The Mental Health Condition Made Them Do It

I was chatting on the phone to a former colleague last night and during our long conversation he briefly mentioned training he sometimes delivers, on aspects of mental health, that reminded me of my final year as a Metropolitan Police Cadet. Mental health seems to be rarely out of the news these days and is often cited as mitigation for tragic incidents. The following is an account of part of my training during my time at Deptford police station:

Unlike my fully trained police mentors, I would get the occasional break from the 24/7 downs, and downs, of dirty Deptford, for which I was truly grateful. The work was relentless and at times almost overwhelming. One such break turned out to be one of those transforming experiences that would resonate throughout my service. When I first heard what I was about to do, it caused me to wonder what could possibly be gained from sending me to work with the NHS as an auxiliary in either a secure psychiatric unit or a nursing home for the disabled? As it turned out, I gained a great deal and It was due to our remarkable Cadet Corps commandant, Colonel Andrew Croft, and his vision to broaden our outlook in order to enhance our effectiveness in the wider community.  

There were two such establishments; St Francis Hospital, Camberwell and Crab Hill House, Redhill, Surrey. St. Francis was a very old hospital, having opened in 1895 as the ‘Constance Road Workhouse’ before becoming the ‘Constance Road Institution for unmarried mothers, the handicapped, the elderly and the mentally ill’ - quite a variety of ‘eggs in one basket’. What effect that label had on those sent there I can only imagine, as just one look at the building was sufficient to send a shiver down the spine. By1930 the Public Health Department of London County Council took it over and under their management it catered for people with chronic mental illness and also had a so-called 'special mental observation ward'. I guess that was where I was headed in October 1970, by which time St. Francis was part of the Kings College Hospital group.

Sister Murphy was kind and compassionate; her build and bearing was formidable. Starched blue dress, white apron, frilly hat and a handshake that felt like a padded vice. She was responsible for a unit of the hospital that was looking after people who were diagnosed with various types of mental illness. I was issued with a short, white, starched jacket which had faded yellow bars on the epaulettes which apparently identified me as ‘unqualified dogsbody’. Apart from that I was allowed to wear my own clothes. Everywhere smelled of floor polish and something I couldn’t quite identify but assumed was disinfectant. There was also a background odour of boiled cabbage. It’s funny how public sector buildings all have their own distinctive smell. The floors were worn but shiny and clean. There was a communal area with tables and chairs for meals and therapeutic activities as well as soft chairs around the perimeter which I assumed were for relaxing and reading, although today it just seemed to be patients ‘sitting and staring’, mostly at me. My first hour consisted mainly of being introduced to everyone. There were very few nursing staff, maybe four in total, two of whom were male, one of whom I initially took to be a patient; I was told he definitely wasn’t, but after a full shift with him I still wasn’t convinced.

There was one patient Sister Murphy took extra care to brief me about. Apparently, Damien believed he was Jesus Christ and was still undergoing assessment. He’d been there for a couple of weeks and by all accounts was a very disturbed young man, having once tried to walk across the Thames at Greenwich. There are no bridges at Greenwich. Over the next few days, I got to chat with the patients, some of whom were happy to talk to me. There were quite a few ladies, most of whom I guessed were in their sixties. They were all considered a risk to others as well as themselves, although in most cases you wouldn’t know it.

I was issued with several large keys on a chain as there were certain rooms that had to be secured, something described as a ‘lock and key regime’. I didn’t appreciate quite how important this was until one afternoon when I was assisting a nurse to administer drugs to a male patient. On a previous occasion he had assaulted her, nearly knocking her out. As I locked the door behind us the man stood up and backed himself into a corner. Although he was a slightly smaller build than myself, his body language did not bode well, and I found my mind quickly running through a few of the restraint holds I’d been taught over the previous 18 months. The nurse spoke very matter-of-factly to him, and he complied with her instructions to the letter. His injection was administered, he gave a big smile, and everybody seemed happy. We left the room, alert for any sudden movements and I locked the door. I mentioned to her that he seemed fine and asked what his situation was. She told me that if he didn’t respond to his treatment there was only one option for him and that was Broadmoor. I was shocked. There I was holding the key that held the man whose next stop would be Broadmoor Hospital, ‘if he didn’t respond to his treatment’ - Broadmoor, where most of the nursing staff are members of the Prison Officers Association and where the surrounding villages have ‘inmate escaped’ sirens. Broadmoor sounded like the ultimate challenge for the staff and come to think of it, the local estate agents as well. It took a while for this to sink in, but it had by the time I saw Damien for his injection the next day. I said, ‘good morning’, but I wasn’t sure he agreed with me.

