Committee for Conflict Transformation Support

CCTS
Newsletter 14

Social Healing of the Wounds of War

In this article Adam Curle describes an experiment to 'resocialise' ex-Prisoners of War at the end of World War II and considers its relevance for the twenty-first century

Half a century ago, when the Second World War came to an end, the survivors, soldiers and civilians, returned to their homes. But for some, all that remained were the ruins of a home; for yet others, exile or the cold rule of a tyrant. Most had suffered in mind or body, most had lost something - peace of mind, a beloved person, a community, a country, a way of life, happiness. The challenge of a new life in a new world lay ahead, but some could not meet the opportunities or excitement of that challenge. They had suffered too much.

One group facing this challenge were the tens of thousands of British Prisoners of War returning to Britain after five years of captivity in Europe. (These were initially referred to as PsOW, but at some subsequent stage - and in this writing - as POWs). Later we will consider whether what we can learn from them could be applied to the difficulties experienced by others elsewhere whose lives have been disrupted by war and other catastrophes in the twenty first century.

The prisoners of war

As it became clear in 1945 that the war was coming to an end, a group of very senior officers approached the government with an urgent plea that some provision should be made for the 120,000 British POWs who had mostly been captured in 1940. These officers had themselves been captured during World War I and argued that their lives had been ruined because no one had recognised the damaging effect of long-term captivity. Some provision must be made, they said, for the young men who would soon be returning to Britain from German prison camps. With an amazing lack of bureaucratic delay and with the assistance of two remarkable psychiatrists, A.T. Macbeth (Tommy) Wilson and Eric Trist, the army set up therapeutic bodies called Civil Resettlement Units (CRUs). The task of the CRUs was to help the returned POWs bridge what turned out to be a very wide social gap between captivity and freedom. There were twenty such units, each servicing the needs of some 240 men, usually for a month at a time. (The awful physical plight of captives from South East Asia required special conditions and treatment not provided by the CRUs.)

The first job for Wilson, Trist and their colleagues was to meet the fairly large number of men who by one means or another had managed to return to Britain early. Most of them had enjoyed a blissful first few weeks, but then after a month or six weeks, their mood had changed. They were depressed, felt they were losing touch with their families, and wanted to return to such minimal military security as was offered by the CRU. They suffered from insomnia, and from loss of appetite and sexual drive. Some had aimlessly left home; a certain number had committed petty crimes. Many felt vaguely guilty for having allowed themselves to be captured, seeing this as failing both the army and their families.

There was no single symptom apart from a strong sense of malaise and dissatisfaction, of being no longer part of society. There was therefore no obvious treatment. The psychiatric staff of the CRU organisation did not feel, however, that these POWs, with the exception of a few individuals, were suffering from any sort of psychological sickness. Wilson and Trist rejected any idea that they were 'ill'; or 'abnormal'. They were, however, unhappy and felt alienated from the society to which they had returned - and in tragic cases this included their wives and other members of their families. They were, in the rather horrible but expressive parlance that evolved, desocialised or unsettled.

CRUs as transitional communities

The CRU structure provided ample medical and dental facilities for the POWs, but the emphasis of the effort was social: the POWs were to be helped to 'feel at ease', in fact to be eased into the social and familial roles in which they had previously felt comfortable but from which they now felt estranged.

Their alienation from normal civilian life had occurred during the whole process of militarisation. This is a process which transforms the civilian into the fledgling soldier through an increasing identification with the army unit, a process cemented by the experience of battle in which small-group solidarity and mutual trust is essential to survival. If it happens that the action ends in capture, reliance on the group intensifies. Without their weapons and their military leaders (who, if captured, are sent to other camps), the captives have to depend entirely on each other. It might have been assumed that the outcome would have been a chaotic anarchy. But from the available accounts, it was a tender democracy in which its members followed the mandate of reciprocal respect and care. It seems that this democracy persisted as an ideal socio-psychological form, one looked back on with nostalgia during periods of painful repatriation.

However, although the culture of the camps was democratic, this was not entirely conducive to resettlement. The POWs were returning to roles - as father, citizen, neighbour, employee, especially perhaps husband - from which they had been progressively and often ruthlessly estranged. How could a sojourn in the CRU help these men recover the sense of being truly part of a society? At present they were still soldiers and must be eased back into more gentle, and - in a different sense - more 'democratic' roles. Wilson and Trist saw that they must also learn to combine the civilian skills of family and occupational life with those of citizenship. The role of the CRU was to serve as a stepping stone between military and civilian worlds, to be a transitional community.

The CRU curriculum

The permanent staff of the CRUs wore uniforms and were subject to normal (but relaxed and non-doctrinaire) military discipline. The POWs, though nominally soldiers in that they had not been discharged from the army, were all volunteers. Nothing was compulsory. They could come and go as they wished. In fact, perhaps encouraged by the complete lack of restrictions, the great majority took full advantage of available facilities and opportunities. These included:

• Psychiatric treatment if the volunteer felt he needed this. The psychiatric unit was located in an inconspicuous part of the camp to avoid the chance that 'old so and so' might be considered 'a bit potty';
• Help in mastering the complexities of post-war society: the rationing of food, clothing, furniture and so forth; taxation and other financial issues; problems of accommodation;
• Studying employment possibilities - the term used was 'job rehearsal'. A number of businesses, trades, crafts, and so on, generously provided time and skilled practitioners to give volunteers a chance to find out about building, farming, clerical work, the law, teaching, nursing, or various forms of further education;
• Seminars or workshops. These were held fairly regularly with a participating (rather than a chairing or 'facilitating') officer on the staff. The exchanges that took place during these sessions gave volunteers the chance to break down feelings of shyness, or to deal with experiences in a way that could help them to become closer to their families and others in the civilian community;
• Finally, regular weekend home visits - the most important stepping stone. Until towards the end of the (usually) four or five weeks stay at the CRU, the volunteers were not ready to open themselves to family life. However, the security of the CRU experience gradually lowered the barriers. The gap between the stepping stones grew narrower.

