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Art Therapy with Military Veterans

Art Therapy with Military Veterans: Trauma and the Image provides a compre-
hensive framework for understanding and applying art therapy with former
and serving armed forces personnel who have Post-​Traumatic Stress Disorder
(PTSD). This book brings together experienced contributors in one volume
to provide the range of information essential to those seeking to understand
the complexities of working in this context.
In recent years, art therapy has received increasing attention as a promis-
ing treatment for veterans with PTSD. This cutting-​edge book provides vital
background information on PTSD, military culture and mental health provi-
sion, and an effective art therapy working model. The text explores creative
partnerships with other disciplines, in different settings, and includes first-​
hand accounts from veterans about the role art therapy has played in their
recovery. This accessible book is a timely response to growing recognition of
the value of art therapy with veterans, and it also addresses issues relevant to
the wider population of people whose lives have been detrimentally affected
by trauma.
With chapters authored by leading clinicians in this field, Art Therapy with
Military Veterans: Trauma and the Image will be of interest to all art thera-
pists and mental health professionals working with traumatised veterans.

Janice Lobban is Senior Art Psychotherapist at Combat Stress. She has spe-
cialised in military trauma for over 16 years, and has lectured on the subject in
London, Stockholm, Amsterdam, St Petersburg and New York.
Art Therapy with Military
Veterans

Trauma and the Image

Edited by Janice Lobban

First published 2018
by Routledge
2 Park Square, Milton Park, Abingdon, Oxon OX14 4RN
and by Routledge
711 Third Avenue, New York, NY 10017
Routledge is an imprint of the Taylor & Francis Group, an informa business
© 2018 selection and editorial matter, Janice Lobban; individual chapters, the contributors
The right of the editor to be identified as the author of the editorial material, and of the
authors for their individual chapters, has been asserted in accordance with sections 77 and 78
of the Copyright, Designs and Patents Act 1988.
All rights reserved. No part of this book may be reprinted or reproduced or utilised in any
form or by any electronic, mechanical, or other means, now known or hereafter invented,
including photocopying and recording, or in any information storage or retrieval system,
without ­permission in writing from the publishers.
Trademark notice: Product or corporate names may be trademarks or registered trademarks,
and are used only for identification and explanation without intent to infringe.
British Library Cataloguing in Publication Data
A catalogue record for this book is available from the British Library
Library of Congress Cataloging in Publication Data
Names: Lobban, Janice, editor.
Title: Art therapy with military veterans : trauma and the image /
edited by Janice Lobban.
Description: 1st edition. | Milton Park, Abingdon, Oxon ; New York, NY :
Routledge, 2018. | Includes index.
Identifiers: LCCN 2017023468 (print) | LCCN 2017024661 (ebook) |
ISBN 9781315564197 (ebook) | ISBN 9781317189787 (ebook) |
ISBN 9781317189770 (ebook) | ISBN 9781317189763 (ebook) |
ISBN 9781138654549 (hbk) | ISBN 9781138654556 (pbk) | ISBN 9781315564197 (ebk)
Subjects: LCSH: Post-traumatic stress disorder–Treatment. | Art therapy. | Veterans.
Classification: LCC RC552.P67 (ebook) | LCC RC552.P67 A78 2018 (print) |
DDC 616.89/1656008697–dc23
LC record available at https://lccn.loc.gov/2017023468
ISBN: 978-​1-​138-​65454-​9 (hbk)
ISBN: 978-​1-​138-​65455-​6 (pbk)
ISBN: 978-​1-​315-​56419-​7 (ebk)
Typeset in Times New Roman
by Out of House Publishing
This book is dedicated to all veterans who have been
psychologically wounded through military service. In particular, to
those who have sought the help of Combat Stress over its long
history, pursuing peace of mind.
Contents

List of figures ix
List of plates xi
Foreword
dr val huet xii
Contributors xiii
Acknowledgements xv

Introduction 1
Janice Lobban

PART I
Art therapy and Post-​Traumatic Stress Disorder 7
1 The development and practice of art therapy with military veterans 9
Janice Lobban

2 An Army Reservist’s story 26

Clement Boland

3 The biological basis of Post-​Traumatic Stress Disorder and recovery 43

Kathy Kravits

PART I I
The British Forces 61

4 Mental health treatment for serving UK military personnel 63

Jamie Hacker Hughes

5 Military culture effects on mental health and help-​seeking 73

Walter Busuttil
viii Contents

6 Coming home 89
Robert Bieber, Michael Sterba and
Christine Sterba

PA RT I I I
Current approaches to art therapy with
veterans in the UK 101

7 An adaptive art therapy model for working with

traumatised veterans 103
Janice Lobban, Kirsty Mackay, Mark Redgrave
and Sandya Rajagopal

8 In two minds 126

Janice Lobban

9 Trauma and dissociation: an insider’s view 140

Richard Kidgell

10 Bypassing the sentinel 152

Janice Lobban

11 Research and evaluation 167

Alison Smith and Janice Lobban

PA RT I V
Taking a wider perspective 181

12 Cultural collaborations 183

Janice Lobban and Liz Ellis

13 Art in action: the Combat Art Project 202

Jon England, Tim Martin and Stuart Rosamond

14 Reclaiming life through art 215

David Murtagh and Janice Lobban

Index 227
Figures

All unattributed figures and plates were created by veterans as part of art
therapy sessions.
1.1 Over the Top by John Nash (1918) 10
1.2 Shelling Back Areas: Where Did That One Go?
by Adrian Hill (1918) 12
1.3 The Hydra, December 1917, drawing titled Shell Shock! 14
1.4 Nightmare 14
2.1 Minotaur by Clement Boland 39
2.2 Woman and Child by Clement Boland 40
6.1 Scenes from our Curative Centre, Tyrwhitt House (1949) 92
6.2 The Paras Bury their Dead (1982) 95
7.1 Evolution of Recovery 111
7.2 Transformation 112
7.3 Broken Links 112
7.4 Tool Belt 113
7.5 Safe Place by Mike 115
7.6 Perceptions by Mike reproduced by Kirsty Mackay 116
7.7 Balance by Mike reproduced by Kirsty Mackay 118
7.8 Resources/​Heart of Gold by Mike 119
9.1 Left and Right by Richard Kidgell 147
9.2 Mind and Body by Richard Kidgell 148
9.3 The General by Richard Kidgell 149
9.4 Dead Eye by Richard Kidgell 150
10.1 Pin Box 153
10.2 Mask 1 by John 156
10.3 Mask 2 by John 157
10.4 Mask 1 by Steve 157
10.5 Mask 1 by Brian 158
10.6 Mask 2 by Brian 159
10.7 Inner Saboteur by John 161
10.8 My Mind by Rob 162
x List of figures

12.1 Frozen Clocks 192

12.2 Change in the Wind 195
12.3 The Lightbox 195
13.1 A Combat Art Project art kit 203
13.2 Decorated Cup by Marine Conway 208

Table
7.1 A selection of commonly used art therapy themes 110
Plates

1.1 Hope
2.1 Clone Trooper by Clement Boland
2.2 Camel Train by Clement Boland
7.1 Balance/​Green Man
7.2 Patterns/​Wooden Heart Image by Mike
7.3 Patterns/​Wooden Heart Poem by Mike
8.1 Past and Present by Simon
8.2 In Two Minds by Vic
8.3 Looking on From a Distance by Richard
9.1 Taffy the Friendly Dragon by Richard Kidgell
10.1 Mask 2 by Steve
10.2 Joint Image by Ian and Janice Lobban
12.1 Smudge’s Universe
13.1 Land Rover Silhouetted Against a Sunset by Captain Morgan
(left) and Marine Lowry (right)
14.1 Swans by Spike
14.2 A City Garden by Ron
Foreword

In recent years, there has been growing awareness of the devastating impact
of Post-​Traumatic Stress Disorder (PTSD) on veterans’ lives. There is increas-
ing recognition that PTSD affects not only the veterans themselves but also
their families and friends, and that providing the right help at the right time
can make a profound difference to many lives. Through practice, research
and partnership work with veterans, clinicians from a variety of backgrounds
are developing a better understanding of which approaches and methods can
really help improve the experience of living with PTSD.
It is therefore a great honour to write the foreword to this book as it offers the
most moving and comprehensive descriptions of the reality of life with PTSD,
and introduces best practice in this area. Since 2004, I have had some involve-
ment with Combat Stress, initially to provide staff support groups and more
recently as Jan Lobban’s supervisor. I therefore feel a strong connection to its
work and mission. Veterans are at the heart of this book as active contributors
and this is one of the core strengths of this publication. Another strength is
the high quality of experiences that all contributors have shared, and how this
reflects a profound dedication and passion for this subject. Chapters introducing
historical, cultural and psycho-​social issues, and outlining the complex interplay
between these issues, add a welcome depth of understanding. Those on research
and partnership work illustrate excellent, innovative practice. The contribution
of art therapy to improving veterans’ lives is particularly poignant: sometimes,
finding words to describe internal states is virtually impossible, especially when
clients have been so well trained to keep guard over thoughts and feelings.
Importantly, emerging research evidence indicates that trauma and PTSD
are often present in the lives of mental health service users who have been
given other diagnoses. Therefore, this book addresses issues relevant not only
to veterans with PTSD, but to a much larger group of people whose lives have
also been affected detrimentally. As such, art therapy is seen to offer hope in
the shape of excellent practice, developed from always putting clients at the
forefront of its evolution, and steeped in a compassionate understanding of
the need to alleviate distress.
Dr Val Huet
CEO of the British Association of Art Therapists
Contributors

Robert Bieber MBE, MA, Visiting Research Fellow in the Department of War
Studies at King’s College, London and a Vice President of Combat Stress.
Clement Boland, previously a Territorial Army Reservist mobilised into the
Regular Army as an infantryman, now an art and design student.
Dr Walter Busuttil, MBChB MPhil MRCGP FRCPsych. Consultant
Psychiatrist and Medical Director, Combat Stress.
Liz Ellis, BA(Hons), MA, MA, RMN. Policy Advisor Communities and
Diversity at Heritage Lottery Fund, UK where she leads on promot-
ing inclusive practice across the heritage sector. As Curator Community
Learning at Tate Modern 2006–​2014, Liz led high-​quality local, national
and international partnerships.
Jon England, artist, exploring traces of history.
Professor Jamie Hacker Hughes, BSc(Hons), DipClinPsychol, MPhil(Cantab),
MSc, PsychD, CPsychol, CSci, FBPsS, FRSM, FAcSS, is a clinical psych-
ologist, clinical neuropsychologist, psychotherapist and academic. He
is former senior clinical lecturer at King’s College London, Head of
Defence Clinical Psychology and Defence Consultant Advisor to the
Surgeon General. He co-​founded the Veterans and Families Institute and
Veterans Research Hub at Anglia Ruskin University. He is visiting profes-
sor at Anglia Ruskin, Hertfordshire and Northumbria Universities, hon-
orary professor at Lomonosov Moscow State University and is a former
President of the British Psychological Society.
Richard Kidgell, IEng, MIET, retired Principal Systems Engineer.
Kathy Kravits, MA, RN, HNB-​BC, LPC, NCC, ATR-​BC, Senior Research
Specialist, City of Hope Comprehensive Cancer Center, Duarte, California,
USA.
Janice Lobban, BA(Hons), PG Dip. AT, BAAT, HCPC reg., PG Cert. Research
Methods, Cert. Trauma Studies, Cert. Psychotherapy for Dissociation,
EMDR Therapist. Senior Art Psychotherapist at Combat Stress, super-
visor, lecturer BAAT foundation course and in private practice.
xiv List of contributors

Kirsty Mackay, MSc, BAAT & HCPC reg. artist and Art Psychotherapist at
Combat Stress.
Tim Martin, independent artist/​curator.
David Murtagh, BSc(Hons), MSc (War and Psychiatry), BAOT. Lead
Occupational Therapist formerly with Combat Stress now with HM Prison
Service, Barnet, Enfield and Haringey Mental Health NHS Trust.
Sandya Rajagopal, HCPC reg. Art Psychotherapist based at Birmingham and
Solihull Mental Health NHS Foundation Trust.
Mark Redgrave, BA(Hons), MSc, BAAT, MBACP & HCPC reg. Art
Psychotherapist at Combat Stress and in private practice.
Stuart Rosamond, retired Head of Higher Education Fine Art, Plymouth
University.
Alison Smith, BA(Hons), BSc(Hons), MSc, RN (Mental Health), Field Lead
Mental Health, School of Health Sciences, University of Surrey.
Christine Sterba, RGN. Retired army trained nurse (C344), Red Cross officer
(Hong Kong), former trustee Combat Stress.
Michael Sterba, Professional soldier/​medic for 26 years, retired fruit farmer,
chairman Staple Branch TRBL, ancient building conservationist.
newgenprepdf

Acknowledgements

This book has been a cross-​disciplinary, multifaceted project and a tremen-

dous privilege to co-​ordinate. I thank all the contributors who have shared
their inspirational ideas and experiences. Special thanks go to the veteran con-
tributors who have permitted their stories and images to be used to explain
the art therapy process, bringing it to life.
My sincere gratitude goes to my daughter Rosemary Lobban, who played a
key role in the production of this book. Her expertise has been invaluable. My
appreciation also goes to Tom Jenkins for his assistance with imagery editing.
We are all part of wider systems and I acknowledge the influence of my
family, past and present, in the motivation and development of this book.
First, I have valued the ongoing, sincere encouragement and practical sup-
port of my husband Andy Lobban, and the cheering-​ on received from
our sons Tom and Alex. Undoubtedly, my interest in the military context
has been influenced by family experiences. Between them, my grandfather,
father, uncles and nephews served in the British Army, Royal Navy and RAF
Regiment in major campaigns over the last century. I am custodian of some
of their medals, tangible symbols of personal stories of those no longer with
us. Moreover, I am also indebted to those inextricably connected with the
stories, although they did not wear uniforms –​the women who held my fam-
ily together on the home front. Similarly, this text represents the silent stories
of many others.
Introduction
Janice Lobban

