PTSD in the Civil War-- Part 9: Corp. John Hildt, Co. K, 1st Michigan

They returned to a society without a Veterans Administration, a G.I. Bill or modern pharmaceuticals.

PTSD didn't enter the language until 1980, but Civil War soldiers certainly were afflicted with it.  They had flashbacks, panic attacks, insomnia and suicidal thoughts.

Historian Eric Dean has examined the records of 291 veterans admitted to the Indiana Hospital for the Insane and found cases like Elijah Boswell who "Sobbed & cried & imagined that someone was going to kill him" and that "the rebels was after him."

Another one, who survived a horrific artillery bombardment, would shout at his wife, "Don't you hear them bombarding?"  Another one considered suicidal and sleepless was convinced he was "bleeding to death from imaginary wounds."

The brother of John Hildt, the Union soldier described in the first post after losing his arm in the Seven days Battle, wrote a letter in his native German in hopes "he will recognize anything I say to him.  He is John Hildt Corporal Co K 1st Michigan Vol."

Hildt's family also sought a pension for both his physical and mental disability.  The latter was denied, the pension office wrote, due to "lack of proof" that Hildt became insane due to his wartime service and wounding.

--Old Secesh

PTSD in the Civil War-- Part 8: "The Vicious Nature of Combat"

Another book on the war "Living Hell: The Dark Side of the Civil War" by Michael Adams describes the "vicious nature of combat, the terrible infliction of physical and mental wounds, the misery of soldiers living amid corpses, filth and flies."

Some historians do not like new scholarship which include subjects such as rape, torture and guerrilla atrocities.  They say that these were on the margins of the war and don't reflect the mainstream of Civil War experience.

Gary Gallagher at the University of Virginia is one of these and adds that the vast majority of soldiers weren't traumatized and went on to have productive postwar lives.

One thing he and others warn against is viewing 1860s Americans as though they were like modern Americans.  As a rule, Civil War soldiers were more religious, more imbued with notions of honor and glory and less inclined to share their pain or seek help for it.

--Old Secesh

PTSD in the Civil War-- Part 7: The 16th Connecticut, "Broken Regiment"

Another former member of the 16th Connecticut, Wallace Woodford flailed in his sleep, dreaming that he was still searching for food at Andersonville.  He died at age 22 and was buried beneath a headstone that reads "8 months a sufferer in Rebel prison; He came home to die."

Others managed to live longer, before killing themselves or being committed to insane asylums.  Lesley Gordon, in his research on the 16th, was amazed at how many times the members returned to the twin horrors of Andersonville and Antietam in their diaries and letters.  "They're haunted by what happened until the end of their lives," she says.

She wrote a book on the 16th Connecticut called "Broken Regiment."

--Old Secesh

PTSD in the Civil War? You Betcha. --Part 6: The 16th Connecticut

Historian Lesley Gordon followed the men of the 16th Connecticut from home to war and back again and found that "the war had a very long and devastating reach."

The men of this regiment had just been mustered in and barely trained when they fought at the Battle of Antietam, the bloodiest day of combat in U.S. history.    They rushed directly into a Confederate crossfire and then broke and ran, suffering 25 percent casualties in a matter of a few short minutes.  One soldier wrote, "We were murdered."

In a later battle, nearly the whole regiment was captured and sent to the infamous Confederate prison at Andersonville, where a third of them died from disease, exposure and starvation.  Upon return to home, many became invalids, emotionally numb or abusive of family.

Alfred Avery, traumatized at Antietam, was described as "more or less irrational as long as he lived."

William Hancock, who had gone off to war  as "a strong young man" returned so "broken in body and mind" that he didn't even know his own name.

--Old Secesh

PTSD in the Civil War? You Betcha.-- Part 5: Away From Home "Nostalgia"

Though the Civil War soldiers were less distant from home than today's soldiers, many were farm boys who had never been far from home.  They didn't have phones or Skype to keep in touch with loved ones back home .

This caused the condition Civil War doctors referred to as "nostalgia," an old term for despair and homesickness so severe that soldiers became listless and emaciated and sometimes died.  It was recognized as a serious "camp disease," but generally blamed on "feeble will," "moral turpitude" and inactivity in camp.  Few who had it were discharged or granted furloughs to go home.  Recommended treatment was drilling and shaming.  An even better cure was active campaigning.

After the war, the veterans faced not only wounds but also lingering ailments such as rheumatism, and chronic dysentery.

--Old Secesh

PTSD in the Civil War? You Betcha-- Part 3: World War I's "Shell Shock" and "Gas Hysteria"

All wars are scarring.  The relentless trench warfare and artillery bombardments in World War I led to "shell shock."  The fear of gas attacks led to "gas hysteria."  Long campaigns in later wars brought the realization that all soldiers have a breaking point, causing "combat fatigue" and "old sergeant's syndrome."

In Vietnam, the line between civilians and combatants in that country blurred, drug abuse was rampant and veterans returned home to an often hostile public.  Improvised explosive devices in Iraq and Afghanistan makes for a constant risk of death.

Civil War combatant was different from later wars in that battles were concentrated and personal.  Bullets rather than bombs accounted for over 90 percent of the carnage.  Most troops fought on foot, marching in tight formation and firing at relatively close range.

By the 1860s, they had new and more accurate, longer range rifles as well as improved cannons.  As a result, units were often cut down in mass, showering survivors with blood, brains and body parts of their comrades.

--Old Secesh

PTSD in the Civil War? You Betcha-- Part 2

The Civil War killed and injured over a million Americans, roughly a third of all those who served.  That, however, doesn't include its psychic wounds.  Military and medical officials in the 1860s had little grasp of how war could scar minds as well as bodies.

However, that is changing as conditions such as post-traumatic  stress disorder are becoming more well known.  medical officials are looking back for it in the Civil War.  Corporal John Hildt would certainly qualify as a sufferer.

Men back then who suffered psychic problems were thought to have character flaws or underlying physical problems.

An example would be of a soldier suffering from constricted breath and palpitations, a condition referred to as "soldier's heart" or "irritable heart" back then, was blamed on exertion or knapsack straps being drawn too tightly across the chest.  Asylum records frequently listed soldier problems as being the result of "masturbation."

--Old Secesh

PTSD in the Civil War? You Betcha-- Part 1: "Acute Mania"

From the January 2015, Smithsonian Magazine "PTSD: The Cuvil War's Hidden Legacy" by Tony Horwitz.

IN THE SUMMER OF 1862, JOHN HILDT LOST A LIMB.  THEN HE LOST HIS MIND.

John Hildt was a 25-year-old corporal from Michigan who saw the elephant (action) for the first time at the seven Days battles in Virginia where he was shot in the right arm.  It had to be amputated close to the shoulder which caused a severe hemorrhage.

He survived, but was transferred to the Government Hospital for the Insane in Washington, D.C., suffering from what was termed "acute mania."

Before the war, he had been a laborer with no prior history of mental illness.  In the Army, he had risen quickly through the ranks as an able soldier.  His family wrote to the hospital expressing surprise that "his mind could not be restored to its original state.

Hildt remained in the hospital for years without improvement.  He was described as withdrawn, apathetic and at times so "excited and disturbed" that he hit other patients at the asylum.  He finally died there in 1911.

--Old Secesh