0:00:02 > 0:00:05100 years ago, this stretch of Southampton Water was
0:00:05 > 0:00:07black with ships.
0:00:07 > 0:00:11It was the First World War and they were carrying troops back
0:00:11 > 0:00:14and forth from the Western Front.
0:00:14 > 0:00:18Packed into hospital ships were thousands of wounded soldiers.
0:00:19 > 0:00:21They were brought here to Netley,
0:00:21 > 0:00:23a village on the south coast of Hampshire.
0:00:23 > 0:00:27At the time it was the location for the largest military hospital
0:00:27 > 0:00:33ever built. A vast Victorian edifice, sprawling along the shore.
0:00:33 > 0:00:36For some it would be a place of peace and recuperation.
0:00:38 > 0:00:41For others it became a prison, a place of shadows and nightmares.
0:00:43 > 0:00:46In this programme I will be discovering previously unseen
0:00:46 > 0:00:48letters, hospital records
0:00:48 > 0:00:52and fragile photographs that offer a glimpse into the primitive
0:00:52 > 0:00:57and sometimes brutal world of medicine during the First World War.
0:00:57 > 0:01:01Our most famous war poet, Wilfred Owen, was a patient here.
0:01:01 > 0:01:04What happened to him shaped some of his best work.
0:01:04 > 0:01:05We'll find out how.
0:01:07 > 0:01:08'And with the help of experts'
0:01:08 > 0:01:11we'll investigate disturbing new
0:01:11 > 0:01:13evidence that reveals what really happened here.
0:01:15 > 0:01:17- This is a faked scene. - Unbelievable.
0:01:17 > 0:01:22The story of this hospital reveals the true
0:01:22 > 0:01:26impact of the First World War and its horrors, re-enacted here,
0:01:26 > 0:01:29on the shores of the south coast of England.
0:01:46 > 0:01:49'My name is Philip Hoare. I grew up close by,
0:01:49 > 0:01:52'and I still swim here every day.'
0:02:00 > 0:02:03I learned about this place from my mother.
0:02:03 > 0:02:05As a young girl, her father,
0:02:05 > 0:02:06my grandfather, who'd served
0:02:06 > 0:02:12in the First World War, used to take her on Saturday outings to Netley.
0:02:12 > 0:02:15She remembered peering through the gates of this huge military
0:02:15 > 0:02:18compound, seeing what looked like grown men being
0:02:18 > 0:02:20wheeled about in prams.
0:02:21 > 0:02:24In fact, they were the paralysed victims of the war,
0:02:24 > 0:02:26still languishing here in the 1920s.
0:02:29 > 0:02:31Later, as a reprobate teenager,
0:02:31 > 0:02:36I trespassed in the grim buildings of the hospital's lunatic asylum.
0:02:37 > 0:02:41What I saw told me that this place was anything but a playground.
0:02:42 > 0:02:45In fact, it was one of the darkest sites you could imagine.
0:02:46 > 0:02:48Its stories, mysteries and ghosts,
0:02:48 > 0:02:51inspired me to write a book,
0:02:51 > 0:02:53in which I sought to bring the building
0:02:53 > 0:02:55and its history back to life.
0:02:57 > 0:03:00Because the hospital has been demolished,
0:03:00 > 0:03:03it's hard to imagine how huge this place was.
0:03:03 > 0:03:06To do that you need a lot of imagination or a little help.
0:03:10 > 0:03:12One quarter of a mile long, with 1,000 beds,
0:03:12 > 0:03:17this imperial edifice was a tribute to Victorian ambition.
0:03:17 > 0:03:2030 million bricks were used to build it.
0:03:20 > 0:03:23It was the largest brick building of its age.
0:03:23 > 0:03:27Behind the hospital a Red Cross extension housed another
0:03:27 > 0:03:292,500 beds.
0:03:29 > 0:03:31There were officers' quarters,
0:03:31 > 0:03:33a railway station, stables and gasworks.
0:03:33 > 0:03:36It was a town in its own right.
0:03:37 > 0:03:40And tucked away out of sight was D Block, the first
0:03:40 > 0:03:42purpose-built military asylum.
0:03:43 > 0:03:47When I first started to work on the history of the hospital there were
0:03:47 > 0:03:50very few official records to document it.
0:03:50 > 0:03:53But now, a remarkable collection has come to light.