I rang the doorbell of the large Victorian country house. It was 11 September
2001 and I was at the ex-​services mental health charity in Surrey for a job
interview. Later that day the world was to change when members of the mil-
itant Islamist group al-​Qaeda, under the leadership of Osama bin Laden,
made suicide attacks in the US that resulted in the death of almost 3,000
people. This included flying hijacked planes into the twin towers of the World
Trade Center in New York City. The psychological effects rippled out across
the nation and the world to those not directly involved in the event. The US
Government responded to the attacks by launching the ‘War on Terror’; its
eventual consequences significantly impacting the ex-​services charity Combat
Stress.
The door was opened by a veteran who warmly invited me in. I found
myself in a congenial foyer area with five veterans reading newspapers or just
sitting. They were interested in why I was there and good humoured banter
ensued. This was so familiar as it reminded me of being with my father and
uncles, who had all served in the Second World War but never spoke about
it. I sat in a comfortable armchair with the friendly and curious men while
waiting to be called in for my interview. Little did I know that I would still
be working there 16 years later. As it was, I managed to arrive just in time to
experience the end of an era. The second Gulf War in Iraq, involving the UK
military Operation Telic and UK Operation Herrick in Afghanistan were yet
to occur. In due course, I was to discover that three of the five veterans I met
in the reception area that day had been Far Eastern prisoners of war during
the Second World War, and as such, were held in the highest regard by other
veterans. Sometime later I was privileged to be able to explore their experi-
ences with them through their art therapy imagery.
As I was shown around on that day, I noticed old photographs of veterans
engaged in recuperative tasks and portraits of the royal patron and benefac-
tors. I was gaining a sense of history not only related to the organisation but
of tapping into something much broader and intriguing. A few days later,
I was offered and accepted the job. Combat Stress had not employed an art
therapist before, so it was new ground for both parties. I read around the
2 Janice Lobban

subject of Post-​Traumatic Stress Disorder (PTSD), as specific art therapy lit-

erature was sparse, and I learned much by looking outside of the profession
to trauma-​focused treatments. The knowledge gained from my previous years
of experience as an art therapist was not all directly transferable to this new
context. It was also necessary to gain an understanding of military culture.
Mostly I recall the encouraging support of colleagues and willingness of the
veterans to ‘give art therapy a go’.
Veterans who have been physically or psychologically injured through ser-
vice are the responsibility of the National Health Service (NHS). Currently
art therapy is not available routinely through NHS specialist veteran mental
health services. So, the art therapy approach offered in this text centres on the
model developed at Combat Stress. There has been an increase in the number
of combat-​related casualties in recent years due to UK involvement in both
the Iraq and Afghanistan conflicts. Consequently, it is likely that many NHS
and independent therapists will receive veteran referrals over time and will
seek literature to inform practice. Consequently, the aim of this book is to col-
late into a single volume the range of information essential to those seeking
to understand the complexities of working with traumatised veterans. Key
objectives are to increase awareness of the unique benefits of art therapy with
military veterans, and to equip clinicians with an effective working model.
As a profession, art therapy is rooted in the regeneration following the
Second World War. In order to set the context, the first section of the book
provides an overview of the development and practice of art therapy within
military rehabilitation and also provides an explanation of the neuroscience
behind PTSD. Possible effects of hearing war stories and the concept of vicar-
ious traumatisation are also explored as part of the discussion around work-
ing in this context.
Veterans have played a core part in the book’s production. There are two
chapters written by veterans about their experiences of PTSD and the part
that art therapy has played in their recovery, as well as two chapters written
by veterans in collaboration with other contributors. Chapter 2, by veteran
Clement Boland, provides an invaluable glimpse into his experience of com-
bat trauma as an Army Reserve soldier. Army Reserves ‘come from all walks
of life and work part-​time as soldiers for the British Army alongside full-​time
Regular soldiers’ (‘The Army Reserve’, 2016). Recent UK studies suggest that
‘after deployment reservists are more likely to suffer from probable PTSD
and psychological distress than regular forces’ (Hunt, Wessely, Jones, Rona &
Greenberg, 2014, p. 10). With current Government plans to reduce the num-
ber of regular soldiers and to increase the number of Reservists (Edmunds,
Dawes, Higate, Jenkings & Woodward, 2016), it is important for mental health
service providers to have an awareness of their particular needs in order to be
able to offer appropriate treatment and support when required.
The following chapter, by Kathy Kravits, incorporates the account of vet-
eran Clement Boland’s lived experience of stress to explain the underlying
 Introduction 3

biological mechanisms in play, differentiating between PTSD and the adap-

tive stress response. A recently developed model that integrates the concepts
of homeostasis, allostasis and stress is presented, along with current thinking
about PTSD. Consideration is given to the part art therapy can play in recov-
ery from PTSD, drawing on ideas from neuroscience and from attachment
theory.
Part II of the book is dedicated to providing background information about
the British Armed Forces to increase necessary understanding. Professor
Jamie Hacker Hughes equips readers with essential knowledge about UK
mental health provision within a serving military context. Beginning with an
historical perspective, the chapter describes how services have evolved into
the current provision. This is followed by a study of ‘Military culture effects
on mental health and help-​seeking’ by Dr Walter Busuttil, Medical Director
of Combat Stress. This covers a range of influential factors including the
uniqueness of the military population, psychological effects of military train-
ing, and moral injury. The section closes with the chapter ‘Coming home’.
Military historian Robert Bieber provides a brief history of the early years
of Combat Stress from its establishment in 1919 in response to the plight of
traumatised veterans demobilised after the First World War. This is followed
by personal accounts written by Falklands War veteran Michael Sterba and
his wife Christine Sterba, which allow readers to gain insight into the pro-
cesses of injury and recovery, and the effects on families.
With the contextual foundation laid, Part III focuses on current approaches
to art therapy with veterans using case studies to illustrate the processes in
action. It begins with a chapter written by the Combat Stress art therapy
team: Janice Lobban, Kirsty Mackay, Mark Redgrave and Sandya Rajagopal,
with a detailed description of the adaptive art therapy model used in all the
short-​stay, inpatient programmes at all three treatment centres across the UK.
A phasic, theme-​based approach is discussed and an art therapy ‘toolbox’ of
techniques is outlined, suggesting what might be integrated from established
evidence-​based trauma approaches to assist treatment.
Chapters 8, 9 and 10 explore particular aspects of art therapy with veterans.
‘In two minds’ examines psychological divisions and disharmony revealed
through art therapy imagery. Different frameworks of understanding are
considered including the effects of dissociative processes, the way trauma
memories are stored and the influence of military culture. Subsequently,
veteran Richard Kidgell writes about ‘Trauma and dissociation:​an insider’s
view’, describing his dissociative experiences and how art therapy is helping
to re-​integrate the traumatised aspects of his personality back into a com-
plete sense of self. Through first-​hand experience, the benefits gained from
art therapy are compared with those from talking therapies. Next ‘Bypassing
the sentinel’ discusses an outpatient research pilot designed to investigate
how art therapy might help to overcome avoidance and assist therapeutic
engagement. A sensitised psychological sentinel, always on guard and driven
4 Janice Lobban

by threat perception, can present a significant barrier to progress, preventing

access to material essential for growth and repair. Results of the study suggest
that through symbolic expression participants were able to ‘trick’ their own
defences into exposing the crux of their inner conflict, and to use the insights
gained to challenge perceptions and to begin to see their own material from
fresh perspectives.
Drawing this section of the book to a close, ‘Research and evaluation’
by Alison Smith and Janice Lobban underlines the opportunity for creative
research partnerships whereby differing theoretical stances might provide
enriching collaborative studies. A literature review of published research into
art therapy with veterans is provided. Proven benefits of art therapy are high-
lighted and recommendations are made for further research.
The final section of the book, Part IV, builds on the idea of partnership
working and also takes a wider perspective of the therapeutic benefits of art-​
making and art-​viewing. ‘Cultural collaborations’ written by Janice Lobban
and Liz Ellis, looks beyond the art therapy room to working with colleagues
from other disciplines and in different settings. Discussing a long-​standing
collaboration between Combat Stress and Tate Modern, treatment object-
ives and outcomes are explored and placed within the wider context of art
therapists working with museums and galleries. This chapter also includes a
discussion of a pilot short-​stay art therapy inpatient admission with gallery
workshops, and the subject of exhibiting art therapy images in public places
based on three exhibitions.
In Chapter 13, Jon England, Tim Martin and Stuart Rosamond discuss the
‘Combat Art Project’. In 2013, 500 arts and crafts sets were given to mem-
bers of 40 Commando Royal Marines when they deployed to Afghanistan
for their final tour, with the aim of supporting their emotional well-​being
through creativity. There was also potential to serve a preventative function
whereby expression and processing of experiences as they occurred might
positively impact future outcomes. The project provided a new perspective on
‘war art’, the ultimate aim being to encourage the provision of such resources
as ‘standard issue’ for all forces personnel. The final chapter is written by
David Murtagh and Janice Lobban, in collaboration with two veterans who
describe the role that art-​making has played in their lives as part of recovery
from PTSD. The text pays homage to the healing properties of art using a
model of post-​traumatic growth to explore how creativity through art can
help veterans to reclaim life after trauma.
Currently, as I stand in the art therapy room at Tyrwhitt House looking
out of the patio doors, I can make out the shape of past ground work just
below the surface of the lawn; a kitchen garden that used to provide fresh
produce and an area where veterans tended pigs (Figure 6.1). So it is that
spaces change in function as requirements develop. During this century, there
has been progression away from the enhanced respite care offered to veterans
towards providing evidence-​based psychological treatment. Combat Stress
 Introduction 5

received a 71 per cent increase in referrals between 2010/​2011 and 2015/​2016

(‘Combat Stress sees 71% increase in referrals’, 2016). Necessarily, the organi-
sation has evolved to meet that need. Some of the men and women who come
for art therapy now are young enough to be great-​grandchildren of those vet-
erans who welcomed me at the outset of my time at Combat Stress, but their
stories echo. This book is the product of those stories.

References
The Army Reserve (2016). Retrieved from www.army.mod.uk/​reserve/​31781.aspx.
Combat Stress sees 71% increase in referrals (2016, 9 September). Retrieved from www.
combatstress.org.uk/​news/​2016/​09/​combat-​stress-​sees-​71-​increase-​in-​referrals/​.
Edmunds, T., Dawes, A., Higate, P., Jenkings, K. N. & Woodward, R. (2016). Reserve
forces and the transformation of British military organisation: soldiers, citizens and
society. Defence Studies, 16(2), 118–​136.
Hunt, E. J. F., Wessely, S., Jones, N., Rona, R. J. & Greenberg, N. (2014). The men-
tal health of the UK Armed Forces: where facts meet fiction. European Journal
of Psychotraumatology, 5. Retrieved from www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/​pmc/​articles/​
PMC4138705/​pdf/​EJPT-​5-​23617.pdf.
Part I

Art therapy and

Post-​Traumatic Stress
Disorder
Chapter 1

The development and practice of

art therapy with military veterans
Janice Lobban

Introduction
Art therapy is rooted in the regeneration that followed the Second World War.
Since then, the profession has thrived, spreading out into a variety of con-
texts. Beginning at the roots of art therapy in the UK, this chapter follows the
branch of its evolution associated with the armed forces up to contemporary
practice. Attention is given to the use of art as part of rehabilitation in mili-
tary hospitals, and connections are made with the growth of art therapy at
the UK veterans’ mental health charity Combat Stress. Currently, Combat
Stress is a key provider of art therapy within specialist veterans’ services.
Remembrance and ritual are seen to play a part in recovery, and to provide a
way for the wider public to acknowledge the sacrifices made through military
service. The focus is then turned towards art therapists working within the
field of trauma, and the benefits and challenges of working in this context are
explored. The possible effects of war stories, the concept of vicarious trau-
matisation and the likelihood of encountering prejudice towards the military
are all examined as part of the complexities of working with this client group.

War art to art therapy

On the bitterly cold morning of 30 December 1917, the 1st Artists Rifles
were ordered to push forward at Welsh Ridge, Marcoing towards Cambrai,
in response to an attack. Of the 80 men present, 68 were soon killed by a
barrage of machine gun fire. One of the 12 survivors was John Nash, who
captured the experience in the officially commissioned painting Over the Top
a few months later (Figure 1.1). The exhausted unit had been recalled from
rest at the support line and had to mount the hurried counter-​attack upon
arrival at the front line, with tragic consequences. The painting is unusual as
it captures an actual event (Clark, 2014).
It is the vulnerability of the hunched soldiers going ‘over the top’ that
seems so shocking as they walk forwards exposed to enemy fire. They stand
out clearly against the whiteness of the snow with no shields or armour to
10 Janice Lobban

Figure 1.1 Over the Top by John Nash (1918)

Source: with kind permission of the Imperial War Museum.

protect them, only ‘tin hats’. Their weapons are not raised to fire and one
soldier is carrying his rifle on his shoulder. Already several soldiers have
been shot. One soldier kneels slumped, his helmet on the ground in front of
him, having barely left the trench. His comrades’ focus is forwards, with no
attention given to those falling around them. The painting serves as a chill-
ing reminder of the great loss of life experienced by all sides, the sacrifice of
individuals, and the inevitable consequences on families and communities.
What was to become the Artists Rifle Regiment was established in 1860
as part of the Volunteer Corps. Its early headquarters were at the Royal
Academy, Burlington House. Founder members included artists G. F. Watts,
John Everett Millais, William Holman Hunt, Edward Burne-​ Jones and
William Morris. Frederick Leighton was one of the early commanders and
John Ruskin was an honorary member. The Volunteer Corps was raised in
1859 in response to the threat of French invasion. Initially there seemed to
be more of a social function to the Artists Rifles than military. However, by
1914 the regiment had become an officer training corps and its membership
had broadened to include many other professions. Artists who served in the
regiment during the Great War of 1914–​1918 included Paul Nash, sculptor
Frank Dobson, poet Wilfred Owen and playwright R. C. Sherriff. The Artists
 Art therapy with military veterans 11

Rifles were disbanded in 1945, reformed in 1947 and currently form part of
the Special Air Service Reserves (Christiansen, 2014; ‘Unit history: 21 Artist
Rifles’, n.d.).
Both John Nash and his elder brother Paul became commissioned as
official war artists. Paul Nash’s powerful paintings of devastated battlefield
landscapes have become iconic of the era. The British government’s War
Propaganda Bureau first set up a war artist’s scheme in 1916. By 1917, the
remit had changed from propaganda to recording and memorialising events.
The Imperial War Museum (IWM) was established that year and was tasked
by the Department of Information to document the war. The Museum
also commissioned its own war artists, the first of whom was Adrian Hill
(Smalley, 2016).
Adrian Hill enlisted with the Artists Rifles in November 1914 as it seemed
the natural choice, being an art student at the time, but he transferred to
the Honourable Artillery Company after encouragement to do so from his
brother (Hill, 1975). While serving on the Western Front, he was often sent
into ‘no man’s land’, the area between opposing forces, on scouting missions
to sketch the enemy position. Later as an official war artist, he created 180
pen and ink drawings of the troops and their environment between 1917 and
1919, which are stored in the IWM, London (Gough, 2010). One of his draw-
ings Shelling Back Areas has the subtitle Where Did That One Go? referring
to a song that was popular at the time (Figure 1.2). It depicts six hunched
soldiers looking over a shallow, churned-​up ridge of earth in the direction of
an explosion. The implied randomness of the shelling and the lack of cover
underline the vulnerability of the soldiers, but the subtitle also suggests that
humour was used to moderate the sense of threat. This resonates with bat-
tlefield humour to this day.
After the war was over, like everyone else, Hill attempted to get on with his
life. He had studied art at St John’s Wood Art School before the war, from
1912 to 1914, and decided to complete his studies at the Royal College of Art
during 1919–​20. He then became a practising artist and educator. In 1938, he
contracted pulmonary tuberculosis and went to convalesce at King Edward
VII Hospital, Midhurst (Hogan, 2001; Waller, 1991).
It is at this point, following the aftermath of the First World War and on
the brink of the Second World War, that the concept of art therapy entered
the arena. It is Adrian Hill who is attributed as the originator of the term
‘art therapy’. Art played a significant part in Hill’s recovery from tubercu-
losis. Through the IWM’s invaluable archives, it is possible to listen to Hill’s
own verbal account of his war-time experiences and the part art played in
his recovery from tuberculosis. He refers to himself as an ‘unwilling person
who had got to rest’ and how the enforced rest made him feel as though he
was ‘shirking’ (Hill, 1975, Reel 5). While immobilised in bed, he drew objects
around him and seemed to tap into something so valuable that he wanted to
share it with others who were in recovery. As an ambulant patient, he turned
12 Janice Lobban

Figure 1.2 Shelling Back Areas: Where Did That One Go? by Adrian Hill (1918)
Source: with kind permission of the Imperial War Museum.

his attention towards other patients at the sanatorium and enthusiastically

encouraged them to paint. By 1941, King Edward VII Hospital began taking
war casualties and Hill was invited to be involved in their care. He did not
view art therapy as offering something diversional or recreational but as pro-
viding a way to access the source of their difficulties (Hogan, 2001).
Hill became a tireless promoter of art therapy. Benefits could be gained
not only from art-​making but also art appreciation. He gave lectures on
art to patients using prints. These echoed observations by nursing pioneer
Florence Nightingale in the previous century. In her Notes on Nursing (1860),
she wrote about the beneficial effects of colour, form and light towards
the healing of body and mind. She promoted the gradual introduction of
engravings to be hung near the hospital bed to promote recovery (BJN, 1946;
Nightingale, 1860). In 1945, Hill’s book Art verses Illness was published. It
seems to have been well received, as a review in The British Journal of Nursing
recommended that ‘it should be placed in every sanatorium and hospital
library’ (BJN, 1946, p. 16).
Art therapy is associated with the post-​war rehabilitation movement (Waller
& Gilroy, 1992). Hill and fellow pioneers such as Edward Adamson played a
 Art therapy with military veterans 13

key role in establishing the foundation of art therapy in Britain. Both Hill
and Adamson were involved in the British Red Cross Picture Library, which
offered a lending scheme for taking reproductions of artwork into hospitals
and providing associated lectures. The benefits of viewing art will be explored
further in Chapter 12.

