no civil law could impose. It is clear, therefore, that the comparative immunity of the Army from cases of insanity is due very much to the moral restraint to which the men are subjected, which keeps them mentally, as open-air exercise keeps them physically, in good health.
Grrove Hall is, of course, modelled on the military system. The patients are treated as soldiers, as indeed they are ; for they are not discharged from the Army till they quit the Asylum, and the habit of discipline which is carefully preserved is no unimportant principle of the treatment followed out at the institution. When a man has once learned how to obey, he seldom forgets the lesson; and the generally implicit obedience to constituted authority is naturally of great assistance to the medical authorities in exercising a control over the patients. It is not long ago that an instance occurred in which this retention of some form of military discipline was shown to be particularly useful. One of the Lunacy Commissioners?a highly-respected gentleman of literary celebrity, not long de- ceased?visited Bow Asylum in the execution of his duty, and the patients?or at least those that were in a condition to be so?were mustered in a ward of the building. The Com- missioner was anxious to send for the men in turn, and speak to them; but was persuaded by the superintendent to have them drawn up in line and inspect them a la militaire. The superintendent gave the word of command, and the men fell in and ” were brought to attention,” like the highly-trained old soldiers they mostly were. The Commissioner then commenced his interrogations; but refused to allow the superintendent to accompany him down the ranks. The first and second men having been disposed of, the Commissioner addressed the third with a genial ” Well, my good friend ! ” “Who are you calling a good friend?” roared the man, ” when you know you are talking to the Emperor of China ? ” and, with a blow straight from the shoulder, he knocked the Commissioner down.
The unfortunate gentleman was a good deal hurt and shaken, and admitted the advisability of, on future occasions, being accompanied by some one whom the patients would regard as their superior officer. But this was the last visit of that Commissioner to Bow. He shortly afterwards retired ; his retirement, we much regret to say, having been accele- rated by the unlucky episode of which he was the victim. The story, however, shows the great value of maintaining the spirit of military discipline in an institution set apart for soldier lunatics. As we have said, the average number of men dis- charged recovered from Bow is much larger proportionately than that of the cures in County Asylums. And the success in the treatment of military lunatics must be attributed to the fact that it is never forgotten that they are soldiers. The authorities of the War Office are always busily adver- tising any inducements to enlist that may exist. Although, amongst the advantages of soldiering the comparative im- munity from the disease of insanity which the service un- doubtedly enjoys is unlikely to be considered by sane recruits, yet, with parents who have children with a predisposition to maladies of the nature, the fact should weigh. If entering the Army means, as it often does, that the youth will become both mentally and physically a strong and healthy man, whereas, if he pursues one of the vocations in civil life, he will probably close his career in a lunatic asylum, it behoves all those inte- rested in the future of young men constitutionally predisposed to diseases of the brain to use their influence to persuade them to enlist. Whatever drawbacks the profession of arms may have urged against it, it cannot be accused of being an un- healthy calling. Military lunatics may be in themselves a class so numerically small as scarcely to entitle them to separate consideration ; but, for the very reason that there are comparatively so few of them, may the fact of their existence be advantageously dwelt upon. Insanity is, unfortunately, a disease which seems to gain strength as the world grows older; and, therefore, it becomes a satisfaction to point to at least one calling in which the malady is losing ground. Soldiering may not be a cure for insane people; but enlistment, no doubt, often acts as a prevention of the malady?which, according to the proverb, is more acceptable than the cure itself.
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