0:03:53 > 0:03:55A series of very rare postcards.
0:03:57 > 0:03:59Many photographers worked at the hospital,
0:03:59 > 0:04:04producing postcards which patients could send home to loved ones.
0:04:04 > 0:04:07These sepia images reveal snapshots of life here.
0:04:07 > 0:04:11Traction wards with rows of shattered limbs.
0:04:11 > 0:04:13Doctors in their surgeries.
0:04:13 > 0:04:14Operating theatres
0:04:14 > 0:04:18and new therapies such as whirlpool baths for amputees.
0:04:20 > 0:04:24These poignant photographs help tell the story of Netley's
0:04:24 > 0:04:27hospital. One which spans 100 years of warfare.
0:04:30 > 0:04:32The hospital was founded in 1856.
0:04:32 > 0:04:36After Queen Victoria visited Fort Pitt in Chatham which is
0:04:36 > 0:04:39where the Crimean War veterans were being treated.
0:04:39 > 0:04:43The conditions were appalling so Her Majesty decreed a splendid
0:04:43 > 0:04:46new hospital should be built for her brave soldiers.
0:04:47 > 0:04:51But the building was mired in controversy from the very beginning.
0:04:51 > 0:04:54The whole design of the place seemed to go against modern medical
0:04:54 > 0:04:55architecture.
0:04:55 > 0:04:59Those great long corridors separated the men in their wards
0:04:59 > 0:05:02from the sunny seaside aspect of the place.
0:05:02 > 0:05:05When they showed the plans to Florence Nightingale she was aghast.
0:05:05 > 0:05:08She said, "You might as well take 1,100 men out on
0:05:08 > 0:05:13"Salisbury Plain each year and shoot them, as put them in this building."
0:05:13 > 0:05:16In fact, history would prove her correct.
0:05:18 > 0:05:23Fast forward 150 years and the site is now a much-loved country park.
0:05:23 > 0:05:26But the people who work here are still discovering Netley's past.
0:05:27 > 0:05:30Richard Gough knows a few of Netley's secrets.
0:05:30 > 0:05:32So what is this building then, Richard?
0:05:32 > 0:05:37It used to be the powerhouse. And it used to run all the
0:05:37 > 0:05:40electricity to the hospital.
0:05:40 > 0:05:42We think it was run with steam engines.
0:05:42 > 0:05:45- Very big steam engines. - It's an amazing building.
0:05:45 > 0:05:47What's this horrible looking contraption?
0:05:47 > 0:05:48That's an iron lung.
0:05:48 > 0:05:51These were used for people suffering from polio, weren't they?
0:05:51 > 0:05:55Polio, lung damage. I wouldn't want to be in one, let's put it like that.
0:05:55 > 0:05:56Looks like a metal coffin.
0:05:56 > 0:05:58I though it looked like an aeroplane, but anyway.
0:05:58 > 0:05:59PHILIP LAUGHS
0:05:59 > 0:06:02But you must know the real secrets of the hospital,
0:06:02 > 0:06:04- working here for quite a long time.- Some of them.
0:06:04 > 0:06:07Underneath us, there's supposed to be half a tank underneath our feet.
0:06:07 > 0:06:08Under here?
0:06:08 > 0:06:12- Yes, but whether it's there or not, I don't know.- Oh, my God.
0:06:20 > 0:06:23The hospital had its own dedicated pier built in 1856
0:06:23 > 0:06:24by Eugenius Birch.
0:06:24 > 0:06:27The man responsible for the piers at Brighton and Bournemouth.
0:06:27 > 0:06:30Unfortunately, it was totally useless.
0:06:30 > 0:06:32It didn't go out far enough to receive
0:06:32 > 0:06:34the troops from the ambulance ships.
0:06:34 > 0:06:38And so a dedicated railway line was built from Southampton
0:06:38 > 0:06:40docks into the hospital itself.
0:06:40 > 0:06:43The pier, by now, was a place of resort and refuge.
0:06:43 > 0:06:45A place to recuperate.
0:06:45 > 0:06:50You can see from these wonderful postcards, the veterans,
0:06:50 > 0:06:54the wounded soldiers, taking the sun and the sea air.
0:06:54 > 0:06:56Right by the pier and next to it is this tree.
0:06:56 > 0:07:00In the image you can see it's about six foot high.