Art activities to art therapy in military hospitals

The Royal Victoria Military Hospital, Netley, Hampshire was founded
in 1856 in response to the Crimean War. It was an enormous site, being a
town in itself, complete with gasworks, prison and a reservoir (Hoare, 2001).
It housed the first military asylum, built in 1870, and half those diagnosed
with ‘shell shock’ during the First World War passed through there. News
clips capture the effects of war neurosis on Netley patients and the process of
recovery (British Pathé News, 1917–​1918). Later, in 1953, radical psychiatrist
R. D. Laing, who had worked at Netley when conscripted into the British
Army in 1951, wrote that art therapy had been one of the treatments available
during his time there, but no details are provided (Beveridge, 2011).
The huge need for hospital and rehabilitation services fuelled by the
unprecedented volume of war injured during the First World War of 1914–​
1918 saw the establishment of more specialist military hospitals. Many stately
homes were requisitioned to act as temporary hospitals. Craiglockhart War
Hospital, Edinburgh was formerly Craiglockhart Hydropathic Institution, a
health spa hotel, before becoming a psychiatric hospital for Army officers
from 1916 to 1919. It was there that psychiatrist and psychoanalyst W. H. R.
Rivers pioneered the use of talking therapy to treat shell shock and neuras-
thenia. Perhaps two of the best-​known patients were poets Siegfried Sassoon
and Wilfred Owen. Shell shock is further considered in Chapters 4 and 5 of
this book.
A journal called The Hydra was produced by patients at Craiglockhart and
featured short stories, articles, advertisements, poems, prints and the occa-
sional sketch. The sketches are usually satirical but the December 1917 edi-
tion contains a striking image of Shell Shock! (Figure 1.3). It shows someone
in bed suddenly sitting up, looking terrified by ghostly monsters and about to
be hit by a shell. It has a resonance with work currently produced by veterans
as part of art therapy. For instance, Figure 1.4 depicts three shadowy, armed
figures standing at the foot of the coffin-​like bed of a veteran. The haunt-
ing emotions and body sensations of trauma find expression through both
images.
In January 1918, a Fine Arts Club was started at Craiglockhart in associa-
tion with Edinburgh College of Art. In the July 1918 edition of The Hydra,
Secretary W. G. Shearer draws readers’ attention to the arts and crafts classes
that were available, which included painting, decorative pottery and wood
carving. It seems that pottery painting was the most popular class (‘Arts and
Figure 1.3 The Hydra, December 1917, drawing titled Shell Shock!
Source: with kind permission of the Trustees of the Wilfred Owen Estate.

Figure 1.4 Nightmare

 Art therapy with military veterans 15

crafts’, 1918). The arts and crafts approach to rehabilitation was fostered
at other hospitals too during the First World War. However, at Hollymoor
Hospital, Northfield, Birmingham a new approach to art-​making was to
emerge during the Second World War.
The ‘Northfield Experiments’ are acknowledged as having played a crucial
role in the development of group psychotherapy and the therapeutic com-
munity movement (Harrison & Clarke, 1992). In 1940, Wilfred Bion began
to explore the idea of ‘using all the relationships and activities of a residen-
tial psychiatric centre to aid the therapeutic task’ (Bridger, 1990, p. 68). He
was given the opportunity to put theory into practice in 1942 at Hollymoor
Hospital with troops returning home traumatised by war. This was with a view
to enabling them to return to active military service. Bion and John Rickman
used group dynamics to promote recovery. However, the First Northfield
Experiment, as it became known, was not well received due to the chaos it
caused, and it only lasted six weeks. Ideas were developed and revised, leading
to the Second Northfield Experiment, led by Sigmund Foulkes, Tom Maine
and Harold Bridger. This proved more successful (Harrison & Clarke, 1992).
Sergeant Laurence Bradbury of the Royal Engineers was attached to the
Army Education Corps and posted to Northfield in 1944 to set up an art
group as part of occupational therapy. In audio recordings made in 1998 and
now held at the IWM (Bradbury, 1998), Bradbury shares his opinion that the
group he established in the ‘Art Hut’ had nothing to do with the approach
taken by occupational therapy. He states that the art made in the group was
‘not deflecting and trying to get people to forget the injury to their mind but
rather to face up to it’ and he was ‘given lease to do it’ without any prior
experience. He refers to the space as the ‘little hut of mayhem’ where patients
could express themselves rather than let problems fester. There was no rank
system in the Art Hut and patients were given freedom of expression, which
resulted in a ‘form of anarchy’ and mess (ibid.). Sometimes there were fights
or work was destroyed. Bradbury allowed the tension to build without taking
responsibility for addressing the anxieties or mess and eventually the patients
would decide to clear up (ibid.; Harrison, 2000).
Bradbury was convinced that it was the process of free expression and
allowing people to ‘be themselves’ that helped (Bradbury, 1998). He painted
with the patients and did not take a lead, nor did he require any prior knowl-
edge of the patients. He sensed resentment from some other staff members
for allowing the mayhem, with concern that it might spread, and that some
considered this approach an indulgence. Dr Foulkes would visit the group
once a week and artwork would be spread over a table. Everyone sat quietly
until someone broke the silence. Bradbury describes how ‘heartrending’ it was
to witness the grief expressed and that he learned by observation (ibid.). He
was not an advocate of interpreting patient’s work.
Dr Eric Cunningham Dax, Medical Superintendant of Netherne Psychiatric
Hospital, Surrey visited Northfield on several occasions and it seems he was
16 Janice Lobban

impressed by Bradbury’s work to the extent that he decided to introduce a

similar approach at Netherne. In 1946, artist Edward Adamson, who vis-
ited Netherne as part of his work for the British Red Cross picture-​lending
scheme, was invited to join the staff and run an art group. He accepted and
was employed in a full-​time post. His remit was specific as he was not to
interpret the work or to have any knowledge of patients’ history. Adamson
went on to become a key figure in the development of art therapy in the UK
(Waller, 1991). Bradbury became an art historian and lectured at Tate Britain.
Another significant development in military rehabilitation occurred in the
1980s when staff at the Royal Hospital Haslar, Hampshire used art-​making to
help patients express their problems. Haslar was founded in 1753 as a Royal
Naval Hospital. It received casualties from many conflicts including the Battle
of Trafalgar in 1805. By 1966, the hospital treated patients from the Army
and Royal Air Force too. In 1987, Surgeon Captain Morgan O’Connell,
Cognitive Behavioural Therapist Jan Beach and their colleagues introduced
a four-​week Post-​Traumatic Stress Disorder (PTSD) treatment programme.
It was the first course of its kind in the UK and as such it pioneered new
ideas. PTSD had only been classified as a diagnostic condition in 1980 when
it was included in the third edition of the American Psychiatric Association
Diagnostic and Statistical Manual of Mental Disorders (American Psychiatric
Association, 1980).
Participants in the non-​residential PTSD programme had been traumatised
by a range of situations including service in Northern Ireland, the Falklands
War and road traffic accidents, and they were from the armed forces and the
emergency services. A staff member with a social work background suggested
the use of themed image-​making to aid recovery. The art-​based groups were
nurse-​led. The five or six group members were required to create individual
work to represent them before, during and after the trauma. They could use
any medium including newspaper articles, photographs and drawings. The
work was rich, varied and innovative. Some used poetry and even Celtic knots
to express themselves. Some participants were very reluctant to engage and
left it until the end of the programme to complete the task. Each participant
was then filmed explaining the finished work to the group and a copy of the
video was given to them to show family and friends. This gave them control
over what to include and families felt more a part of the recovery process.
There was discussion of the work within the group. Feedback was that it had
been a powerful experience. People said that they had felt caught out by the
process and that they had revealed more than intended but it helped to make
sense of their experiences. The courses ran for four years at Haslar (J. Beach,
personal communication, 18 January 2016; M. O’Connell, personal commu-
nication, 13 January 2016).
One of the most recent purpose-​built military hospitals was the Queen
Elizabeth Military Hospital, Woolwich, which operated between 1977
and 1995. Initially, it treated soldiers and their families before a tri-​service
 Art therapy with military veterans 17

amalgamation. Art therapist Nigel Hilton worked there part-​time during the
late 1980s until its closure when services were relocation to Catterick. In a per-
sonal communication (N. Hilton, personal communication, 15 January 2016),
Hilton explained to me how he introduced art therapy to the programme and
ran an open studio group, as well as offering one-​to-​one sessions. It seems
that originally the job had been for an occupational therapist but the post
could not be filled. In conversations between us, he has described some of the
challenges of being a civilian working within a military environment. With
a hierarchical structure in place, it was sometimes difficult to know where to
fit; for example, which of the dining messes to use. Hilton also experienced
ambivalence from staff and patients regarding art therapy.
The art therapy groups were for two-​and-​a-​half hours. Patients did not
have to talk about their work but often there was discussion. Participants
could choose to display work on the studio walls and this stimulated reflec-
tion. Hilton observed the catalytic role of the art-​making and how conse-
quential value was given to the experience. Sometimes patients created group
paintings on large sheets of paper. The group experience itself was seen as an
important component.
The patients were from a range of operational duties including the
Falklands War and peacekeeping in Northern Ireland. During Hilton’s time
at Woolwich, the first Gulf War occurred, and in 1991 casualties were received
into the hospital, many of whom had psychological injuries. A percentage of
the casualties were subsequently discharged from service through the psycho-
logical route. Hilton found that his training in cognitive analytical therapy
informed his approach during individual interventions with patients.
The phased closure of dedicated military hospitals was a result of a defence
review carried out by the Conservative Government in the 1990s. It concluded
that the military hospitals could not provide the same quality of care as the
National Health Service (NHS). Since then, the Ministry of Defence has con-
tracted out residential treatment to the NHS. Chapter 4 provides an over-
view of past and present mental health treatment for serving UK military
personnel.

Setting a current context for art therapy with veterans

Art therapy was established at Combat Stress in 2001, as outlined in the
introduction to this book. Former Royal Navy Surgeon Captain Morgan
O’Connell was Consultant Psychiatrist there at the time. He supported the
introduction of art therapy based on his experience of the benefits of expres-
sive art at Haslar. Arts and crafts were already available at Combat Stress,
along with activities such as poppy-​making and woodwork. The activities
room formed the heart of the Surrey treatment centre, where veterans young
and old would socialise and keep busy on projects. There was banter and a
sense of camaraderie between veterans in that warm and welcoming space.
18 Janice Lobban

At the time, there was a respite model in place that was just beginning to be
reviewed.
The only room large enough to hold groups at the time was a television
lounge. I feared that the sofas and carpet would suffer, but in all seven years
that space accommodated the art therapy group, no damage was ever caused.
I soon learned that the veterans preferred not to make a mess, and if they
did, they would clean it up. I also learned that it is necessary to allow people
with anxiety disorders to leave the room when they need to, and in that way,
they are more likely to return. However, I did not realise at the beginning
of my time there that it is more important to apply brakes than to promote
the venting of feelings. Art therapy enables participants to access sensory
memories, visual imagery and emotions very quickly. There is a possibility
of moving too deeply, too quickly in which case memories are re-​experienced
rather than processed. A full account of the integrated, adaptive art therapy
model that has evolved to ensure safe, gradual exposure will be covered fully
in Chapter 7.
Van der Kolk suggests that ‘one of the most urgent tasks facing therapists
of traumatized individuals is the re-​creation of a sense of human interdepend-
ence and community’ (1987, p. 155). He refers to ‘the essential qualities of
human existence: belonging, being useful to others and sharing a common
culture and past’ (ibid., p. 156). It became very clear that something import-
ant happened as soon as veterans entered the treatment centres of Combat
Stress. The sense of reconnecting with a familiar peer group within a safe
environment helped to reduce isolation and improve well-being. I lost count
of the number of times that veterans told me ‘the best therapy is being with
the lads’. The mutual sharing of war stories could be a comfort but also detri-
mental when it affected sleep and functioning. Veterans showed their support
of the organisation by purchasing sweaters, polo shirts and wristbands with
the Combat Stress logo, thereby creating an alternative uniform. Some veter-
ans had already met during service years or had friends in common. Service
jargon and nicknames were sometimes used, for instance, some former mari-
ners went to the ‘galley’ for meals and their ‘cabin’ at bedtime. My two therap-
ist colleagues and I gained our own nickname as the ‘stealths’. This related to
the stealth bomber that was able to overcome anti-​aircraft defences because
it was hard to see it coming. Two veterans were overheard discussing that
they would not be able to meet later that day because one was going to be
‘stealthed’ at 15:00; that is he would be having a therapy session at that time
(Lobban, 2014).
There was resistance/​avoidance of therapy too. Some veterans preferred,
and still prefer, to do their ‘art therapy’ in the activities room. Others who
came for individual sessions filled the time with tangential talking and
avoided using the art materials. I came to realise that art therapy needed to be
paced, and that beginning the sessions with relaxation or emotional regula-
tion techniques could enable veterans to progress on to using the materials.
 Art therapy with military veterans 19

This method was in tune with the phasic approach in literature on trauma
work (Chu, 1998; Herman, 1992). Veterans sometimes referred to an inter-
nalised ‘Pandora’s Box’ where trauma memories were stored away under lock
and key, but that might break open with disturbing consequences. Trauma
affects the ability to trust, so trust might have to be won over time before
being ready to open the box and examine the contents. Additional training
in a variety of approaches to trauma-​focused work proved invaluable for
increasing understanding and finding ways of helping veterans to engage. Art
therapy is now part of all the programmes at Combat Stress, across all three
treatment centres.
Although the vicissitudes of warfare and peacekeeping are frequently at the
root of veterans’ post-​traumatic stress, not all trauma associated with military
service is combat-​related. Other causes are within the full range of stressor
events that are found in the civilian context, such as experiencing or witness-
ing abuse, accidents or natural disasters. Single incident trauma within this
client group is rare, with repeated and prolonged exposure to trauma being
a common presentation. There can be pre-​and post-​service vulnerabilities as
well as experiences during military service. A full discussion of these issues
will be covered in Chapter 5.
For a number of years, the average age of veterans attending Combat Stress
for treatment was 44. This is reducing now due to the increase of referrals
from the recent wars in Iraq and Afghanistan. Warfare continues to change
too with advances in weapons systems, real-​time reporting and the use of the
Internet for the recruitment of terrorists (Turitto, 2010). Understanding and
defining the psychological effects of trauma has necessarily progressed too. In
2013, the American Psychiatric Association Diagnostic and Statistic Manual
criteria for PTSD were revised. This included creating four clusters of symp-
toms instead of three, with negative alterations in cognitions and mood being
the additional cluster, alongside avoidance, re-​experiencing and hyper-​arousal
symptoms (American Psychiatric Association, 2013).