Evaluating the CRUs

We now come to the crucial problem of assessing the effectiveness of the CRU system. To what extent did these transitional communities succeed in resettling volunteers who had entrusted themselves to their care? We had carefully considered possible symptoms of deterioration or improvement, but none was very plausible.

I should interpolate that my CRU role was as a research officer. It was particularly important that I should avoid any bias towards the CRU system and my thought constantly returned to many discussions with Wilson and Trist, and also with Ben Morris, Henry Dicks, Isobel Menzies and Harold Bridger. I mention these then eminent names because they may jog the memory of readers who know their work and will the better understand the work of the CRUs.

I had by this time resumed post-graduate work at Oxford where there were a considerable number of ex-POWs within easy cycling distance of my home. It had been decided that the best way to assess the performance of the CRUs would be to study the products of the system, and to compare these with a larger number - larger because there were more to choose from - who had not volunteered for the Units. One hundred and fifty men were selected according to criteria chosen by others of our colleagues. I do not have a list of the criteria, but they were chiefly aimed at ensuring a certain rough balance, for example with regard to age, marital status, and level of education. One hundred of them had been to CRUs; the rest, not. A further forty took part in the study who had not been in the services at all because they were in reserved occupations, though they otherwise conformed to the CRU/nonCRU sample. These comparisons, we thought, should be revealing.

For weeks I spent much of my time with all the members of the samples. We met in their homes, at their places of work, and in pubs (though there was an unfortunate shortage of beer!) At first I didn't know what I was looking for. After a while, however, we began to recognise various patterns of role behaviour and identified 15 illustrative types of relations which we termed Criteria of Social Participation. These included relations with partners, children and other close family members, with neighbours, employers and work mates, and with the wider society. However, the 'local culture' within which people played these parts varied greatly, from warmly close and co-operative to indifferent or hostile. It seemed to me that the men performed their roles at four different levels of skill and competence which we defined as the statistical norm, the ideal or supranorm, and two narrow and limited infranorms. Looking back at this material with which I was so deeply involved half a century ago, I am struck by how many aspects of human relations, or failures of relations, have remained basically unchanged.

An able statistician, Hugh Murray, who was associated with the development of the CRUs, undertook detailed analyses of the scoring of the Fifteen Criteria of Social Participation (4 for supernorm, 3 for norm, 2 for infranorm 1, and 1 for infranorm 2) in relation to the ex POWs and the forty men who had not been in the army at all. This analysis showed that a significantly larger proportion of those who had been to CRUs were better settled than those who had not. To put it simply, this vindicated the CRU experiment; statistically there is a very low probability that some other factor could have been responsible for the result.

I think it was Eric Trist who spoke of the significance of 'creative casualties'. These were people who had coped with pain, confusion and separation from their loved ones without losing hope or the ability to help and encourage their companions in captivity. These were the men who, after repatriation, scored supranormally in the survey. A further way of expressing the idea would be that these 'creative casualties' had, by surviving threat and hurt, gained an exceptional new awareness and power. Obviously this development does not depend on having been a POW, although this may sometimes have helped.

There are other exceptional people whose inner growth does not depend on comparably demanding conditions.

Contemporary relevance of CRUs

Since the early days of my own career, which was really kick-started by my work with the CRU organisation, I have had the chance to meet creative casualties in many parts of the world. Several of them have in fact been former prisoners, though sadly a far greater proportion of former prisoners become victims.

We cannot, alas, say that the world has become a more peaceful place. Those subjected to violence and those practising it are very numerous. Although the last fifty years have seen a wonderful growth of agencies working for human peace and well-being, there can be no certainty that they are winning the race against violence. Among the losers are millions whose lives have been ruined by wars, economic disruption, injustices, or a damaged environment. These millions need to receive and to give help to their fellow women and men, and to the material world we live in.

I believe that the experience of the CRUs provides grounds for hope and that units of this kind, adapted to suit present day circumstances, might help those who have experienced the trauma of war and violence in recent years. When this idea first came to me, I turned it nostalgically aside: ludicrous, I thought, too difficult, too big. But I then realised that the basic idea was simple. Throw out the frills and what is left is a frame-work of fundamental principles which remain relevant.

The first practical step in applying these principles would be to provide a restorative refuge where people could free themselves from shocking experiences. Here they could be helped by the priests and elders, the creative casualties, the inner shamans. They would be guided away from shame by discovering that many others were also plagued by illusory guilt. They would talk to each other about what, as a result of this process, would no longer be secret degradations. Respected relatives and friends would guide them back into the community of life. The character of each group would depend on the local culture, the types of pain its members had suffered, and the types of inner skills members brought to the group and developed within it. The healing power of the refuge would come from the trust, confidence and affection that it generated.

Adam Curle

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