0:07:00 > 0:07:04Now, it's a massive, fully grown pine tree.
0:07:04 > 0:07:08A real marker of the passage of time of the years between then and now.
0:07:18 > 0:07:21During the First World War the hospital railway station was
0:07:21 > 0:07:22working at full pitch.
0:07:22 > 0:07:26Sometimes three trains a day would arrive from the Western Front.
0:07:26 > 0:07:29Bringing the casualties with the mud and blood of war still on them.
0:07:29 > 0:07:32You can still see the train tracks embedded in the tarmac.
0:07:32 > 0:07:35But just imagine how busy this place would have been
0:07:35 > 0:07:37when a train arrived.
0:07:37 > 0:07:39An alarm bell would go.
0:07:39 > 0:07:40Everyone would stop work and run to come
0:07:40 > 0:07:42and help bring the wounded off the trains.
0:07:44 > 0:07:46A nurse working here wrote vividly about the patients
0:07:46 > 0:07:48arriving at the station.
0:07:50 > 0:07:52"Outside the bad cases were unloaded.
0:07:52 > 0:07:55"The men. Men with chunks of steel in their lungs
0:07:55 > 0:07:59"and bowels were vomiting great gobs of blood.
0:07:59 > 0:08:04"A splendid boy of Black Watch was but a living trunk.
0:08:04 > 0:08:08"Both his arms and legs had been shattered.
0:08:08 > 0:08:13"Men without noses and brains throbbing through open scalps."
0:08:17 > 0:08:21So I have a postcard here which shows the hospital with the
0:08:21 > 0:08:25station at the back. You can see the train tracks running here so I
0:08:25 > 0:08:29guess that's the line of the tracks there.
0:08:29 > 0:08:31Which runs right into here.
0:08:31 > 0:08:33Which must mean...
0:08:33 > 0:08:38You can see, actually, there's the tower rising up through
0:08:38 > 0:08:43the pediment of the hospital, the back of the chapel.
0:08:43 > 0:08:47So the railway line and station actually run straight along there.
0:08:47 > 0:08:52Extraordinary if you can imagine that suddenly coming back
0:08:52 > 0:08:56out of the past and all those men, all those troops.
0:08:56 > 0:08:58Amazing scene, really.
0:08:59 > 0:09:04It was one of these ambulance trains that brought a young soldier
0:09:04 > 0:09:07named James Roberts to Netley.
0:09:07 > 0:09:09Six months earlier,
0:09:09 > 0:09:1220-year-old Jim had graduated as an officer from Sandhurst.
0:09:14 > 0:09:19He'd had a privileged Edwardian upbringing of horses and cricket.
0:09:20 > 0:09:24Jim and his sister Hilda had grown up close to one another,
0:09:24 > 0:09:26having lost their mother as children.
0:09:28 > 0:09:30'Hilda's nephew, John Woolmer,
0:09:30 > 0:09:33'only recently discovered his aunt Hilda's diary.'
0:09:34 > 0:09:38This is the entry in 1916.
0:09:38 > 0:09:41"Then Jim had another leave.
0:09:41 > 0:09:43"He said he wanted to spend it in London
0:09:43 > 0:09:47"and not waste time travelling to Westow. We spent it hectically.
0:09:47 > 0:09:51"Theatres, meals out, anything to forget the horrors at the front.
0:09:51 > 0:09:54"Jim knew a big battle was planned.
0:09:54 > 0:09:57"And I think he knew he might not come back.
0:09:57 > 0:09:59"When the time came and his leave was up,
0:09:59 > 0:10:03"I was the only one he allowed to come to the station.
0:10:03 > 0:10:07"But not even me onto the platform.
0:10:07 > 0:10:11"Then the Battle of the Somme started."
0:10:11 > 0:10:14And that's where she finished her diary.
0:10:14 > 0:10:17She didn't write anything more although she lived for another
0:10:17 > 0:10:1870 years.
0:10:23 > 0:10:26Aged just 20, Jim found himself in charge of defending
0:10:26 > 0:10:29an infamous area of ground called High Wood.
0:10:30 > 0:10:33So many men had died here that the troops had nicknamed it,
0:10:33 > 0:10:35"the rottenest place on the Western Front."
0:10:37 > 0:10:39Jim wrote home to his sister,
0:10:39 > 0:10:41"What an awful time we have just had.