Remembrance and ritual

Remembrance through ritual is an important way of honouring the dead. The
Royal British Legion poppy has become a national token of remembrance
and its purchase provides an opportunity to make a contribution towards the
support of veterans and their families. Each year on Remembrance Sunday,
a group of veterans and staff from Combat Stress participate in the National
Service of Remembrance and March Past at the Cenotaph, Whitehall,
London. They join with the nation for two-​minute silence when the injured
and fallen are held in mind: ‘we will remember them’ (Binyon, 1914). Small
wooden crosses with hand-​written messages are placed respectfully in par-
ticular regimental areas of the Field of Remembrance at Westminster Abbey
until the grass is barely visible. Across the land, poppy wreaths are laid at the
20 Janice Lobban

foot of war memorials. In 2014, 888,246 ceramic poppies designed by art-

ists Paul Cummins and Tom Piper were placed in the moat at the Tower of
London as an installation called ‘Blood swept lands and seas of red’ to mark
the centenary of the outbreak of the First World War. It was a roll of honour
to the dead, with each poppy representing a British military fatality (‘About
the installation’, n.d.). Visitors were able to connect with others past and pre-
sent in this symbol of shared grief.
The grounds of the Combat Stress treatment centres are sometimes used
for quiet contemplation when veterans need some space to think. They pro-
vide a pleasant and peaceful environment in which to stroll and observe
nature. They have also been used for rituals such as symbolically letting go of
the past. For instance, items representing trauma have been released into the
breeze, the physical action of letting go seeming to fulfil a somatic need. For
some veterans, there is a desire to leave something tangible in the grounds
to be held in the care of the organisation. This might be a small cairn of
stones in the woods or an acorn planted to symbolise hope. Such rituals
might be private experiences or involve a small group of veterans with shared
memories.
As part of the journey of recovery, some veterans chose to make a pilgrim-
age back to the place of their trauma, to try to ‘lay ghosts to rest’, sometimes
placing a personal tribute on the spot where a comrade fell. I had the privil-
ege of participating in a pilgrimage to the Falkland Islands with a group of
veterans to mark the twenty-​fifth anniversary of the 1982 war. It provided an
invaluable opportunity to work together at the site of the trauma. Veterans
were able to retrace their footsteps, re-​evaluate viewpoints and start to work
through the traumatic grief of experiences. The wholehearted support and
gratitude of the Falkland Islanders undoubtedly helped veterans in the search
for personal meaning.
I have heard remarkable accounts of veterans meeting and making peace,
for instance with their former prison camp guard or the submarine captain
responsible for the sinking of their ship. Veterans and former terrorists have
met around a table to find a way of moving on from past hostilities. However,
letting go of anger, guilt, shame or suffering can seem an impossible task for
some veterans. Remembering the lost might stir survivor guilt or the horror
of witnessing suffering and being unable to intervene. Being able to forgive
oneself or others for actions of omission or commission might be unaccepta-
ble. Self-​compassion can be resisted and holding on to pain can be an effec-
tive form of self-​punishment, reinforcing the view that they do not deserve to
enjoy life. One veteran, the sole survivor of an ambush who had been severely
injured himself in the attack, explained to me that the pain he continued to
experience so many years after the event was not suffering as it served as a
reminder that he was alive. When he felt the pain, it kept him close to his
lost comrades, thereby maintaining continuing bonds; the identification also
seeming to assuage survivor guilt.
 Art therapy with military veterans 21

Working with traumatised veterans

Veterans can be reluctant to speak about their experiences not only because
of the distress it causes them but also due to not wanting to contaminate
the listener with knowledge that might have a detrimental effect on them, or
affect the way the listener views them. According to contemporary theory,
trauma shatters the fundamental assumptions we have about life, namely that
the world is benevolent and meaningful, and that the self is worthy (Janoff-​
Bulman, 1992). Basic trust is lost which causes a profound sense of discon-
nection, isolation and alienation (Herman, 1992). Hearing stories of suffering
or horror, and witnessing it symbolically through the imagery is part of the
task of art therapy in assisting the processing of trauma memories. This can
make the therapist aware of areas of human experience beyond prior knowl-
edge or understanding. It can stimulate questioning of personal beliefs and
assumptions.
Due to the sensory nature of traumatic memories, when veterans reconnect
with the trauma in an attempt to express the wordless experience of the event,
they might re-​experience the original imagery, body sensations and emotions.
This can resonate in the counter-​transference or empathic attunement of the
therapist and might manifest in responses such as nausea, headache or a sense
of helplessness. Horrors that cannot be expressed in words might be conveyed
in a ‘felt’ sense. Dissociation might occur whereby the veteran disconnects
psychologically from the here and now, and is pulled back in time to a frag-
mented sense of past trauma, or becomes disorientated and confused. This
can be reflected in the therapist’s own thought processes affecting concen-
tration and recall of the task in hand. Writing about counter-​transference
responses to dissociative processes, Pearlman and Saakvitne (1995) note that
in such situations, the therapist can feel abandoned and could respond in a
number of ways including being relieved, dissociating his or herself and aban-
doning the client, or becoming angry. It is also suggested that the therapist
might not remember material from the previous session, or feel spaced out
and unable to think. Without an understanding of dissociation, the therapist
might use other concepts such as passive-​aggression, psychosis or resistance
to explain the situation (ibid.).
It is important to recognise the sensory impact of trauma work on both the
client and therapist, and to be prepared to work with this on a practical level.
Relaxation, breathing and grounding techniques practised in the early stages
of treatment can help to improve affect management and keep therapy within
tolerable levels. This subject will be explored in more depth in Chapter 7.
Terms such as ‘secondary traumatic stress’ (Hudnall Stamm, 1995) and
‘vicarious trauma’ (Pearlman & Saakvitne, 1995) have been coined to describe
a range of symptoms experienced as a consequence of working in the field of
trauma. Pearlman and Saakvitne (1995) define vicarious traumatisation (VT)
as the ‘cumulative transformation in the inner experience of the therapist that
22 Janice Lobban

comes about as a result of empathic engagement with the client’s traumatic

material’ (p. 31). It is distinguished from ‘burnout’, which might manifest as
apathy, disillusionment, an uncaring attitude or even contempt for clients
(Pross, 2006), as it reaches a deeper and more profound level. Symptoms of
VT might include increased sensitivity to violence, social withdrawal, cyni-
cism, feeling vulnerable, experiencing intrusive imagery and having no time or
energy for oneself (Pearlman & Saakvitne, 1995; Pross, 2006). McCann and
Pearlman (1990) suggest that trauma is infectious.
When working in the field of trauma, it is important to be self-​aware and
to recognise any warning signs of negative effects in order to ensure healthy
work practice. Pross (2006) suggests that promoting self-​awareness in this
way should be an essential part of therapy and job training. He proposes
that a flexible and creative work environment that encourages research and
development can help to avoid the ‘rut of routine’ that can lead to burnout
(ibid., p. 9). Other factors that help to prevent burnout and VT include having
a limited caseload, maintaining professional boundaries and ensuring that
an adequate provision for self-​care is in place to balance the effects of the
work. This might necessitate the seeking out of other pursuits for improving
well-being such as physical or creative activity, or introducing times of rest
and play. Personal therapy might be considered. Supervision and reflective
practice are essential. Pearlman and McKay (2008) also suggest that work-
ing through vicarious trauma involves transforming the experience through
meaning-​making and reconnecting with hope and purpose, as well as challen-
ging personal cynicism.
Over time, I have encountered prejudice against the military from other
professionals and trainees. This might be associated with political beliefs and
ideals, or life experiences. The armed forces might be viewed as heroes or
villains, victors or victims according to circumstances or viewpoint. When
speaking at conferences, audience questions have sometimes implied strong
views about working with people seen as being professional killers. As with
all contexts, art therapists can be drawn towards working with a particular
client group or reluctant to work with another. It is important to understand
our motives and barriers.
In this context, there can be a sense of tapping into an intrinsic aspect
of the human condition. Throughout history, disputes have been settled by
­setting one army against another. The warrior archetype is cross-​cultural and
features in the myths and legends of most civilisations. It often embodies
qualities such as courage, stoicism, discipline and loyalty. Indeed, the ‘Values
and standards of the British Army’ (2012) expect selfless commitment,
integrity and respect, and recruits have to make an oath of allegiance to
the ­monarch. The ultimate personal sacrifice is possible. These are high ide-
als to reach and maintain. However, post-​combat psychological symptoms
have long been documented. A recent study suggests that the first account of
post-​traumatic stress symptoms could be attributed to the Assyrian Dynasty
 Art therapy with military veterans 23

in Mesopotamia, 1300–​609 b c (Abdul-​Hamid & Hughes, 2014). Between the

outbreak of the First World War in August 1914 and the exit of British Forces
from Afghanistan in October 2014, the UK was involved continuously in war-
fare or peacekeeping somewhere in the world (MacAskill & Cobain, 2014),
and so it continues.
Alongside the challenges of working with traumatised veterans, there are
many benefits. As well as hearing accounts of mankind’s cruelty, violence,
suffering and despair, I have been privileged to hear remarkable stories of
kindness, compassion and resilience, representing the breadth of human
experience. I have been amazed by the ability of the human spirit to over-
come adversity and to transform a trauma into an opportunity for growth.
A Second World War veteran once explained to me how after a mortar attack,
he had been trapped for a long time in a tank under the decapitated body of
his tank commander. The commander had been his well-​respected mentor.
For the rest of his life, the veteran suffered from crippling back pain associ-
ated with that incident. He described how for him the weight he continued to
feel on his back was not a burden, but the presence of his guardian angel, who
continued to protect and encourage him through life. Art therapy helped him
to express not only the horror of the event but the transformative power of
meaning-​making and finding peace.
When Pandora’s Box is opened, all that is left is hope. Hope plays a vital part
in recovery. It is a frequent ingredient of art therapy groups and is nurtured
between veterans (Plate 1.1). Newcomers to treatment might have struggled
with symptoms for many years before finally asking for help. Although Combat
Stress is a civilian organisation, the client group is all ex-​military and most vet-
erans say that they feel safe as soon as they come through the gates because they
know the other veterans will be looking out for them, and that they no longer
feel alone with their problems. They are hopeful that the organisation will be
able to meet their needs and guide them along the road to recovery.

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Chapter 2

An Army Reservist’s story*

Clement Boland

I was a Territorial Army (TA) reservist for three years. I joined the TA in 2004
when I was 19 and studying for an undergraduate degree. My basic training
was conducted locally over seven weekends with the regiment, and a two-​
week course at the Infantry Training Centre. Subsequently, I attended weekly
drill nights at the local TA centre, trained roughly every other weekend and
attended two-​week annual summer camps. This provided me with part-​time
paid work to help fund my studies, and I enjoyed the adventure and excite-
ment of training in the countryside at the weekends. I was taught basic infan-
try skills, marksmanship, field craft, physical training, radio procedures and
first aid. My local unit was a mortar platoon, so I trained with 81mm mor-
tars on Salisbury plain, and in summer 2005, I attended a two-​week camp
in Florida where we trained with the National Guard. Some members of
my unit were mobilised for an operational tour in Iraq, but some others and
I were exempted because we were students. In late summer 2006, I was finish-
ing my exams and watching the Paras on the news fighting their way into
a town called Sangin in southern Afghanistan. By spring 2007, I would be
patrolling the same streets.
Having finished my degree, I was selected for officer training. Each of the
companies in our TA battalion were assigned to different local regular regi-
ments, which were all due to be amalgamated the next year. Around the same
time, there was an interest in finding individuals for full-​time reserve service
with our regular battalions. The military situation seemed to be ‘hotting up’
and I felt a responsibility to do my bit. I considered that our country and
its armed forces were a force for good and stability in the world. I said that
I would be willing to go on full-​time reserve service and gain practical experi-
ence before attempting my commission. My commanding officer was keen on
this and willing to hold my place on the officer training programme until my
return if I was mobilised.
I received my mobilisation papers informing me that I was to be deployed
to Afghanistan. I reported as ordered to the Reserves Mobilisation Centre in

*In this personal account, names have been changed to anonymise identity.
 An Army Reservist’s story 27