Another young male patient, who I got on with really well, was something of an enigma. Highly intelligent (Oxford graduate) he had some expensive looking clothes, always wore a freshly laundered shirt with smart casual jacket and trousers. He seemed very popular with the staff, but Damien (Jesus) didn’t like him. He would chat to me about matters scientific or natural history and then suddenly stop mid-sentence and begin lightly hopping from one foot to another, sometimes so quickly it was as if he was tap dancing. He would always apologise and repeat the word, Stelazine several times. He told me it gave him itchy feet and hands. Stelazine was the brand name of a first-generation anti-psychotic drug prescribed for schizophrenia.  

On my last day at the unit, on what had been a fascinating and eye-opening attachment, I was thinking how relatively peaceful everything had been during my time there. Sister Murphy was a pillar of calm authority and the rest of the staff, from the nurses to the cleaners, were all compassionate and caring towards the patients. In my short time I had been privileged to take the briefest peek into their hitherto secret world, although I never saw any doctors – although in such company it can be difficult to tell.

My final duty of the morning was to set the tables for lunch and help serve it up; something I’d done several times before. Everything was routine; patients sat in their usual places as the food trolley was wheeled in. A nurse and I began to serve the food and I noticed that Damien had stood up and was muttering a prayer. He then picked up a glass of water, dipped his fingers in it and started flicking water over his roast beef and Yorkshire pudding. Sister Murphy appeared from her office and watched. The nurse whispered to me that Damien sometimes blessed and anointed his food. He sat down and I moved to serve the person next to him, placing my free hand gently on Damien’s shoulder. Bad move. He leapt out of his seat, spun round and pushed me, his arms flailing wildly as he headed for the corridor, determined to leave the building. Sister Murphy shouted feckin’ get him Geoff and I took off after Damien, halfway down the corridor heading for goodness knows where. I rugby-tackled him above the knees and we hit the deck, my arms clamped tight around his legs. As we slid to a stop, I noticed I was staring at his buttocks, his trousers having come down just past his waist. He struggled like crazy, forcing me to increase my grip and then someone thumped down next to me. It was sister Murphy. Her next words of command were equally brief, “hold him still” at which point the biggest hypodermic syringe I’ve ever seen appeared an inch from my nose and was jabbed straight into his backside. Having emptied the barrel, she left the needle in situ and screwed a fresh dose onto it and pumped a second dose in. I felt his muscles and his fight quickly subside. It was game over. He was quickly taken elsewhere to recover. Sister Murphy congratulated me on a good tackle and explained that when Damien snaps, he snaps big time. She’d forgotten to tell me that he didn’t like being touched; a simple oversight, she was a very busy woman.

My time at the sharp end of NHS mental health care was over. Who would’ve predicted that the finale to a fascinating week would be a rugby tackle on a bloke making a break for it, who thought he was Jesus? There were no tearful goodbyes, there was no time, although I did get invited to the single nurses' quarters regular dance evening that became a most popular venue for me and my mates. It was a remarkable week for me but merely business as usual for Sister Murphy; or should that be Sister ‘Mercy’? From the perspective of value, that week punched way above its weight. I had been told the day I arrived that the people I would meet as patients of St. Francis were exactly like the ones I would be meeting on a regular basis on the streets of London, in fact anywhere up and down the country. The following extract is from the foreword to a report by Her Majesty’s Inspectorate of Constabulary and Fire and Rescue Services entitled, “Policing and Mental Health - Picking up the pieces”:

“In our inspection, we found that the police approach to people with mental health problems is generally supportive, considerate and compassionate. But we believe there is only so much the police can do to improve the overall picture. This is because, in our view, too many aspects of the broader mental health system are broken; the police are left to pick up the pieces. The fact that almost every police force now has its own mental health triage team indicates that there isn’t nearly enough emphasis on early intervention and primary care to prevent the need for a crisis response. This is letting down people with mental health problems, as well as placing an intolerable burden on police officers and staff. It is a national crisis which should not be allowed to continue; there needs to be a fundamental rethink and urgent action”.

The fact that this report was published in November 2018, forty-eight years after I first reported for duty at St Francis Hospital, speaks volumes, not only of the vision of Colonel Croft who identified the need for our awareness of the mentally ill, but also how this ‘national crisis’ has hardly caught us unawares.

Metropolitan Police Cadet Corps - 1969

What you are about to read about bears no resemblance to the ‘Police Cadets’ you might find in certain areas of the UK today.  Today it is all voluntary and they are of a much younger age, so it’s more akin to the scouts or the army, navy or RAF cadets. 

I was typical of the youth of the day, two months short of my 17th birthday and busting to get out into the world on my own. I’d passed a home interview and background checks that included my parents and my sister (who was 22 years older than me, married with three children). I had also passed the recruitment tests and medical examinations that were undertaken in London at the Met Police Recruiting Centre, Borough High Street. My parents drove me from our home in Lancashire, to the Hendon Cadet Centre one sunny Sunday in April 1969.

