List of people with post-traumatic stress disorder

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This is a listing of persons with Post Traumatic Stress Disorder. See the main article Post traumatic stress disorder for an explanation of PTSD. Also, see List of fictional characters with post-traumatic stress disorder.

• Richard Aldington, English poet, writer, and husband to writer and poet Hilda Doolittle, was said to have suffered tremendously from PTSD following World War I.
• Roméo Dallaire, retired Lieutenant-General and current Canadian Senator, suffers from PTSD as a result of his service in Rwanda during the 1994 Rwandan Genocide. His suffering was so acute it brought him close to suicide before he started receiving treatment.
• Tim Fischer, while the deputy prime minister of Australia, had to be escorted from a fireworks display after having flashbacks of the Vietnam War.
• Karel Kinsky, a prince from the Austro-Hungarian empire, was believed to have suffered from PTSD after serving extensively on the Russian front during World War I.
• John Bradley, one of the Mt. Suribachi flag raisers during the Battle of Iwo Jima, and a Navy Cross recipient, never spoke of the events that occurred during World War II. After his death, his wife revealed his terrible, recurring nightmares, often about one of his closest friends, who had been kidnapped and tortured by Japanese soldiers during that battle.
• Actor Charles Durning still suffers nightmares stemming from his experiences in World War II, which included surviving the infamous Malmedy massacre of American POW's by German troops. Durning drew on his personal experience of PTSD when he played a Marine veteran of Iwo Jima in a special episode of the televison series, NCIS. (see entry in List of fictional characters with post-traumatic stress disorder)
• Audie Murphy, the most decorated American soldier in history at the time of World War II (he received thirty-three awards, including the Medal of Honor), Hollywood actor (he starred as himself in the 1955 film version of his autobiography To Hell and Back, in addition to films such as 1951's The Red Badge of Courage, 1957's Night Passage, and 1960s The Unforgiven), and songwriter (he wrote songs for Dean Martin, among others), suffered from PTSD as a result of his experience in World War II. According to his first wife, actress Wanda Hendrix, he suffered terrible nightmares and always slept with a gun under his pillow. Murphy was one of the first people to actually speak out publicly about PTSD, and during the Vietnam War he called for more government funding to care for the returning veterans and to research the condition.
• Marshal Ney, one of Napoleon Bonaparte's most notable commanders, is believed to have suffered from symptoms of PTSD. The decisions he made towards the end of his career were questionable, including those made during the Battle of Waterloo. It is suspected by most scholars that his exposure to extreme combat conditions eventually began to erode his mental capacities. He gained his biggest notoriety for leading rearguard actions during Napoleon's retreat from Moscow in 1812.
• Ira Hayes, one of the soldiers that is forever immortalized in the photo of the American flag being raised on Mt. Suribachi during the Battle of Iwo Jima, and one of the three that survived the battle, suffered greatly from PTSD, although in those days it was called "Shell Shock". He died in 1955 at thirty two years of age.
• James Blake Miller, U.S. Iraq War veteran, known as "the Marlboro Man" for the iconic, close-up photograph of his dirt-smeared, battle-weary face, with a cigarette dangling from his lips. (The photograph was taken by Los Angeles Times photographer Luis Sinco, and was published in more than 100 newspapers.) Miller's Marine unit took part in the November 2004 assault on Fallujah — an experience he doesn't talk about. Since returning from Iraq, he has suffered many of the classic symptoms of PTSD: difficulty sleeping, recurring nightmares, startling easily, and serious flashbacks. He was diagnosed by a military psychiatrist in mid-2005. [1]

[edit] Non-fiction

• "Mussolini: His Part in My Downfall", by Spike Milligan.

In this war diary, Milligan, one of Britain's greatest post-war comedians, details his descent into madness during the Italian campaign of World War II. The sequel, "Where Have All the Bullets Gone?", describes the unsympathetic treatment he received at the hands of military doctors.