February 2007 with several other members of my TA battalion. Here we were

grouped with other mobilised territorials and regular reservists, given medi-
cals and sworn into the regular army for 11.5 months.
Over the next month, we went through our physical fitness and profi-
ciency tests. During this time, we also learned horror stories about where we
were going, and I began to be bothered by how haphazard our mobilisation
seemed to be. The unit we were to join were already on their pre-​deployment
training, so we were unable to train with them as a team before we were
deployed into the warzone. To me, the training we were given seemed like
a collection of tick-​box exercises to get us through the process, which felt
like a last-​minute affair. I felt that we were very much disposable and were
about to be massively thrown in at the deep end. However, by this point
I had committed to the deployment and felt that I had to see it through.
I was now feeling seriously underprepared and fearful of what I had signed
myself up for.
In early April, we were sent down to join the regiment and it seemed that we
might get time to train and integrate into the unit before we deployed. However,
when we arrived, the company was being sent on leave after which they would
fly out to Afghanistan. We met our platoon commanders briefly before they
left and then we remained at the barracks for further training. At one point, we
were shown a beaten up, old WIMIK Land Rover to familiarise us with what
we were to deploy in. I had never actually seen one of these vehicles before, and
it was in such a state that all I got from the experience was an image of its floor
being awash with blood during the total mess we were heading into.
We were due to fly out to Afghanistan a couple of days before my twenty-​
third birthday. I met my mum in London to say goodbye. We were just get-
ting off the London Eye and I was due back for the flight that evening when
I received a telephone call to tell me that our flight had been delayed. So, I vis-
ited my housemates before returning for the rearranged flight. Some friends
came to see me off at the station. The crowd cheered as I said goodbye to my
friends. It all felt very unreal. I was terrified.
Back at barracks, I got into uniform and waited around. I started smoking
again after two years without. That night a coach took us to Brize Norton
where we were processed for our flight. As we queued with all the other per-
sonnel, I was struck by the mismatch between what a momentous time this
was for us, being sent off to war for the first time, and how mundane and bor-
ing it seemed to be for the RAF staff around us. Everything was so clinical
and routine that I was very aware of what a tiny, insignificant piece I was in
this great big system.
It was morning when we boarded the Tri-​ Star. When we reached
Afghanistan, the plane flew high over Kandahar airport and then spiralled
down so as not to attract enemy fire. All the lights were turned out and the
blinds drawn on the window ports, leaving only emergency lighting strips in
the aisles. We all had to put on body armour and helmets, and I remember in
28 Clement Boland

the gloom seeing a press guy in a dark suit looking like Darth Vader at the
front of the rows of fresh, white desert combats.
We landed and disembarked in darkness on the huge airfield at Kandahar.
Around us were the shapes of large warplanes, drones and racks of ordnance.
We were processed again and taken to a massive hangar full of bunks where
we were to stay until our onward flight to Camp Bastion the next day. We
smoked outside by the mortar shelter and did not sleep much. In daylight,
the base at Kandahar was huge –​a sprawling jumble of support areas for
all the multinational forces present. There was even a bus service that took us
from the hanger to the air head for our next flight. I remember being puzzled in
the midst of all this sparse dust, utilitarian concrete and military hardware, by
the little, frilly green curtains with a decorative sash in the windows of the bus.
We boarded a C130 Hercules transport plane and flew on to Camp Bastion
to join the company and be assigned to our platoons. Bastion was very differ-
ent from Kandahar. It was a planned military base set out in neat rows of air-​
conditioned tents. We were taken to our company’s line and here I joined the
platoon with three other territorials. They were practicing drills on the 50 cal
machine gun when I arrived, a weapon I had never even seen ‘in the flesh’. The
privates were all very young but I remember feeling rather overawed by them
as a group –​all very ‘gobby’ and wearing mirror shades as they ran through
the drills. I was assigned to one section and shown to a bed space, and we were
issued with extra weaponry and equipment. Heavy Osprey body armour, gre-
nades and radio batteries all started to add up. In training, having carried at
most six magazines of rifle ammunition plus loose, I now found myself pack-
ing 13 filled magazines and a bandolier of loose. Then came the underslung
grenade launchers and I realised it was not necessarily just me that felt under-
trained. We were asked if anyone had used one before and nobody answered.
I said that I had once used the old American version with paint rounds on
exercise in Florida, and so I became a rifle grenadier.
After zeroing weapons on the ranges, packing and re-​packing kit and going
on acclimatisation runs around the perimeter of Camp Bastion, during which
we were on standby to fly out as a quick reaction force, we got the news that
we would now be deploying to Sangin District Centre (DC). This was the very
place I had watched the Paras under siege on the news not eight months before
and now widely known as the most dangerous district in Helmand province.
‘Sangin? I feel sick!’ was one of my section-​mate’s responses to the news.
We assembled in section lines, and then filed onto the back of one of the
Chinooks, crouching under the rotors and gasping in the heat of the engine’s
back blast. Crammed in and half buried in kit, we took off and flew across
Helmand towards the green zone with two Apache gunships escorting. I man-
aged to peer out of one of the window ports as we flew across the desert and
could see the lines of dog-​legged trenches and knocked-​out Soviet era tanks
from previous years of conflict and wondered how on earth I had managed to
get myself in such a situation.
 An Army Reservist’s story 29

Our platoon was first assigned to a guard routine at various positions

around the perimeter of the compound at Sangin DC. My recollection of
time is very hazy during this period because we were overstretched, sleeping
on average 20 minutes at a time, 12 times a day over 3 days. Fatigue began
to set in and I remember catching people talking to rucksacks and suchlike.
During one of the night-​time two-​hour guard stints in one of the sangars, one
of the regular privates and I found ourselves under fire for the first time. It
was a strangely anti-​climactic event. We had been taking it in turns to catch
40 winks at the back of the sangar while the other watched out. It was my
turn to rest and I was flitting in and out of sleep becoming aware of a sort
of thumping sound when my companion nudged me awake and said ‘I’m not
being funny but I think we’re being shot at’. I sat up and looked out of the
sangar and tracer fire was arching out of the darkness in the distance off to
our right and the occasional round was thumping into the Hesco wall near
our position. It stopped soon afterwards and we heard on the radio that there
had been a firefight involving the Afghan Police nearby.
My first trip outside the compound into Sangin occurred when I was
grabbed as part of an ad hoc reaction force in response to a call for assis-
tance. I climbed onto one of the Pinzergauer vehicles as top cover and we
rumbled out of the main gate into the town. Much of the town had been com-
pletely smashed by airpower when the Paras were under siege and the streets
we drove along were under several feet of rubble, which the vehicles bounced
over crazily. We got to the scene where one of the Afghan Army units we were
working with had been hit by an explosion, with two soldiers injured. An
Afghan man who ran after the blast had been shot. We were to retrieve him.
I cannot remember all that much about how the situation played out but what
I do remember remains vivid to this day.
I was told to help carry him. I think he was in a ditch when I got to him.
I was horrified. He had been shot from behind and his intestines were all spill-
ing out from his torn belly. I had never seen a body or anyone so badly hurt
before, and I felt so sorry and appalled, I just wanted to help him but did not
know how and the first thought that ran through my head was ‘Oh my God, he
looks like Jesus’. I ended up carrying him to the back of the vehicle by his legs
while I think two others were holding him by the arms, though all I can really
remember is the image of him in that crucifix-​like position. All the periphery
of the scene is very vague. His insides were spilling onto my arms and the smell
was awful. I remember feeling at the same time how terrible it was how low he
had been struck, but also how serene and dignified his face appeared among
all the panic and bustle. We put him in the vehicle and I climbed back as top
cover, with him at my feet. As we bounced back through the streets of Sangin
towards the DC I became aware that the tailgate of the truck was hanging
open and that his guts and genitals were hanging out for the locals to see as we
drove along. I bent down, pulled up the gate and secured it with the bit of old
rope that served as a handle. At some point before or after this, I felt him grab
30 Clement Boland

onto the back of my leg. I was told afterwards that he was already dead when
we picked him up, but to me he died in the truck with me. I have agonised in
dark moments over the meaning of this grab on my leg, whether it was an
appeal to close that gate or an acknowledgement of my doing so, and have
felt compelled to try and find some meaning in these actions, though really,
I know there was no such importance to it. It was probably simple rigamortis
or the last desperate reaching out of a pointless, horrible death.
I took from this incident that I never wanted to inflict that kind of terrible
hurt on anybody but also that I had another six months left on this tour and
that I would probably have to or end up that way myself. I was trapped. I was
a fool.
Soon after this, my platoon started on a patrol rotation as well. We started
to do a lot of night-​time clearance operations out into the surrounding coun-
tryside, which was terrifying. We were not allowed to use any light when clear-
ing rooms in compounds and as night-​sights only work on amplifying existing
moon and starlight, our procedure was simply to walk into the pitch black-
ness trying to stay straight on so that any shots would be more likely to hit us
in the front armour plate. We would wait a few seconds and then declare the
room clear if we were not shot at.
An incident occurred during one of these clearances, which although
amusing at the time, has stayed with me and became the subject of recurring
nightmares for some time. I entered one of these dark rooms ready to wait a
few seconds not be shot at and then declare it clear. I could tell on entering
that it was somewhat larger than usual with a higher ceiling. Some moonlight
was filtering in through a gap in the ceiling and I could vaguely make out
shapes in the darkness. Nothing happened, and I was just starting to turn and
leave when a cough rang out and I was suddenly aware of something loom-
ing towards me. I swung around, brought up my rifle and was beginning to
squeeze the trigger. During this split-​second I thought ‘There’s a man in the
room; there’s a Minotaur. Oh, it’s a cow’. I had walked into a room full of
cattle in the otherwise unoccupied compound and nearly shot the inquisitive,
dark brown cow that came to take a look at me all dressed up like Universal
Soldier sneaking round cowsheds in the middle of the night.
While on guard in the sangar at the main gate of Sangin DC, I received
a report over the radio that there was word there was going to be a suicide
bombing attempt, and that the suspects were expected to be a woman and
child. Not 20 minutes later, a woman and child came walking hand in hand
up the path towards my position. There was no reason for them to be using
this path unless they were coming to the main gate. As I stood there behind a
GPMG, I realised that in a few seconds I was going to have to stop them at the
designated point and somehow establish what they wanted. What would I do
if they did not stop? These checkpoint situations were always very difficult
to navigate, with misunderstandings easy when unfamiliar with each other’s
languages and keeping at a distance. One of my biggest fears was shooting an
 An Army Reservist’s story 31

innocent person accidently or, by hesitating, getting my friends killed. They

got closer; they were heading towards the gate. I was terrified. I could not
gun down a woman and child, but this was what I was meant to do if they
did not stop; neither could I let them run in and blow themselves up, killing
my friend who waited down by the gate to search. What would I do? I do not
know to this day. At the last possible moment, they left the path and headed
back towards the town.
During my time in Sangin, increasingly I came to realise that this deploy-
ment was not just about helping a nation complete the removal of the
imposed control of a psychotically fundamentalist Taliban regime and estab-
lishing peaceful governance. Things were a lot more complicated and I began
to question the focus of our involvement.
After about two months in Sangin, we were redeployed to Garmsir, the
southernmost town held by British Forces in Helmand. The town and the
British base there, FOB Delhi, had effectively been under siege since 2006. We
were told that we would be fighting out of trenches down there. I remember
having a dream while we were still in Bastion where I was desperately fighting
alone in a ditch to hold off attackers. This dream has stuck with me because
of how viscerally accurate it turned out to be.
We were flown out again by Chinook to an artillery base in the desert
near Garmsir, then moved out by road and established ourselves at the next
base. From here we held a strip of ground between the Helmand River and a
canal. Our routine consisted of three days of guard/​reserve and three days of
patrols. We would conduct security and resupply patrols to the checkpoints
and raid over the canal, mostly at night, into the Taliban controlled areas
to the southeast. We would set ambushes, usually unsuccessful, and then
be attacked by the Taliban as we extracted in the morning. Then we would
do three days at one of two forward positions that we referred to as ‘check-
points’. Here the fighting became heavy. We would be attacked many times a
day in these positions with firefights sometimes lasting several hours. When
we started receiving fire, we would all jump onto the firing line and blaze
away at the Taliban firing points with every weapon we had. All this was so
regular that it began to feel quite routine and even boring. I remember being
told off by my Sergeant after one firefight. During the time when you are
meant to be looking out for further action, I was absent-​mindedly scratching
a spot on my arm. ‘Enemy, Boland, not spots’ he said, and I realised how
used to this I had become.
Some of the firefights were extremely close run. During one, the Taliban
were pressing forward seemingly determined to storm the base. I was ammo
running for two of our machine guns, which were the only things holding
them back. I ran into the ammo store to find that we were down to the last box
of GPMG rounds. I remember my vision going into tunnel-​like focus, like in
a horror film. Some Taliban then tried to rush the bridge and claymores were
used on them. This was brutal. Black shapes in the dust then bang, nothing.
32 Clement Boland

The bridge clear for a moment, dust, smoke and men smashed down by the
blast and sucked away. The rest pulled back, the firefight died down, and the
dust settled like nothing had happened.
After a couple of months of this, my time came up for R&R, so I handed
over my extra weapons and jumped into a Chinook back to Camp Bastion
with two others from the company. Our ride was shot at as we took off, the
countermeasure flares were set off and fire shot past the windows. The inter-
preter riding with us wet himself and no one said anything as the piss ran
across the floor.
At Camp Bastion, I washed and shaved, because you had to there, and
enjoyed the canteen meals until there was a flight for us. I cleaned and handed
in my rifle, ammunition and body armour and we flew to Kandahar where we
stuffed ourselves at the American canteen and fast food outlets. We watched
some celebrity cheerleading team get mobbed by American and Canadian
troops for autographs. We waited in the huge hangar and then boarded the
Tri-​Star back to the UK and a week of freedom. Would I come back? Another
guy had gone AWOL on his leave and many of the other TA guys I knew had
been evacuated for one reason or another. Things were really heating up back
in Garmsir and although I had grown quite accustomed to fighting from fixed
positions, I dreaded the next time we made contact out on the ground, when
utter chaos ensued. Just no way was I going to survive the whole tour –​it was
getting too crazy and I did not have a clue what I was doing. My luck would
run out.
We landed at Brize Norton and some of my university mates picked me up.
As we drove down the motorway, with me still in my combats and basic body
armour from the flight, I could not help but notice how close all the cars were
and felt I should be waving them back and pointing a weapon at them. After
this I managed to forget about Afghanistan and whether I should return by
getting absolutely ‘smashed’ for the next week, then getting dropped off and
bumbling back into the queue for my return flight still in a total daze.
After a couple more weeks, we were told that we were due to leave Garmsir
and go back to Camp Bastion to redeploy elsewhere. However, before we left
we were to put in a big push with the whole company attempting to clear the
Taliban positions in front of our line and push their front back to the south.
I remember smoking cigarette after cigarette while waiting around before
heading over to form up with the rest of the company. The whole company
was together now and there was a feeling of hysteria among many. I remem-
ber some attempt at a dance-​off forming in the middle of the area, but many,
such as myself, were quieter, busy rechecking kit and hanging around with a
rising sense of dread. Many of us privates had to lie down on our rucksacks
to get into the straps then be dragged to our feet by another, as the packs
were so heavy. I remember noticing an informality, almost friendliness, to the
words (now forgotten) used to move us out. For me, that increased the feeling
of foreboding that surrounded this operation. I did not know how I would
 An Army Reservist’s story 33