Once checked in at reception, I grabbed my suitcase and was led off by a senior cadet, failing to appreciate that my parents were stood watching me disappear and although there was not a shred of animosity between us, I don’t believe I actually said goodbye. On reflection I could have made a much better job of this significant moment, certainly as far as Mum was concerned but not so sure about my dad.  I could not have been an easy deal for him, after all he was sixty-three and I was sixteen!  I always suspected he felt more relief than sadness at my transition. We were starting to butt heads over my motorcycle. Dad hated them, yet he had bought me a brand new one to learn on.  He then he financed my trade-up to a very exciting Honda CB250 SS once I’d passed my test. I didn’t tell him it could top 100 mph. His one condition was that I was to have training from his friend Paddy. Paddy was our local village bobby and a former Liverpool City Police traffic motorcyclist.  My Dad was a lovely man, but things were getting a little tense between us, though I eventually came to realise that he did his very best for me.

 

My slightly shameful farewell was exacerbated less than an hour later. I’d had a whistle stop tour en route to my dormitory; gymnasium here, assault course there, reveille at 07:00. As I was unpacking my bag, I glanced up to see a group of parents, including Mum and Dad, walk past the window on their tour of the establishment, which was led by the fearsome, ex Grenadier Guardsman, Sergeant “Bill” Bailey, with whom us recruits would soon become acquainted - we would call him ‘Sergeant’, he would call us whatever took his fancy. Mum waved at me and dabbed away a tear. I don’t know if Dad spotted me, but my selfish teenaged conscience wasn’t even scratched, let alone pricked. One day I would be a parent and would learn exactly how it feels when the child you love flies the nest. I like to think Mum knew there was no malice on my part; that it was ‘par for the course’ of a teenaged son and that I would make it up to her. Seven years later, aged sixty-eight, she would have the pleasure of a third granddaughter and enjoy precious, happy times with her, including a week’s cruise on the river Thames. Mum died a few weeks before her seventy first birthday.

 

My two years training as a Metropolitan Police Cadet would turn out to be the most transformative period in my life. There is no exact equivalent in today’s police, and I doubt we shall see its like again. Today there is the volunteer police cadets, but it takes kids from 13 years of age and I bet they don’t have to do ‘milling’ (I’ll explain later), which makes it sound a bit more like the scouts although it does look like a whole load of fun and can be nothing but good for adventure-starved teenagers of today.  Even today’s military cadet forces have doubtless undergone changes that renders them unrecognisable to those who I often competed against on the sports fields. The Met Police Cadet Corps regime that transformed me was established around 1960 by Colonel Andrew Croft. If you consider the background of this man, it will give you a clue as to why I consider it to have been one of the most outstanding organisations of its time for the positive development of teenaged males. Females would not be joining the cadets until 1975, by which time the Sex Discrimination Act had been passed and even the specialist ‘Policewomen’s Department’ would cease to exist, its members absorbed into the main force along with a levelling up of their pay.

While I’m on the subject of demographics, in my eighty-strong cadet intake of April 1969, there was just one non white recruit a strapping chap of African-Caribbean heritage named Mick Jackman. I never had the opportunity to really get to know him, other than brief chats at mealtimes, because he wasn’t in my House - we were divided into four separate ‘houses’ as per the school’s system of that era.  Mick was just a nice chap going through the same mill-grinding as the rest of us. Being in a visible minority of one would have brought with it many additional challenges for the guy, challenges that I couldn’t possibly have understood at the time.

 

The Commandant, Colonel Andrew Noel Cotton Croft DSO, OBE was an inspiration. Actually, that is an understatement. His Wikipedia entry alone could form the basis of a feature film. The below is taken from the website of the Andrew Croft Memorial Fund, created after his death in 1998.

 

Colonel Andrew Croft DSO, OBE, Polar Medal

Andrew Croft had a diverse and distinguished career as Arctic explorer, SOE agent behind the German lines during World War II and latterly as reforming Commandant both of the Plymouth-based Infantry Boys’ Battalion and thereafter the Army Apprentices School at Harrogate. Colonel Croft was invited by then Commissioner, Sir Joseph Simpson, to (re-) create a Cadet Corps for the Metropolitan Police.

He arrived in 1960 and retired in 1971 shortly before his 65th birthday. During his time as Commandant, the system of training underwent complete overhaul. Andrew Croft was not, however, a man to sit behind a desk. He participated in every activity, outdoor and indoor; it was his example that converted new recruits into some of the best policemen of their time.

For Croft, every young man had talent and could be trained to bring out the best in himself and, in due course, pass on the skills he had learned. Croft knew each man’s history; he shared their triumphs and disasters; with sympathy and insight, he imbued them with his own exemplary integrity and leadership skills.

Croft was awarded the DSO for his achievements in North Africa, Corsica and France during 1943-44 and was appointed OBE in 1970. His participation in the Oxford University Arctic Expedition of 1935-36 earned him the Polar Medal.