0:10:41 > 0:10:46"It started just as soon as the snow began to melt. Icy cold water poured
0:10:46 > 0:10:51"down the trenches which came over the top of my waders. Then the
0:10:51 > 0:10:55"Huns started blowing in our trenches which mixed with water
0:10:55 > 0:10:57"had made thick mud.
0:10:57 > 0:10:59"At 2:30am we were relieved and
0:10:59 > 0:11:02"most of us had to leave our boots behind.
0:11:02 > 0:11:05"How much longer the brigade staff
0:11:05 > 0:11:08"expects the men to carry on like this,
0:11:08 > 0:11:09"I do not know."
0:11:09 > 0:11:13Hilda wrote back to Jim, but he was never to receive
0:11:13 > 0:11:18the letter. On the 14th July, he was ordered to attack the Germans.
0:11:18 > 0:11:21During the battle, Jim was shot in the back.
0:11:22 > 0:11:25He was taken to a nearby clearing station,
0:11:25 > 0:11:28bandaged up and rushed back to Netley.
0:11:28 > 0:11:33The surgeons battled to save Jim's life, but he died six days later.
0:11:35 > 0:11:39Tucked away in the quiet grounds of Netley Hospital is its cemetery.
0:11:39 > 0:11:41It was here that Jim was buried.
0:11:41 > 0:11:44His nephew is visiting the grave for the first time.
0:11:50 > 0:11:53Lt James Thursby Roberts.
0:11:53 > 0:11:552nd Battalion, Queen's Guard.
0:11:55 > 0:11:59Only son of Major Herbert Roberts of Westow.
0:12:01 > 0:12:06It's very, very moving. I didn't know a great deal about my half-uncle
0:12:06 > 0:12:11because my aunt was so shattered by his death she didn't
0:12:11 > 0:12:13talk much about him.
0:12:13 > 0:12:17But it's very moving to come here and to see this
0:12:17 > 0:12:23and to realise what the end was for him and so many, many others.
0:12:26 > 0:12:29The medics who treated Jim on the front line were
0:12:29 > 0:12:31trained at Aldershot in Hampshire.
0:12:31 > 0:12:33This footage, filmed 100 years ago,
0:12:33 > 0:12:37shows the Royal Army Medical Corps drilling on the parade ground.
0:12:37 > 0:12:40YELLING
0:12:43 > 0:12:45Nowadays they do things differently.
0:12:50 > 0:12:544 Medical Regiment are part of today's Royal Army Medical Corps.
0:12:54 > 0:12:56They still train here in Aldershot.
0:12:58 > 0:13:01So what do they make of the 1914 footage?
0:13:02 > 0:13:04Stretchers look the same.
0:13:04 > 0:13:08- Are they the same? Are they, really? - They've evolved slightly.
0:13:08 > 0:13:10Ours are collapsible and
0:13:10 > 0:13:14more lightweight material so we can take them on patrol with us.
0:13:15 > 0:13:18You'd find casualties would be rolling around screaming, as well.
0:13:18 > 0:13:20Whereas they're just sat quite nicely for them.
0:13:20 > 0:13:21That's not going to happen.
0:13:21 > 0:13:25It's harder when they're writhing about on the floor to treat them.
0:13:25 > 0:13:28I guess the other key thing is they don't have a Chinook
0:13:28 > 0:13:33- waiting for them. - That's a horse and cart, isn't it?
0:13:33 > 0:13:34Exactly.
0:13:34 > 0:13:39From point of injury to a hospital with surgeons, doctors,
0:13:39 > 0:13:43you're looking at maybe 30 minutes. Sometimes quicker than that.
0:13:43 > 0:13:4730 minutes. During the First World War it could have taken two days
0:13:47 > 0:13:49to reach Netley.
0:13:49 > 0:13:53And by the middle of the war its wards were full-to-bursting.
0:13:53 > 0:13:55Even the corridors were lined with beds.
0:13:56 > 0:14:01The strict hospital regime varied only on one day of the week,
0:14:01 > 0:14:02on Sunday, in the chapel.
0:14:15 > 0:14:17You had to be almost on death's door
0:14:17 > 0:14:22if you were to be excused Sunday worship in Netley's chapel.
0:14:23 > 0:14:25It's a wonderful space,
0:14:25 > 0:14:28the stained glass windows, the inscriptions, the pulpit.