endure those endless hours of nerve-​wrecking tedium on top of already ach-

ing fatigue. As it turned out I would not have to.
I think we had cleared one compound already, when we began to advance
towards the position where we were hit. I had gone about 10 metres from the
ditch into the open ground when the night was torn apart by a sudden storm
of fire. I hit the ground in an instant and snap fired a few shots at the inferno
ahead of me. Raising my head from the dirt I saw the blazing swarm of tracer
rounds flying towards and over me, the corkscrew flights of Rocket Propelled
Grenades (RPGs) from straight on looking like wheels of fire in the night. All
this was tearing towards me from where 2 Section had been only a moment
before.
To my left I saw ‘Cleon’. His face was in the dirt. I rolled over to him –​per-
haps five metres –​and I remember screaming ‘Cleon’s hit’ as I reached him.
He did not respond immediately. ‘Ajax’ appeared and we grabbed at Cleon,
who came to. He got up and ran back to the ditch, I think. Ajax and I scram-
bled up to do the same and as we did I heard a ripping tearing sound of a
round hitting. As I turned I saw him slump and the blood, black in the dark-
ness against the white of his combats, spray out downwards from under his
armour. He hit the ground and grabbing onto him I thought I would have
to drag him back to the ditch, but as I pulled him he got up to run with me
and I pitched forward to the ground. I put a hand down to break the fall and
a line of bullet impacts tore across the earth across my outstretched right
hand –​several hitting just before it and several just after. I recovered my bal-
ance and, still grabbing onto Ajax with the other hand, we dashed back into
the ditch. I dumped Ajax with the medic. I then turned to fire out from behind
the raised bank of the ditch. Others began to arrive into the ditch, scrambling
back in dazed and blind from flares or shock.
‘Arnold’ had been shot in the side of the head but his helmet had stopped
the round. He was dazed and delirious –​at some point someone had to sit on
him to stop him running out of the ditch into fire. I was told to clear down
the ditch. I fixed my bayonet and crawled down it. At some point, I fired
more rounds down the ditch in the direction of the Taliban. I thought I heard
Pashtun voices and movement down the ditch at some point, and have a half-​
memory of hearing my rounds hit something, making sounds like the one that
had hit Ajax. I have a huge block of confusion and blackness when I try to
recall exactly what happened down this ditch. Sometimes I feel like I remem-
ber more details but my mind recoils. I used 17 rounds in total during this
long firefight of three to six hours. Later at Cally Calay, I would expend 11-​
and-​a-​half magazines of 30 in about five minutes. So, I think a lot of the time
I must have just been frozen, squirming as deep as possible into the ditch as
the heavy rounds and blasts of RPGs smashed away the cover.
We could all hear snatches of what was going on elsewhere through our
personal radios, which added to the madness. Years later, I have managed, it
seems, to lose the recording in my mind of a voice gurgling desperately and
Discovering Diverse Content Through
Random Scribd Documents
 already enjoys out of the salary of the above mentioned
Haveck per year; we confirm the act hereby; wherefore
we have graciously issued, this decree, which our Electoral
Court Exchequer will humbly observe and make all
necessary provisions.
Attest, p. Münster, 17th 9bris 1769.
(On the margin:) “Gracious addition of 50 fl. for the court
musician Philipp Salomon” and, besides Brandt and
Meuris, also “in simili for Court Musician Joann Bethoff 25
fl.”
There need be no apology for filling a few more pages with extracts
from documents found in the Düsseldorf archives; for now a period
has been reached in which the child Ludwig van Beethoven is
growing up into youth and early manhood, and thrown into constant
contact with those whose names will appear. Some of these names
will come up many years later in Vienna; others will have their parts
to play in the narrative of that child’s life. Omitting, for the present, a
petition of Johann van Beethoven, we begin them with that of
Joseph Demmer, of date January 23, 1773, which first secured him
his appointment after a year’s service and three months’ instruction
from “the young Mr. van Beethoven.”
Most Reverend Archbishop and Elector,
Most Gracious Lord, etc., etc.
I have been accepted as chorister in the cathedral of this
city at a salary of 80 th. per year, and have so practised
myself in music that I humbly flatter myself of my ability
to perform my task with the highest satisfaction.
It being graciously known that the bass singer van
Beethoven is incapacitated and can no longer serve as
such, and the contra-bassist Noisten can not adapt his
voice: therefore this my submissive to Your Reverend
Electoral Grace that you graciously be pleased to accept
me as your bass singer with such gracious salary as may
 seem fit; I offer should it be demanded to attend the
operettas also and qualify myself in a short time. It
depends upon a mere hint from Your Electoral Grace
alone; that it shall not be burdensome to the cantor’s
office of the cathedral to save the loss of the 80 th. yearly
which it has bestowed upon me.
I am in most dutiful reverence
Your Electoral Grace’s
most obedient
Joseph Demmer.
Pro Memoria.
Cantor Demmer earned at the utmost 106 rth. per year if
he neglected none of the greater or little Horis.
Pays the Chamber Chancellor Kügelgen
for board, annually, 66 rth.
for quartier (lodging) 12 rth.
moreover, he must find himself in clothes and washing
since his father, the sub-sacristan in Cologne, is still
overburdened with 6 children.
He has paid 6 rth. to young Mr. Beethoven for 3 months.
In response to another petition after the death of
L. van Beethoven the following decree was issued: Joseph Demmer
Succeeds
Decree as Court vocal bass for Joseph Demmer. Beethoven

Whereas His Electoral Grace of Cologne, M. F. our most

gracious Lord, on the humble petition of Joseph Demmer
has graciously appointed and accepted him as His
Highness’s vocal bass on the Electoral Toxal, with a yearly
salary of 200 fl. divided in quartalien to begin with the
current time, the appointment is confirmed hereby and a
decree granted to the same Demmer, of which, for
purposes of payment, the Electoral Chancellary will take
notice and all whom it may concern will respect and obey
 the same and otherwise do what is necessary in the
premises.
Attest, p. Bonn, May 29, 1774.
Two years later leave of absence, but without salary, was granted to
Joseph Demmer to visit Amsterdam to complete his education in
music. Further notes from documentary sources:

1774. May 26. Andreas Lucchesi appointed Court

Chapelmaster in place of Ludwig van Beethoven,
deceased, with a salary of 1,000 fl.
May 29. Salary of Anna Maria Ries raised from 230
fl. to 300 fl. On May 13, 1775, together with
Ferdinand Trewer (Drewer), violinist, she receives
leave of absence for four months, to begin in June
with two quarters’ pay in advance. In the Court
Calendar for 1775, which was printed about seven
months in advance, she is already described as
Madame Drewers, née Ries. She was considered
the best singer in the chapel.
November 23. Franz Anton Ries has granted him 25
th. payable quarterly.

1775. March 23. Nicolas Simrock appointed on petition

“Court Hornist on the Electoral Toxal, in the cabinet
and at table,” and a salary of 300 fl. was granted
April 1. This is the first appearance in these records
of a name which afterwards rose into prominence.

1777. April 20. B. J. Mäurer, violoncellist, “who has served

in the court chapel from the beginning of the year
till now on a promise of 100 th.,” prays for an
appointment as court ’cellist at a salary of 400 th.
Appointed at a salary of 200 th.; we shall have
 occasion to recur to him presently in connection
with notices touching Beethoven.

Under date May 22, 1778, J. van Beethoven informs the Elector that
“the singer Averdonck, who is to be sent to Chapelmaster Sales at
Coblenz, is to pay 15 fl. per month for board and lodging but that
only a douceur is to be asked for her instruction and that to take her
thither will cost 20 th.” There followed upon this the following
document:
To the humble announcement of Court Musician
Beethoven
touching the singer Averdonck.
Electoral Councillor Forlivesi is to pay to the proper
authorities for a year beginning next month, 15 fl. a
month and for the travelling expenses 20 rth. once and for
all as soon as the journey is begun.
Attest. p. Bonn, May 22, 1778.
This pupil of Johann van Beethoven, Johanna Helena Averdonk, born
in Bonn on December 11, 1760, and brought forward by her teacher
at a concert in Cologne, received 120 th. “as a special grace” on July
2, and was appointed Court Singer on November 18, 1780, with a
salary of 200 th. She died nine years later, August 13, 1789.
The petitions sent in to the Elector were rarely dated and were not
always immediately attended to; therefore the date of a decretum is
not to be taken as conclusive in regard to the date of facts
mentioned in a petition. An illustration is afforded by a petition of
Franz Ries. He has returned from a tour to Vienna and prays for a
salary of 500 fl. “not the half of what he can earn elsewhere.” The
petition is dated March 2. Two months passing without bringing him
an answer, he petitions again and obtains a decree on May 2 that in
addition to his salary of 28 th. 2 alb. 6, he shall receive “annoch so
viel,”—again as much,—i. e., 400 fl.
 1780. August. Court Organist Van den Eede prays that in
consideration of his service of 54 years he be
graciously and charitably given the salary vacated
by the death of Court Musician Salomon. Eighteen
others make the same prayer. The decision of the
privy council is in these words: “To be divided
between Huttenus and Esch. A decree as musical
vocalist must first be given to the latter.”

1781. February 15. The name of C. G. Neefe is now met

with for the first time. He petitions for appointment
to the position of organist in succession to Van den
Eede, obviously aged and infirm. A decree was
issued “placet et expediatur on the death of
Organist Van den Eede,” and a salary of 400 fl.
granted.

1782. May 16. Johann van Beethoven petitions for “the

three measures (Malter) of corn.”

The archives of Düsseldorf furnish little more during the time of Max
Frederick save certain papers relating to the Beethoven family, which
are reserved for another place.
The search for means to form some correct idea of
the character of the musical performances at the Opera at the
Elector’s Court
Elector’s court during this reign has been more
successful than for the preceding; but much is left to be desired
down to the year 1778, when the theatre was placed upon a
different basis and its history is sufficiently recorded. Such notices,
however, in relation to the operatic entertainments as have been
found scattered, mostly in the newspapers of Bonn, in those years,
are numerous enough to give an idea of their character; while the
remarks upon the festivities of the court, connected with them,
afford a pretty lively picture of social amusement in the highest
circle. We make room for some of the most significant occurrences,
in chronological order:

1764. January 3. Galuppi’s opera “Il Filosofo di

Campagna,” given in the Electoral Theatre with
great applause.
January 8. A grand assembly at the palace in the
afternoon, a magnificent supper in the grand
gallery at which many spectators were present, and
finally a masked ball.
March 23. Second performance of “La buona
Figliuola,” music by Piccini.
May 13. Elector’s birthday; “Le Nozze,” music by
Galuppi, and two ballets.
May 20. “II Filosofo” again, the notice of which is
followed by the remark that the Elector is about
removing to Brühl for the summer but will visit
Bonn twice a week “on the days when operas are
performed.”
September 21. “La Pastorella al Soglio” (composer
not named, probably Latilla), and two ballets.
December 16. “La Calamità di cuori,” by Galuppi,
and two ballets. This was “the first performance by
the Mingotti company under the direction of Rizzi
and Romanini.”

1765. January 6. “Le Aventure di Rodolfo” (Piccini?), given

by the same company together with a pantomime,
“L’Arlequino fortunato per la Maggia.” After the play
there was a grand supper at which the Pope’s
nuncio was a guest, and finally a masked ball kept
up till 6 o’clock in the morning.
1767. May 13. The Archbishop’s birthday. Here is the
programme condensed from the long description of
the festivities in the “Bonnischer Anzeiger”: 1, Early
in the morning three rounds from the cannon on
the city walls; 2, The court and public graciously
permitted to kiss His Transparency’s hand; 3,
solemn high mass with salvos of artillery; 4, Grand
dinner in public, the pope’s nuncio, the foreign
ministers and the nobility being the guests and the
eating being accompanied by “exquisite table-
music”; 5, After dinner “a numerously attended
assembly”; 6, “A serenata composed especially for
this most joyful day” and a comic opera in the
palace theatre; 7, Supper of 130 covers; 8, Bal
masqué until 5 a. m. The two dramatic pieces were
“Serenata festivale, tra Bacco, Diana ed il Reno,”
the authors unnamed, and “Schiava finta,” drama
giocoso dal celebre don Francesco Garzia,
Spagnuolo, the music probably by Piccini; “Giovanni
van Beethoven” sang the part of Dorindo.

1768. May 16. “On the stage of the Court Theatre was
performed with much applause a musical poem in
German, specially written for the birthday of His
Highness, and afterward an Italian intermezzo
entitled ‘La Nobiltà delusa.’”

1769. The festivities in honor of the birthday of the

Elector took place May 17th, when, according to
the “Anzeiger,” “an Italian musical drama written
expressly for this occasion was performed”—but the
title suggests the possibility of a mistake; “II Riso
d’Apolline,” with music by Betz, had been heard in
1701.
 1771. A single discovery only for this year has rewarded
search, that of a text-book, one of particular
interest: “Silvain,” comédie en une acte, mélée
d’ariettes, représentée, etc. Text by Marmontel,
music by Grétry. Dolmon père, Mons. Louis van
Beethoven, Maître de Chapelle; Dolmon, fils ainé,
Jean van Beethoven, etc.

1772. February 27. “Le Donne sempre Donne,” music by

Andreas Lucchesi.
In March, on occasion of the opening of the
Estates, “La Contadine in Corte,” music by Sacchini.
The pieces given on the birthday this year were “Il
Natal di Giove,” music by Lucchesi, and “La buona
Figliuola,” music by Piccini. On the 17th the latter
was repeated on the arrival of the French
ambassador.

1773. May 30. The Elector’s birthday; “L’Inganno

scoperto, overo il Conte Caramella,” music by
Lucchesi, in which Ludovico van Beethoven sang
the part of Brunoro, contadino e tamburino.

