'The Twitch' - now known as PTSD

My father, Ben Walsh, was still not seventeen when he lied about his age at the RAF Recruitment office. He reported for duty in early February 1941 and volunteered as aircrew. He was trained as a pilot and was awarded his 'wings' just two months after his eighteenth birthday. Ben was 'above average' with his night flying and was invited to train as an intruder. By the time he was just eighteen-and-a-half, he had joined No. 418 (RCAF) Squadron and was working up to operational standards. Whilst skilled with his flying, he was relatively immature. Within months, the loss of his friends and comrades in the squadron was impacting his mental health. This condition was often known as 'The Twitch'. Ben was noticed in late 1942 by 418 Squadron’s MO, Flight Lieutenant Hagan. My father recalled that, ‘the Medical Officer called me to one side. He said to me, “You don’t drink, do you?” And I said, “No.” And he said, “You don’t smoke?” And I said, “No!” So he said, “Take forty-eight hours off and start smoking and drinking. Your nerves are getting shattered.” And that’s how I started smoking and drinking.’ Like many aircrew, my father started occasionally using alcohol as a stress relief valve. The deaths of his friends continued and, nine months later, when my father was posted to India, this relief valve was removed.

45 Squadron Mosquito at RAF Kumbhirgram (AWM SEA_0089)

India turned out to be a perfect storm for my father. Having been posted to there mid-way through his first tour, with eighteen intruder operations under his belt, he was counting down the operations until his tour ended and he would go back to the UK to take up a training role. Having flown three more operations with 27 Squadron, he and the other Mosquito crews were all posted to 45 Squadron. On arrival they were told that all previous operations didn't count and that their tours would be 250 operational hours or three years, whichever was the shorter. Ben did not take this news well. He collapsed when he was told it! This was when he first went to hospital. After some treatment and rest, later that year he was posted to 82 Squadron where the Mosquitos started having some structural problems. In the autumn he was posted back to 45 Squadron and to RAF Kumbhirgram, an airfield in the jungle. Here, there was 'one beer per person per week', if it arrived. My father admitted that he became more solitary, not wanting to make friends with new arrivals, probably protecting himself against being hurt.

It wasn't just my father. I asked Barbara Boon, the daughter of fellow 45 Squadron pilot, Wal McLellan, about her father. She allowed me to include her reply in my book, Mosquito Intruders - Target Burma. Barbara realised that the war had long term effects on her father.

Wal McLellan with Bill Taylor, both 45 Squadron (AWM SEA_0033)

‘In hindsight, I feel so disloyal to Dad in realising that he certainly had PTSD but, when I talk to other children about their fathers, I realise that we mostly had the same experience of being children of those men. They were kind, peaceful, compassionate and private. They were the strong silent types so often, good citizens and gave much of themselves in service to community and others. But there were the rare and completely unexpected flashes of intense anger. Dad was helping me with my maths homework and I just couldn’t grasp a concept of algebra – he suddenly blew sky high, slammed the book shut and stormed off as he shouted that “I couldn’t be that stupid.” To this day, I feel the tears prickle at the memory. I had never seen Dad angry. He was eternally patient about anything and this shook me to the core. Truly I have PTSD from his PTSD!

‘Some years later he blew up again, completely out of context to the situation and left me devastated with grief. Of course, I didn’t know about PTSD – I had great uncles who regularly went mad and the adult conversations were always so sympathetic because they were ex-WW1 soldiers. But it was never part of Dad’s vernacular for himself. The clue of course was in his nightmares, which were terrifying. I would hear him screaming and calling out in the middle of the night and then the footsteps down the hall of him and Mum and the quiet clinking of cups as they sipped their tea. Low conversations and on the occasion that I crept down the hall to see what was going on, Dad with his head in his hands saying over and over again, “Jesus wept, Jesus wept” with Mum standing behind him with her arms around him and her head on the back of his neck till he recovered. Wow, I haven’t thought of this for a long time. I’m rather emotional now. But, the one time that I asked about it, he laughed and said, “Oh the Heeby Jeebies got me” and that was the end of that!’

Like Barbara's father, Wal, my father was also suffering from PTSD and still was when he should have been demobbed from the RAF. He was not well treated by the RAF medics, even by the standards of the day. Luckily, his girlfriend, who against the advice of a senior medic married him, was extremely strong and protective, supporting him in his return to health.

Air Chief Marshal Sir Stephen Dalton

I was honoured when Air Chief Marshal Sir Stephen Dalton agreed to write the foreword for Mosquito Intruder Pilot. I was so pleased when he focused on the issue of mental health. Referring to my father, Sir Stephen noted that 'we read about the reality of his life, the highs, the lows and the fight to cope with the natural anxiety and fears of seeing friends not return from routine (wartime) missions. We also read of the (historic) challenges in diagnosing and caring for warriors who hide their personal feelings and normal human reactions to the death of comrades and peers. They do this partly because they think it is their duty to ‘cope’ with the emotional strain without showing it and partly because they must get on with fighting the war.

'Today, as a result of the greater understanding and evaluation of the impact on military personnel of their own experiences and the loss of comrades in recent military operations and conflicts, we have learned much more about the mental consequences of ‘hiding’ these normal human feelings and, as a society, we are more able to accept these normal feelings and to help combatants overcome their mental anxieties.'

Sir Stephen went on to conclude that my book 'not only portrays a powerful example of what drives military people to go on in some of the most demanding situations, but also highlights the price that many pay both during and after their combat experience. Such stories tell of ‘normal’ human reaction to devastating events and they deserve to be told and read. Wonderful aircraft are the critical tool of any air force, but the people who fly them, and those who service and support them, give them life and they deserve our understanding and compassion both during operations and potentially for a long time after the combat phase ends.'

Whenever I am asked to sign one of my books, I always write, 'All of these brave young men must be remembered.' The survivors and their families often bore hidden scars.