0:14:28 > 0:14:31You can imagine the men sitting in the balconies around us
0:14:31 > 0:14:36or in the stalls listening to probably an interminable sermon.
0:14:36 > 0:14:38In fact, behind the organ here we
0:14:38 > 0:14:41found graffiti scratched in by bored soldiers
0:14:41 > 0:14:42whiling away the time.
0:14:44 > 0:14:49150 feet high, Netley's tower was once a vast water reservoir.
0:14:50 > 0:14:52Nowadays it offers great vistas,
0:14:52 > 0:14:55if you've got the energy to climb to the top.
0:15:02 > 0:15:05It's an amazing view from up here.
0:15:05 > 0:15:08The whole of Southampton Water spread before you.
0:15:08 > 0:15:10The port and the refinery.
0:15:10 > 0:15:14And the sense of this great waterway and then this amazing
0:15:14 > 0:15:19hospital straddling the whole of this eastern side of the water.
0:15:19 > 0:15:24As a kind of counterpoint to the industry going on around it.
0:15:24 > 0:15:29Sometimes when the grass goes brown in the summer, it dies away and
0:15:29 > 0:15:36you can see the foundations of the hospital coming up out of the site.
0:15:36 > 0:15:41Almost like a ghostly nuclear shadow of the building it once was.
0:15:41 > 0:15:43This sprawling site had
0:15:43 > 0:15:48expanded in response to the exponential spread of the war.
0:15:48 > 0:15:52As result of the desperate shortage of beds, the British Red Cross
0:15:52 > 0:15:56had set up a wooden hutted camp at the rear of the building.
0:15:57 > 0:16:00Unlike the main hospital, now 50 years old, the Red Cross
0:16:00 > 0:16:04hospital was modern, comfortable and offered innovative treatments.
0:16:05 > 0:16:08Some of these images really tell extraordinary stories.
0:16:08 > 0:16:10You can see the faces of the men.
0:16:10 > 0:16:14Rather haunted, probably by the experiences they've been through.
0:16:14 > 0:16:18But here one gets the impression, compared to the main brick
0:16:18 > 0:16:21hospital, of a happier place.
0:16:21 > 0:16:24A place where there's a kind of community life.
0:16:24 > 0:16:26But not all the images from this place were happy
0:16:26 > 0:16:30and this is perhaps one of the most gruesome images, to my mind.
0:16:30 > 0:16:37A series of sometimes double amputees perched on chairs
0:16:37 > 0:16:41and stools, arranged like a fairground sideshow in a way.
0:16:41 > 0:16:44And this image really speaks to the
0:16:44 > 0:16:46true horror of the First World War.
0:16:47 > 0:16:50Many of the soldiers in the Red Cross hospital were
0:16:50 > 0:16:54cared for by VADs, short for Voluntary Aid Detachment,
0:16:54 > 0:16:58or as the troops fondly called them, very adaptable dames
0:16:58 > 0:17:00since they did almost every job.
0:17:01 > 0:17:03Can I have a cup of tea and a glass of water
0:17:03 > 0:17:04and a piece of bread pudding...?
0:17:04 > 0:17:06'Judy Stokes was just a teenager
0:17:06 > 0:17:08'when she joined the VADs in the Second World War.'
0:17:08 > 0:17:10The first thing we had to do was go
0:17:10 > 0:17:13through what we called the Chamber of Horrors.
0:17:13 > 0:17:16These were photographs of all the worst patients to see
0:17:16 > 0:17:18if you could take it.
0:17:18 > 0:17:23Not every girl could. She probably had talents in another direction.
0:17:23 > 0:17:28So we had to see whether you could take it without reaction.
0:17:28 > 0:17:31These men were already damaged physically.
0:17:31 > 0:17:35So you had to think of what was happening to them mentally.
0:17:35 > 0:17:39When families came to visit and brought photographs of what
0:17:39 > 0:17:42some of these men had looked like, heartbreaking.
0:17:42 > 0:17:44Absolutely heartbreaking.
0:17:44 > 0:17:49So we were not only nurses, we were also shoulders to cry on.
0:17:49 > 0:17:52We were kids one day and women the next.
0:18:01 > 0:18:06Sometimes all the nurses could do was to comfort the dying men.