 

Goodbye Cressida. Keep your chin up.

History has an annoying habit of repeating itself, leaving a lingering and not always pleasant taste, along with that annoying mantra, ‘I told you so’.  As I write this the British police continues to be dragged through what I consider to be one of the most traumatic periods of sustained criticism since the formation of the Metropolitan Police in 1829. 

There have always been criticisms of the police; a local Labour politician once proudly announced, after the Broadwater Farm riot in 1985, that the police got a ‘bloody good hiding’, presumably referring to the murder and virtual decapitation of PC Keith Blakelock who was going to the assistance of firefighters who had come under attack from the mob.  A woman standing next to him cheering his words ended up as the shadow Home Secretary! 

That quote caused quite a stir in the press at the time but it seems to have died the death over the last 36 years and its certainly missing from the pages of the “Black History Month” site, so at least someone seems to be letting that bygone be a bygone.  In 1829 half of Parliament never wanted ‘Peel’s Police’  and it wasn’t that long ago that I read of a motion at a debate during a Labour Party annual conference in the 80’s where there was a vote on ‘law and order’ - apparently a majority voted in favour of it; but maybe that was some journalistic joke that I took as gospel?

Politicians from all parties have their fingerprints all over this crisis, but they are the masters of smoke, mirrors and the deflection of blame. Have a long and happy retirement Ms Dick. You’ve earned it.

Are We There Yet?

I'm really only posting this to remind myself of how to do it.
Much has happened.  Good people and old comrades have died.

I became a volunteer with the regional Air Ambulance. Mrs HD and I became international dog sitters over two years ago. I am studying drama. I am still riding my beloved motorcycle. It's dark... and I'm wearing sunglasses........

......and our mighty Government still hasn't managed to conclude Brexit. I'm betting there'll be a `Jocksit` before it's sorted.

Where Did That Come From?

Bad dream last night. It came from out of the old filing system.
I half re-lived the time I came within a gnats whisker of shooting a young chap who, as things planned out, was unarmed. We both dodged a bullet that morning.

I wrote it up under the title “The Judas Kiss in the Garden.....”

Wonder what rattled that file? Perhaps I shouldn’t have watched “Bodyguard’ on the iPlayer? That’ll teach me.

Chatham House Rules - plus The New Royal Engagement

I was up the smoke last week to the annual reunion of the survivors of my old Metropolitan Police station, Cannon Row, closed down in the 80's. It used to stand within the complex on the Victoria Embankment known as "New Scotland Yard" which was the HQ of the Metropolitan Police.  That place then moved to Broadway, off Victoria Street in the late 60's to a brand new building they called....."New Scotland Yard".

Well the new New Scotland Yard got crumbly and crusty (like some of its occupants) and basically wore itself out (like some of its occupants) so they created a new home for London's police headquarters. It's now called, "New Scotland Yard" which by pure coincidence is right next door to the former home of the Met, "New Scotland Yard" - and my old nick. In my 32 years I served at numerous police stations and departments in both London and the Home Counties, but the only reunion I've ever gone to, so far, is this one. It's special to me.

Over lunch, I was sat amongst officers who formed part of the team who looked after Her Maj' when `at home` which could be any of the Royal Households, including Buckingham Palace, Clarence House, Sandringham House in Norfolk or Balmoral in Scotland. I was chatting with old chums including the Queen's former personal protection officers and some who looked after her children for decades. We all knew about the latest `engagement` and that the announcement would be coming when it did. Nobody said a word of this insider information outside of our meeting place. Not one word.

Some may call that a true reflection of the code of honour and oath of office we all took, and still hold ourselves accountable to, despite being well and truly retired. Some may say it was because by the time we tottered out of the club, full of bon homie and alcohol, into the chilly streets of London, we'd completely forgotten.

Empires

http://news.sky.com/story/boy-aged-14-dies-after-being-shot-in-newham-east-london-11022654

My grandmother used to live in Forest Gate. When I was nine years old I rode my little bike the two miles from my home to visit her. Mum was cross as it was a spur of the moment thing and I hadn't asked her permission. She would probably have allowed me. Mums did that sort of thing in those days.

This shooting was just past Wanstead Park tube station. We'll be passing through there on the tube tomorrow - both ways. Luckily we're not fourteen years old.

 `Johnny used to work after school
at the cinema show.
Gotta hustle if he wants an education
Yeah he's got a long way to go.
Now he's out on the streets all day
selling Crack to the people who pay.
Got an AK-47 for his best friend
business the American way.

Eastside meets Westside downtown.
No time, the walls fall down Black man, trapped again. Holds his chain in his hand.
Brother killing brother for the profit of another,
Game point, nobody wins`.*

(*Lyrics from "Empire", a rock album by Queensryche, penned twenty seven years ago)