There are three more operettas which evidently Versatility of the

belong to the succeeding winter when the Bonn Court Musicians
company had the aid of two singers from the
electoral court of Trèves. Their titles are “L’Improvvisata, o sia la
Galanteria disturbata,” by Lucchesi, “Li tre Amanti ridicoli,” by
Galuppi, and “La Moda,” by Baroni. Ludwig van Beethoven did not
sing in them. The means are still wanting to fill up the many gaps in
the annals of this period or to carry them on during the next three
years. Perhaps, however, the loss is not of much importance, for the
materials collected are sufficient to warrant certain conclusions in
regard to the general character of the court music. The musicians,
both vocal and instrumental, were employed in the church, concert-
room and theatre; their number remained without material change
from the days of Christopher Petz to the close of Chapelmaster van
Beethoven’s life; places in this service were held to be a sort of
heritage, and of right due to the children of old incumbents, when
possessed of sufficient musical talent and knowledge; few if any
names of distinguished virtuosos are found in the lists of the
members, and, in all probability, the performances never rose above
the respectable mediocrity of a small band used to playing together
in the light and pleasing music of the day.
The dramatic performances appear to have been confined to the
operetta; and the vocalists, who sang the Latin of the mass, seem to
have been required to be equally at home in German, Italian and
French in the theatre. Two visits of the Angelo Mingotti troupe are
noted; and one attempt, at least, to place the opera upon a higher
basis by the engagement of Italian songstresses, was evidently
made in the time of Clemens August.; it may be concluded that no
great improvement was made—it is certain that no permanent one
was; for in the other case the Bonn theatrical revolution of 1778 had
not been needed. This must be noticed in detail.
Chronologically the following sketch belongs to the biography of
Ludwig van Beethoven, as it embraces a period which happens in his
case to be of special interest, young as he was;—the period from his
8th to his 14th year. But the details given, though of great
importance for the light which they throw upon the musical life in
which he moved and acted, would hardly be of so much interest to
most readers as to justify breaking with them the course of the
future narrative.
It was a period of great awakening in theatrical matters. Princes and
courts were beginning everywhere in Germany to patronize the
drama of their mother tongue and the labors of Lessing, Gotter and
other well-known names, in the original production of German, or in
the translation of the best English, Italian and French plays, were
justifying and giving ever new impulse to the change in taste. From
the many itinerant troupes of players performing in booths, or, in the
larger cities, in the play-houses, the better class of actors were
slowly finding their way into permanent companies engaged and
supported by the governments. True, many of the newly established
court theatres had but a short and not always a very merry life; true,
also, that the more common plan was merely to afford aid and
protection to some itinerant troupe; still the idea of a permanent
national theatre on the footing of the already long-existing court
musical establishments had made way, and had already been carried
out in various places before it was taken up by the elector at Bonn.
It can hardly be supposed that the example of the imperial court at
Vienna, with the immense means at its disposal, could exert any
direct influence upon the small court at Bonn at the other extremity
of Germany; but what the Duke of Gotha and the elector at
Mannheim had undertaken in this direction, Max Friedrich may well
have ventured and determined to imitate. But there was an example
nearer home—in fact in his own capital of Münster, where he, the
prince primate, usually spent the summer. In 1775, Dobbler’s troupe,
which had been for some time playing in that city, was broken up.
The Westhus brothers in Münster built up their own out of
the ruins; but it endured only a short time. Thereupon,
under the care of the minister, H. von Fürstenberg (one of
those rare men whom heaven elects and equips with all
necessary gifts to cultivate what is good and beautiful in
the arts), a meeting of the lovers of the stage was
arranged in May and a few gentlemen of the nobility and a
few from the parterre formed a council which assumed
the direction. The Elector makes a considerable
contribution. The money otherwise received is to be
applied to the improvement of the wardrobe and the
theatre. The actors receive their honoraria every month.[3]
At Easter, 1777, Seyler, a manager famous in
German theatrical annals, and then at Dresden, Opera and Drama
at Bonn in 1779
finding himself unable to compete with his rival,
Bondini, left that city with his company to try his fortunes in
Frankfort-on-the-Main, Mayence, and other cities in that quarter. The
company was very large—the Theatre Lexicon (Article “Mainz”)
makes it, including its orchestra, amount to 230 individuals!—much
too large, it seems, in spite of the assertion of the Theatre Lexicon,
to be profitable. Be that as it may, after an experience of a year or
more, two of the leading members, Grossmann and Helmuth,
accepted an engagement from Max Friedrich to form and manage a
company at Bonn in order that “the German art of acting might be
raised to a school of morals and manners for his people.” Taking with
them a pretty large portion of Seyler’s company, including several of
the best members, the managers reached Bonn and were ready
upon the Elector’s return from Münster to open a season. “The
opening of the theatre took place,” says the Bonn “Dramaturgische
Nachrichten,” “on the 26th of November, 1778, with a prologue
spoken by Madame Grossmann, ‘Wilhelmine Blondheim,’ tragedy in
three acts by Grossmann, and ‘Die grosse Batterie,’ comedy in one
act by Ayrenhofer.” The same authority gives a list of all the
performances of the season, which extended to the 30th of May,
1779, together with débuts, the dismissals and other matters
pertaining to the actors. The number of the evenings on which the
theatre was open was 50. A five-act play, as a rule, occupied the
whole performance, but of shorter pieces usually two were given;
and thus an opening was found occasionally for an operetta. Of
musical dramas only seven came upon the stage and these
somewhat of the lightest order except the first—the melodrama
“Ariadne auf Naxos,” music by Benda. The others were:

1779. February 21. “Julie,” translated from the French by

Grossmann, music by Desaides.
February 28. “Die Jäger und das Waldmädchen,” operetta in
one act, music by Duni.
March 21. “Der Hofschmied,” in two acts, music by Philidor.
April 9. “Röschen und Colas,” in one act, music by Monsigny.
 May 5. “Der Fassbinder,” in one act, music by Oudinot.
May 14. A prologue “Dedicated to the Birthday Festivities of
His Electoral Grace of Cologne, May 13, 1779, by J. A.
Freyherrn vom Hagen.”