0:18:06 > 0:18:08I personally used to sit and hold their hands.
0:18:08 > 0:18:12Just give the odd squeeze to let them know they weren't alone.
0:18:12 > 0:18:18But some of them were so young, younger then we were.
0:18:21 > 0:18:23I was thinking of my brother.
0:18:23 > 0:18:25How I would like him to be treated.
0:18:26 > 0:18:28And do the same for somebody else's brother.
0:18:30 > 0:18:35In 1917, one of the injured soldiers arriving at Netley was Wilfred Owen,
0:18:35 > 0:18:40destined to achieve immortality as Britain's most celebrated war poet.
0:18:41 > 0:18:44Dr Jane Potter from Oxford has been studying his letters.
0:18:45 > 0:18:48Wilfred had been hit by a shell on the front line.
0:18:48 > 0:18:50Exhibiting signs of erratic behaviour,
0:18:50 > 0:18:54he was sent to Netley, from where he wrote home to his mother, Susan.
0:18:55 > 0:18:58"We are on Southampton Water, pleasantly placed but not
0:18:58 > 0:19:01"so lovely a coast as Etretat.
0:19:01 > 0:19:04"They kept me in bed all day yesterday but I got up for an hour
0:19:04 > 0:19:06"and went out today.
0:19:06 > 0:19:08"Only to be recaught and put back to
0:19:08 > 0:19:11"bed for the inspection of a specialist."
0:19:11 > 0:19:14It's tantalising for me, having grown up next to Netley, to
0:19:14 > 0:19:18think of the greatest war poet wandering through.
0:19:18 > 0:19:21How do you think it influenced his poetry, if at all?
0:19:21 > 0:19:24Owen was so good at absorbing his surroundings.
0:19:24 > 0:19:29And turning that into his letters and obviously into his poetry.
0:19:29 > 0:19:32If we have a look at Mental Cases, he starts out with,
0:19:32 > 0:19:34"Who are these?
0:19:34 > 0:19:36"Why sit they here in twilight?
0:19:36 > 0:19:37"Wherefore rock they.
0:19:37 > 0:19:39"Purgatorial shadows.
0:19:39 > 0:19:43"Drooping tongues from jaws that slob their relish.
0:19:43 > 0:19:47"Baring teeth that leer like skulls' teeth wicked."
0:19:47 > 0:19:49And he goes on in much more graphic detail
0:19:49 > 0:19:52and that's his depiction of what he was seeing.
0:19:52 > 0:19:55What he was seeing in his own dreams, as well.
0:19:55 > 0:19:58So it was a combination of his own personal experience
0:19:58 > 0:20:00and those around him.
0:20:01 > 0:20:03Wilfred only spent a few days at Netley being
0:20:03 > 0:20:05assessed for shell shock.
0:20:05 > 0:20:07Others were not so lucky.
0:20:07 > 0:20:09Hello, Professor, nice to meet you.
0:20:09 > 0:20:12'Even now, we know very little about the treatment given to
0:20:12 > 0:20:14'patients suffering from shell shock.
0:20:15 > 0:20:18'But one piece of surviving footage offers precious clues.'
0:20:19 > 0:20:21In the Pathe archives,
0:20:21 > 0:20:26there's a remarkable film called War Neuroses, shot here at Netley.
0:20:26 > 0:20:28The film was produced by Major Arthur Hurst
0:20:28 > 0:20:31of the Royal Army Medical Corps, seen here on the right.
0:20:32 > 0:20:36They show servicemen being treated for a variety of bizarre,
0:20:36 > 0:20:37psychosomatic disorders.
0:20:38 > 0:20:41But many in the Army suspected these victims of malingering or
0:20:41 > 0:20:43even cowardice.
0:20:44 > 0:20:47Alarmed at the number of mentally damaged soldiers arriving
0:20:47 > 0:20:50at Netley, the government wanted Hurst to make a film proving
0:20:50 > 0:20:52shell shock was treatable.
0:20:52 > 0:20:56In effect, it was a propaganda exercise.
0:20:56 > 0:20:59Professor Edgar Jones of King's College London has been
0:20:59 > 0:21:00studying the footage.
0:21:01 > 0:21:04One of Hurst's ideas was that shell shocked patients were
0:21:04 > 0:21:06particularly suggestible.
