'Ghosts of war' leave mental trauma

A car crash outside Wallasey Town Hall on Merseyside triggered a thousand flashbacks for former Sgt Clive Rowlands.

Mass graves, the smells of gunfire, fallen comrades, and the depravity of war came rushing back.

After witnessing the atrocities of the Bosnian conflict in the late 1990s, taking part in five tours of Northern Ireland and serving in the Falklands, suddenly Mr Rowlands had reached breaking point.

The father-of-three had been suffering from a severe case of undiagnosed post traumatic stress disorder since he left Bosnia in 1996.

But eight years on, in the safety of his home town of Wallasey, he suddenly realised he was petrified.

"I was working as a security guard for the mayor at the time. I loved the job and had been out of the army since 2000.

"Two cars crashed outside the town hall, I dashed outside and I treated one of the injured parties. He died later in hospital.

"I couldn't handle it, flashbacks from the war started to plague my waking moments and I knew I wasn't right."

Mr Rowlands began drinking to forget.

"He had seen so much, we all had. He killed himself in front of us. But I couldn't grieve, I couldn't show that I was devastated"

"I was drinking so I could sleep and the images would leave me."

While serving in Bosnia he saw the aftermath of the ethnic cleansing that ravaged the country between 1992 and 1995.

"There were mass graves and bodies everywhere. I saw a 78-year-old blow himself up with a hand grenade in front of me, and I've found babies, women, children mutilated."

Sgt Rowlands said it was the civilian casualties that affected him and his comrades the most.

"We had been trained to deal with killing people, we knew about what to do if one of our mates falls wounded - leave him and continue to hunt down the enemy.

"But we weren't ready for the civilian deaths; women, children, whole families wiped out."

'Body bag'

One of his soldiers reached the point of breakdown while at war in Bosnia.

"He had seen so much, we all had. He killed himself in front of us. But I couldn't grieve, I couldn't show that I was devastated. Everything moves too fast in the Army.

"It sounds so cruel, so callous, but we just had to get him in a body bag and ship him home."

It was more than a decade later that Mr Rowlands would finally be able to grieve and receive treatment.

"I had been sinking, my marriage was over, I was struggling at work and there was a big dark cloud over my life."

It was only when he was referred to the charity Combat Stress, through an occupational therapist for his employer Wallasey Council, that he began to come to terms with what he had seen and endured.

Combat Stress has three centres across the UK that treat servicemen and women who are suffering from the mental trauma caused by war.

"The centres are like safe havens," Mr Rowlands said.

"I go to Audley Court in Newport, Shropshire. I have been going for more than five years now and I gain so much from talking to other lads and women in the armed forces.

"We get taught to know where our switch off and switch on buttons are and we learn to become desensitised to the ghosts that haunt us."

'Nowhere to turn'

Combat Stress chief executive, Wing Commander David Hill, told the BBC that many soldiers leave the army, lose control and end up in prison.

At the moment he estimated, there were 8,000 inmates who had served in the armed forces.

"Our charity specialises in helping those army personnel who have left the army and find themselves with no support and nowhere to turn.

"It is a staggering fact that the average amount of time for an ex-soldier to come to us after leaving the armed forces is 14 years.

"Army veterans are generally a hardy, determined bunch who think they can get through things and try to use their initiative and their own way of dealing with things before approaching us.

"However, a good thing to note is that more solders who have served in recent wars are coming to us and only waiting a couple of years before they seek help."

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