The selection of dramas was, on the whole, very creditable to the

taste of the managers. Five of Lessing’s works, among them “Minna
von Barnhelm” and “Emilia Galotti,” are in the list and some of the
best productions of Bock, Gotter, Engel and their contemporaries; of
translations there were Colman’s “Clandestine Marriage” and
“Jealous Wife,” Garrick’s “Miss in her Teens,” Cumberland’s “West
Indian,” Hoadly’s “Suspicious Husband,” Voltaire’s “Zaire” and
“Jeannette,” Beaumarchais’s “Eugénie,” two or three of the works of
Molière, and Goldoni, etc.;—in short, the list presents much variety
and excellence.
Max Friedrich was evidently pleased with the company, for the
“Nachrichten” has the following in the catalogue of performances:
“On the 8th (of April) His Electoral Grace was pleased to give a
splendid breakfast to the entire company in the theatre.... The
company will occupy itself until the return of His Electoral Grace
from Münster, which will be in the middle of November, with learning
the newest and best pieces, among which are ‘Hamlet,’ ‘King Lear’
and ‘Macbeth,’ which are to be given also with much splendor of
costume according to the designs of famous artists.”
It may be remarked here that the “Bonn Comedy House” (for
painting the interior of which Clemens August paid 468 thalers in
1751, a date which seems to fix the time at which that end of the
palace was completed), occupied that portion of the present
University Archæological Museum room next the Coblenz Gate, with
large doors opening from the stage into the passageway so that this
space could be used as an extension of the stage in pieces requiring
it for the production of grand scenic effects. Above the theatre was
the “Redouten-Saal” of Max Franz’s time. The Elector had, of course,
an entrance from the passages of the palace into his box. The door
for the public, in an angle of the wall now built up, opened out upon
the grove of horse-chestnuts. The auditorium was necessarily low,
but spacious enough for several hundred spectators. Though much
criticized by travellers as being unworthy so elegant a court, not to
say shabby, it seems to have been a nice and snug little theatre.
Meanwhile affairs with Seyler were drawing to a crisis. He had
returned with his company from Mannheim and reopened at
Frankfort, August 3, 1779. On the evening of the 17th, to escape
imprisonment as a bankrupt, whether through his own fault or that
of another—the Theatre Lexicon affirms the latter case—he took his
wife and fled to Mayence. The company was allowed by the
magistrates to play a few weeks with a view of earning at least the
means of leaving the city; but on October 4, its members began to
separate; Benda and his wife went to Berlin, but C. G. Neefe, the
music director, and Opitz, descended the Rhine to Bonn and joined
the company there—Neefe assuming temporarily the direction of the
music in the theatre—of which more in another place.
No record has been found of the repertory of the Bonn theatre for
the season 1779-1780, except that the opening piece on December
3, on the evening after the Elector’s return from Münster, was a
prologue, “Wir haben Ihn wieder!” text by Baron vom Hagen, with
airs, recitatives and choruses composed by Neefe; that the
“Déserteur” was in the list, and finally Hiller’s “Jagd.” In June, 1781,
the season being over, the company migrated to Pyrmont, from
Pyrmont to Cassel, and thence, in October, back to Bonn.
The season of 1781-’82 was a busy one; of musical
dramas alone 17 are reported as newly rehearsed Another Busy
Season at Bonn
from September, 1781, to the same time in 1782,
viz:
“Die Liebe unter den Handwerkern
Music by Gassmann
(“L’Amore Artigiano”)
“Robert und Calliste” „ „ Guglielmi
“Der Alchymist” „ „ Schuster.
 d’Antoine (of
“Das tartarische Gesetz” „ „
Bonn)
“Der eifersüchtige Liebhaber” (“L’Amant
„ „ Grétry
jaloux”)
“Der Hausfreund”
(“L’Ami de la Maison”) „ „ Grétry
“Die Freundschaft auf der Probe (“L’Amitié
„ „ Grétry
à l’Épreuve”)
“Heinrich und Lyda” „ „ Neefe
“Die Apotheke” „ „ Neefe
Deler (Teller,
“Eigensinn und Launen der Liebe” „ „
Deller?)
“Romeo und Julie” „ „ Benda
“Sophonisba” (Deklamation mit Musik) „ „ Neefe
“Lucille” „ „ Grétry
“Milton und Elmire” „ „ Mihl (or Mühle)
“Die Samnitische Vermählungsfeier (“Le
„ „ Grétry
Marriage des Samnites”)
“Ernst und Lucinde” „ „ Grétry
“Günther von Schwarzburg” „ „ Holzbauer
It does not follow, however, that all these operas, operettas and
plays with music were produced during the season in Bonn. The
company followed the Elector to Münster in June, 1782, and
removed thence to Frankfort-on-the-Main for its regular series of
performances at Michaelmas. It came back to Bonn in the Autumn.
The season 1782-’83 was as active as the preceding. Some of the
newly rehearsed spoken dramas were “Sir John Falstaff,” from the
English, translations of Sheridan’s “School for Scandal,”
Shakespeare’s “Lear,” and “Richard III,” Mrs. Cowley’s “Who’s the
Dupe?” and, of original German plays, Schiller’s “Fiesco” and “Die
Räuber,” Lessing’s “Miss Sara Sampson,” Schroeder’s “Testament,”
etc., etc. The number of newly rehearsed musical dramas—in which
class are included such ballad operas as General Burgoyne’s “Maid of
the Oaks”—reached twenty, viz:
“Das Rosenfest” Music by Wolf (of Weimar)
Johann Küchler (Bassoonist
“Azalia” „ „
in the Bonn chapel)
“Die Sklavin” (La Schiava) „ „ Piccini
“Zémire et Azor” „ „ Grétry
d’Antoine (Captain in the
“Das Mädchen im Eichthale”
„ „ army of the Elector of
(“Maid of the Oaks”)
Cologne)
J. A. Juste (Court Musician
“Der Kaufmann von Smyrna” „ „
in The Hague)
Alexander Frizer (or
“Die seidenen Schuhe” „ „
Fridzeri)
“Die Reue vor der That” „ „ Desaides
“Der Aerndtetanz” „ „ J. A. Hiller
“Die Olympischen Spiele”
„ „ Sacchini
(Olympiade)
“Die Lügnerin aus Liebe” „ „ Salieri
“Die Italienerin zu London” „ „ Cimarosa
“Das gute Mädchen” (La buona
„ „ Piccini
figliuola)
“Der Antiquitäten-Sammler” „ „ André
“Die Entführung aus dem
„ „ Mozart
Serail”
“Die Eifersucht auf der Probe”
„ „ Anfossi
(Il Geloso in Cimento)
“Rangstreit und Eifersucht auf
dem Lande” (Le Gelosie „ „ Sarti
villane)
“Unverhofft kommt oft” (Les
„ „ Grétry
Évènements imprévus)
“Felix, oder der Findling” (Félix
„ „ Monsigny
ou l’Enfant trouvé)
“Die Pilgrimme von Mekka” „ „ Gluck
But a still farther provision has been made for the Elector’s
amusement during the season of 1783-’84, by the engagement of a
ballet corps of eighteen persons. The titles of five newly rehearsed
ballets are given in the report from which the above particulars are
taken, and which may be found in the theatrical calendar for 1784.
With an enlarged company and a more extensive repertory,
preparations were made for opening the theatre upon the Elector’s
return, at the end of October, from Münster to Bonn. But the
relations of the company to the court have been changed. Let the
“Theater-Kalender” describe the new position in which the stage at
Bonn was placed:
Bonn. His Electoral Grace, by a special condescension, had
graciously determined to make the theatrical
performances gratuitous and to that end has closed a
contract with His Highness’s Theatrical Director
Grossmann according to which besides the theatre free of
rent, the illumination and the orchestra he is to receive an
annual subvention for the maintenance of the company.
On His Highness’s command there will be two or three
performances weekly. By particular grace the director is
permitted to spend several summer months in other
places.
The advantages of this plan for securing a good
repertory, a good company and a zealous striving An Influence on
the Boy Beethoven
for improvement are obvious; and its practical
working during this, its only, season, so far as can now be gathered
from scanty records, was a great success. It will hereafter be seen
that the boy Ludwig van Beethoven was often employed at the
pianoforte at the rehearsals—possibly also at the performances of
the company of which Neefe was the musical director. That a
company consisting almost exclusively of performers who had
passed the ordeal of frequent appearance on the stage and had
been selected with full knowledge of the capacity of each, and
which, moreover, had gained so much success at the Bonn court as
to be put upon a permanent footing, must have been one of more
than the ordinary, average excellence, at least in light opera, needs
no argument. Nor need comments be made upon the influence
which daily intercourse with it, and sharing in its labors, especially in
the direction of opera, must have exerted upon the mind of a boy of
twelve or thirteen years possessed of real musical genius.
The theatrical season, and with it the company, came to an untimely
end. Belderbusch died in January, 1784. Madame Grossmann died in
childbed on March 28, and on April 15 the Elector followed them to
another world. After the death of the Elector Maximilian Friedrich the
Court Theatre was closed for the official mourning and the company
dismissed with four weeks’ salary.
It is consonant to the plan of this introductory chapter that some
space be devoted to sketches of some of the principal men whose
names have already occurred and to some notes upon the musical
amateurs of Bonn who are known, or may be supposed, to have
been friends of the boy Beethoven. These notices make no claim to
the credit of being the result of original research; they are, except
that of Neefe, little more than extracts from a letter, dated March 2,
1783, written by Neefe and printed in Cramer’s “Magazin der Musik”
(Vol. I, pp. 337 et seq.). At that time the “Capelldirector,” as Neefe
calls him, was Cajetano Mattioli, born at Venice, August 7, 1750,
whose appointments were concertmaster and musical director in
Bonn, made on May 26, 1774 and April 24, 1777.
He studied in Parma, says Neefe, with the first violinist
Angelo Moriggi, a pupil of Tartini, and in Parma, Mantua
and Bologna conducted grand operas like “Orfeo,”
“Alceste,” etc., by the Chevalier Gluck with success. He
owed much to the example set by Gluck in the matter of
conducting. It must be admitted that he is a man full of
fire, of lively temperament and fine feeling. He penetrates
quickly into the intentions of a composer and knows how
to convey them promptly and clearly to the entire
orchestra. He was the first to introduce accentuation,
instrumental declamation, careful attention to forte and
piano, or all the degrees of light and shade in the
orchestra of this place. In none of the qualifications of a
leader is he second to the famed Cannabich of Mannheim.
He surpasses him in musical enthusiasm, and, like him,
insists upon discipline and order. Through his efforts the
musical repertory of this court has been provided with a
very considerable collection of good and admirable
compositions, symphonies, masses and other works, to
which he makes daily additions; in the same manner he is
continually striving for the betterment of the orchestra.
Just now he is engaged in a project for building a new
organ for the court chapel. The former organ, a
magnificent instrument, became a prey of the flames at
the great conflagration in the palace in 1777. His salary is
1,000 fl.
The chapelmaster (appointed May 26, 1774) was Mr.
Andrea Lucchesi, born May 28, 1741, at Motta in Venetian
territory. His teachers in composition were, in the theatre
style, Mr. Cocchi of Naples; in the church style, Father
Paolucci, a pupil of Padre Martini at Bologna, and
afterwards Mr. Seratelli, Chapelmaster of the Duke of
Venice. He is a good organist and occupied himself
profitably with the instrument in Italy. He came here with
Mr. Mattioli as conductor of an Italian opera company in
 1771. Taken altogether he is a light, pleasing and gay
composer whose part-writing is cleaner than that of most
of his countrymen. In his church-works he does not
confine himself to the strict style affected by many to
please amateurs. Neefe enumerates Lucchesi’s
compositions as follows: 9 works for the theatre, among
them the opera “L’Isola della Fortuna” (1765), “Il Marito
geloso” (1766), “Le Donne sempre Donne,” “Il Matrimonio
per astuzia” (1771) for Venice, and the two composed at
Bonn, “Il Natal di Giove” and “L’inganno scoperto,” various
intermezzi and cantatas; various masses, vespers and
other compositions for the church; six sonatas for the
pianoforte and violin; a pianoforte trio, four pianoforte
quartets and several pianoforte concertos. His salary was
1,000 fl.
The organist of the Court Chapel was Christian Christian Gottlob
Gottlob Neefe, son of a poor tailor of Chemnitz in Neefe’s Career
Saxony, where he was born February 5, 1748. He is
one of the many instances in musical history in which the career of
the man is determined by the beauty of his voice in childhood. At a
very early age he became a chorister in the principal church, which
position gave him the best school and musical instruction that the
small city afforded—advantages so wisely improved as to enable him
in early youth to gain a living by teaching. At the age of 21, with 20
thalers in his pocket and a stipend of 30 thalers per annum from the
magistrates of Chemnitz, he removed to Leipsic to attend the
lectures of the university, and at that institution in the course of time
he passed his examination in jurisprudence. Upon this occasion he
argued the negative of the question: “Has a father the right to
disinherit a son for devoting himself to the theatre?” In Chemnitz
Neefe’s teachers in music had been men of small talents and very
limited acquirements, and even in Leipsic he owed more to his
persevering study of the theoretical works of Marpurg and C. P. E.
Bach than to any regular instructor. But there he had the very great
advantage of forming an intimate acquaintance with, and becoming
an object of special interest to, Johann Adam Hiller, the celebrated
director of the Gewandhaus Concerts, the then popular and famous
composer, the introducer of Handel’s “Messiah” to the German
public, the industrious writer upon music, and finally a successor of
Johann Sebastian Bach as Cantor of the Thomas School. Hiller gave
him every encouragement in his power in his musical career; opened
the columns of his musical “Wöchentliche Nachrichten” to his
compositions and writings; called him to his assistance in operatic
composition; gave him the results of his long experience in friendly
advice; criticized his compositions, and at length, in 1777, gave him
his own position as music director of Seyler’s theatrical company,
then playing at the Linkische Bad in Dresden. Upon the departure of
that troupe for Frankfort-on-the-Main, Neefe was persuaded to
remain with it in the same capacity. He thus became acquainted with
Fräulein Zinck, previously court singer at Gotha but now engaged for
Seyler’s opera. The acquaintance ripened into a mutual affection and
ended in marriage not long afterward. It is no slight testimony to the
high reputation which he enjoyed that at the moment of Seyler’s
flight from Frankfort (1779) Bondini, whose success had driven that
rival from Dresden, was in correspondence with Neefe and making
him proposals to resign his position under Seyler for a similar but
better one in his service. Pending the result of these negotiations
Neefe, taking his wife with him, temporarily joined Grossmann and
Helmuth at Bonn in the same capacity. Those managers, who knew
the value of his services from their previous experience as members
of the Seyler troupe, paid a very strong, though involuntary, tribute
to his talents and personal character by adopting such unfair
measures as to compel the musician to remain in Bonn until Bondini
was forced to fill his vacancy by another candidate. Having once got
him, Grossmann was determined to keep him—and succeeded.
As long as the Grossmann company remained undivided Neefe
accompanied it in its annual visits to Münster and other places;—
thus the sketch of his life printed sixteen years later in the first
volume of the “Allgemeine Musikzeitung” of Leipsic bears date
“Frankfort-on-the-Main, September 30, 1782”; but from that period
save, perhaps, for a short time in 1783, he seems not to have left
Bonn at all.
There were others besides Grossmann and Helmuth who thought
Neefe too valuable an acquisition to the musical circles of Bonn not
to be secured. Less than a year and a half after his arrival there the
minister Belderbusch and the countess Hatzfeld, niece of the Elector,
secured to him, though a Protestant, an appointment to the place of
court organist. The salary of 400 florins, together with the 700
florins from Grossmann, made his income equal to that of the court
chapelmaster. It is difficult now to conceive of the forgotten name of
C. G. Neefe as having once stood high in the list of the first North
German composers; yet such was the case. Of Neefe’s published
compositions, besides the short vocal and clavier pieces in Hiller’s
periodical, there had already appeared operettas in vocal score, “Die
Apotheke” (1772), “Amor’s Guckkasten” (1772), “Die Einsprüche”
(1773) and “Heinrich und Lyda” (1777); also airs composed for
Hiller’s “Dorf-Barbier” and one from his own republished opera
“Zemire und Azor”; twelve odes of Klopstock—sharply criticized by
Forkel in his “Musikalisch-Kritische Bibliothek,” much to the benefit of
the second edition of them; and a pretty long series of songs. Of
instrumental music he had printed twenty-four sonatas for pianoforte
solo or with violin; and from Breitkopf and Härtel’s catalogues, 1772
and 1774, may be added the following works included neither in his
own list nor that of Gerber: a partita for string quartet, 2 horns, 2
oboes, 2 flutes and 2 bassoons; another for the same instruments
minus the flutes and bassoons; a third for the string quartet and 2
oboes only, and two symphonies for string quartet, 2 horns, 2 oboes
and 2 flutes. The “Sophonisbe” music was also finished and twenty
years later, after Mozart had given a new standard of criticism, it was
warmly eulogized in the “Allgemeine Musikzeitung” of Leipsic. At the
date of his letter to Cramer (March 2, 1783) he had added to his
published works “Sechs Sonaten am Clavier zu singen,” “Vademecum
für Liebhaber des Gesangs und Clavier,” the clavier score of
“Sophonisbe,” and a concerto for clavier and orchestra. His
manuscripts, he adds (Cramer’s “Magazine,” I; p. 382), consist of (a)
the scores of the operettas which had appeared in pianoforte
arrangements; (b) the score of his opera “Zemire und Azor”; (c) the
score of his opera “Adelheit von Veltheim”; (d) the score of a bardic
song for the tragedy “The Romans in Germany”; (e) the scores of
theatrical between-acts music; (f) the score of a Latin “Pater
noster”; (g) various other smaller works. He had in hand the
composition of the operetta “Der neue Gutsherr,” the pianoforte
score of which, as also that of “Adelheit von Veltheim,” was about to
be published by Dyck in Leipsic. A year before at a concert for
amateurs at the house of Mr. von Mastiaux he had produced an ode
by Klopstock, “Dem Unendlichen,” for four chorus voices and a large
orchestra, which was afterwards performed in Holy Week in the
Fräuleinstiftskirche. In short, Neefe brought to Bonn a high-sounding
reputation, talent, skill and culture both musical and literary, which
made him invaluable to the managers when new French and Italian
operas were to be prepared for the German stage; great facility in
throwing off a new air, song, entr’acte or what not to meet the
exigencies of the moment; very great industry, a cacoethes scribendi
of the very highest value to the student of Bonn’s musical history in
his time and a new element into the musical life there. This element
may have seemed somewhat formal and pedantic, but it was solid,
for it was drawn from the school of Handel and Bach.
Let us return to Neefe’s letter to Cramer again for
some notices of music outside the electoral palace: Music in Private
Houses of Bonn
Belderbusch, the minister, retained a quintet of
wind-instruments, 2 clarinets, 2 horns and a bassoon.
The Countess von Belderbusch, wife of a nephew of the
minister, whose name will come up again, “plays skilfully
upon the clavier.”
The Countess von Hatzfeld, niece of the Elector, was
“trained in singing and clavier playing by the best masters
of Vienna to whom, indeed, she does very much honor.
She declaims recitatives admirably and it is a pleasure to
listen to her sing arias di parlante. She plays the
fortepiano brilliantly and in playing yields herself up
completely to her emotions, wherefore one never hears
any restlessness or uneveness of time in her tempo
rubato. She is enthusiastically devoted to music and
musicians.”[4]
Chancellor and Captain von Schall “plays clavier and violin.
Though not adept on either instrument he has very
correct musical feeling. He knows how to appreciate the
true beauties of a composition, and how to judge them,
and has large historical and literary knowledge of music.”
Frau Court Councillor von Belzer “plays the clavier and
sings. She has a strong, masculine contralto of wide
range, particularly downwards.”
Johann Gottfried von Mastiaux, of the Finance Department
and incumbent of divers high offices, is a self-taught
musician. He plays several instruments himself and has
given his four sons and a daughter the best musical
instruction possible in Bonn. All are pianists and so many
of them performers on other instruments that the
production of quintets is a common family enjoyment. He
is a devoted admirer of Haydn, with whom he
corresponds, and in his large collection of music there are
already 80 symphonies, 30 quartets and 40 trios by that
master. His rare and valuable instruments are so
numerous “that he could almost equip a complete
orchestra. Every musician is his friend and welcome to
him.”
Count Altstädter: “in his house one may at times hear a
very good quartet.”
Captain Dantoine, “a passionate admirer and knower of
music; plays the violin and the clavier a little. He learned
composition from the books of Marpurg, Kirnberger and
Riepel. Formed his taste in Italy. In both respects the
 reading of scores by classical masters has been of great
service to him.” Among his compositions are several
operettas, symphonies and quartets “in Haydn’s style.”
The three Messrs. Facius, “sons of the Russian agent here,
are soundly musical; the two elder play the flute and the
youngest plays the violoncello.” (According to Fischer the
members of this family were visitors at the house of the
Beethovens.)
There are many more music-lovers here, but the majority
of them are too much given to privacy, so far as their
musical practice goes, to be mentioned here. Enough has
been said to show that a stranger fond of music need
never leave Bonn without nourishment. Nevertheless, a
large public concert institution under the patronage of His
Electoral Grace is still desirable. It would be one more
ornament of the capital and a promoter of the good cause
of music.
What with the theatre, the court music, the musical productions in
the church and such opportunities in private it is plain that young
talent in those days in Bonn was in no danger of starvation for want
of what Neefe calls “musikalische Nahrung.”
So much upon the dramatis personæ, other than the principal figure
and his family. Let an attempt follow to describe the little city as it
appeared in 1770—in other words, to picture the scene. By an
enumeration made in 1789, the population of Bonn was 9,560 souls,
a number which probably for a long series of years had rarely varied
beyond a few score, more or less—one, therefore, that must very
nearly represent the aggregate in 1770. For the town had neither
manufactures nor commerce beyond what its own wants supported;
it was simply the residence of the Elector—the seat of the court, and
the people depended more or less directly upon that court for
subsistence—as a wag expressed it, “all Bonn was fed from the
Elector’s kitchen.” The old city walls—(the “gar gute Fortification,
dass der Churfürst sicher genug darinnen Hof halten kann” of
Johann Hübner’s description)—were already partially destroyed.
Within them the whole population seems to have lived. Outside the
city gates it does not appear that, save by a chapel or two, the eye
was impeded in its sweep across gardens and open fields to the
surrounding villages which, then as now hidden in clusters of walnut
and fruit trees, appeared, when looked upon from the neighboring
hills, like islands rising upon the level surface of the plain. The great
increase of wealth and population during the last 150 years in all this
part of the Rhine valley under the influence of the wise national
economy of the Prussian government, has produced corresponding
changes in and about the towns and villages; but the grand features
of the landscape are unchanged; the ruins upon the Drachenfels and
Godesberg looked down, as now, upon the distant roofs and spires
of Bonn; the castle of Siegburg rose above the plains away to the
East; the chapel crowned the Petersberg, the church with the marble
stairs the nearer Kreuzberg.
The fine landing place with its growing trees and
seats for idlers, the villas, hotels, coffee-houses A Prospect of
Bonn in
and dwellings outside the old walls, are all recent; Beethoven’s Day
but the huge ferryboat, the “flying bridge,” even
then was ever swinging like a pendulum from shore to shore. Steam
as a locomotive power was unknown, and the commerce of the
Rhine floated by the town, gliding down with the current on rafts or
in clumsy but rather picturesque boats, or impelled against the
stream by the winds, by horses and even by men and women. The
amount of traffic was not, however, too great to be amply provided
for in this manner; for population was kept down by war, by the hard
and rude life of the peasant class, and by the influences of all the
false national-economic principles of that age, which restrained
commerce by every device that could be made to yield present profit
to the rulers of the Rhine lands. Passengers had, for generations, no
longer been plundered by mail-clad robbers dwelling upon a hundred
picturesque heights; but each petty state had gained from the
Emperor’s weakness “vested rights” in all sorts of custom-levies and
taxes. Risbeck (1780) found nine toll-stations between Mayence and
Coblenz; and thence to the boundary of Holland, he declares there
were at least sixteen, and that in the average each must have
collected 30,000 Rhenish florins per annum.
To the stranger, coming down from Mayence, with its narrow dark
lanes, or up from Cologne, whose confined and pestiferously dirty
streets, emitting unnamed stenches, were but typical of the bigotry,
superstition and moral filth of the population—all now happily
changed, thanks to a long period of French and Prussian rule—little
Bonn seemed a very picture of neatness and comfort. Even its
ecclesiastical life seemed of another order. The men of high rank in
the church were of high rank also by birth; they were men of the
world and gentlemen; their manners were polished and their minds
enlarged by intercourse with the world and with gentlemen; they
were tolerant in their opinions and liberal in their views. Ecclesiastics
of high and low degree were met at every corner as in other cities of
the Rhine region; but absence of military men was a remarkable
feature. Johann Hübner gives the reason for this in few and quaint
words:—“In times of war much depends upon who is master of
Bonn, because traffic on the Rhine can be blockaded at this pass.
Therefore the place has its excellent fortification which enables the
Elector to hold his court in ample security within its walls. But he
need not maintain a garrison there in time of peace, and in time of
war troops are garrisoned who have taken the oath to the Emperor
and the empire. This was settled by the peace of Ryswick as well as
Rastatt.”
While the improvement in the appearance of the streets of Bonn has
necessarily been great, through the refitting or rebuilding of a large
portion of the dwelling-houses, the plan of the town, except in those
parts lying near the wall, has undergone no essential change, the
principal one being the open spaces, where in 1770 churches stood.
On the small triangular Römer-Platz was the principal parish church
of Bonn, that of St. Remigius, standing in such a position that its tall
tower looked directly down the Acherstrasse. In 1800 this tower was
set on fire by lightning and destroyed; six years later the church
itself was demolished by the French and its stones removed to
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