0:21:06 > 0:21:09So you could re-educate them using theatre,
0:21:09 > 0:21:11using the hospital as a stage.
0:21:11 > 0:21:16And it was his power as a doctor, laying on of hands that would
0:21:16 > 0:21:18enable these men to get better.
0:21:18 > 0:21:21We can see this scene here where he's got the man to remove
0:21:21 > 0:21:22most of his clothes.
0:21:22 > 0:21:24He's got just a loincloth.
0:21:24 > 0:21:27One of the ideas behind that is it's more scientific,
0:21:27 > 0:21:31so you can see the outline of his body against a plain screen.
0:21:31 > 0:21:35But another idea is to make the man deliberately vulnerable
0:21:35 > 0:21:39so he's more suggestible and more able to be re-educated in this
0:21:39 > 0:21:41vulnerable state.
0:21:43 > 0:21:45When Edgar examined the film in closer detail,
0:21:45 > 0:21:48he discovered it was not quite what it seemed.
0:21:50 > 0:21:56This scene apparently shows Sergeant Bissett in a state of invalidity.
0:21:56 > 0:21:58He's bent double, walking with sticks.
0:21:58 > 0:22:01And the inter-title says it's September, 1917.
0:22:01 > 0:22:07In the next scene he's described as being almost cured two months later.
0:22:08 > 0:22:11But if we look very carefully at the background,
0:22:11 > 0:22:13we can see the same group of nurses,
0:22:13 > 0:22:17the same column of smoke coming out of the chimney from the hut behind.
0:22:19 > 0:22:22So Hurst has ordered him to recreate his illness to demonstrate
0:22:22 > 0:22:25the effectiveness of his treatment.
0:22:25 > 0:22:27This is a faked scene.
0:22:27 > 0:22:29Unbelievable.
0:22:29 > 0:22:31Many of these seemingly
0:22:31 > 0:22:34"miracle cures" were only temporary and did not last.
0:22:36 > 0:22:41What we think is happening is in 1918 he was able to promise servicemen
0:22:41 > 0:22:46that if they got better, he could discharge them from the Army.
0:22:46 > 0:22:50So it was in their interest to say their symptoms had gone away
0:22:50 > 0:22:54because then they could get a much better paid job in a munitions
0:22:54 > 0:22:57factory and they weren't haunted by the fear
0:22:57 > 0:23:00that they would have to go back to the front line.
0:23:00 > 0:23:01And possibly be killed.
0:23:01 > 0:23:05That is absolutely extraordinary.
0:23:05 > 0:23:08Clearly, soldiers suffering from shell shock got mixed
0:23:08 > 0:23:10treatments at Netley, to say the least.
0:23:11 > 0:23:13But those suffering complex
0:23:13 > 0:23:16and misunderstood mental illnesses fared even worse.
0:23:17 > 0:23:19Often referred to as "mental cases",
0:23:19 > 0:23:23they were assessed in a separate unit, set discreetly
0:23:23 > 0:23:27away from the main hospital, known by the sinister name of D Block.
0:23:27 > 0:23:29D Block was a kind of clearing house,
0:23:29 > 0:23:32where soldiers' fate would be decided.
0:23:32 > 0:23:34Between going home, going
0:23:34 > 0:23:40to a dreaded lunatic asylum or, even worse, being sent back to the front.
0:23:40 > 0:23:43In charge was Captain Frederick Clindening, a colonial
0:23:43 > 0:23:47officer with no psychiatric training and little sympathy for his charges.
0:23:48 > 0:23:52'Author Dr Peter Barnham discovered some of his notes
0:23:52 > 0:23:54'he made on patients.'
0:23:54 > 0:23:57"He is dull, plaintive and stupid, speech thick."
0:23:57 > 0:24:02Captain Clindening was, if you like, old army.
0:24:02 > 0:24:06He was already in his 40s when the war started.
0:24:06 > 0:24:08"He is intensely dull and stupid.
0:24:08 > 0:24:13"His attitude and manner are not convincing. Much of this is put on."
0:24:13 > 0:24:16That's classic Clindening.
0:24:16 > 0:24:17Much of this is put on.
0:24:17 > 0:24:23He had this sense that even stupidity is put on.
0:24:23 > 0:24:29In 1914, a German prisoner of war named Otto Scholz arrived at Netley.
0:24:29 > 0:24:32What happened to him is still wreathed in mystery.
0:24:34 > 0:24:37'Indeed, we wouldn't know anything about Otto and his links with
0:24:37 > 0:24:41'Clindening if it weren't for the man I'm meeting today.
0:24:41 > 0:24:42'Lawyer Simon Daniels was
0:24:42 > 0:24:45'so intrigued about the stories surrounding Otto's death that
0:24:45 > 0:24:49'he's spent the past 20 years trying to uncover the truth.'
0:24:50 > 0:24:54On the 6th of September, 1914, this incredible advance by the German
0:24:54 > 0:24:57army which everybody thought was unstoppable,
0:24:57 > 0:25:00and certainly the Germans did,
0:25:00 > 0:25:03were finally halted at the Marne.
0:25:03 > 0:25:06And very painfully pushed back.
0:25:06 > 0:25:11Otto was at the very forefront there. His horse fell onto him.
0:25:11 > 0:25:13It was not a serious wound.
0:25:13 > 0:25:16But it was sufficient for him to get stuck there.
0:25:16 > 0:25:19And the French were immediately upon him.
0:25:19 > 0:25:23Is the next record of him being at Netley then?
0:25:23 > 0:25:25The next record of him is
0:25:25 > 0:25:26dying at Netley.
0:25:28 > 0:25:33On the 16th December, 1916, two years after he was lightly injured,
0:25:33 > 0:25:36Otto was buried here in Netley's cemetery.
0:25:37 > 0:25:39His family were told he died from a stomach illness
0:25:39 > 0:25:42but the truth was rather different.
0:25:45 > 0:25:47His relatives had no idea that a radically different
0:25:47 > 0:25:51cause of death had been recorded on Otto's death certificate.
0:25:52 > 0:25:55Simon Daniels was able to track down a copy.
0:25:55 > 0:25:58I was stunned to read that the cause of death was acute mania.
0:26:00 > 0:26:04And that the complication was exhaustion.
0:26:04 > 0:26:09Nobody in the history of the human race has ever actually
0:26:09 > 0:26:10died from being insane.
0:26:10 > 0:26:17And exhaustion in 1916 frequently referred to loss of blood.
0:26:17 > 0:26:22And it was that which led me on to further research
0:26:22 > 0:26:26when we discovered that experiments were carried out
0:26:26 > 0:26:28here at Netley into blood transfusions.
0:26:28 > 0:26:31So are you telling me Otto was a human guinea pig?
0:26:31 > 0:26:36I'm suggesting the circumstantial evidence was that there were
0:26:36 > 0:26:39guinea pigs here at Netley.
0:26:40 > 0:26:43If Otto had died by acute mania you would not have expected
0:26:43 > 0:26:47the cause of death to be certified by a surgeon.
0:26:47 > 0:26:51But the name is Clindening.
0:26:51 > 0:26:56That's very interesting because we've heard that name already.
0:26:56 > 0:26:57Is that so?
0:26:57 > 0:27:00For not being particularly sympathetic towards
0:27:00 > 0:27:03the prisoners/patients.
0:27:06 > 0:27:10That really has an extremely startling significance in that case.
0:27:10 > 0:27:12Really?
0:27:12 > 0:27:15Because we just don't have satisfactory
0:27:15 > 0:27:19evidence about the conditions in which Otto was held.
0:27:19 > 0:27:25It is bizarre that somebody who is apparently lightly wounded
0:27:25 > 0:27:29when his horse was shot and fell on top of him would be
0:27:29 > 0:27:35here in a military hospital for two and a quarter years and
0:27:35 > 0:27:37then dies of acute mania.
0:27:41 > 0:27:45There's no doubt Netley has some dark secrets. Ones which may
0:27:45 > 0:27:47remain for ever hidden.
0:27:47 > 0:27:51But we shouldn't forget that over 100,000 soldiers were treated
0:27:51 > 0:27:53here during both world wars.
0:27:54 > 0:27:58Most of them made a full recovery, due to the care and attention
0:27:58 > 0:28:02they received here, almost in spite of the antiquated building.
0:28:05 > 0:28:09After the Second World War the hospital fell into disuse.
0:28:09 > 0:28:13And in 1966 the order was given to demolish the building.
0:28:13 > 0:28:14Some people regretted the loss.
0:28:14 > 0:28:18But nature began to heal the scars of warfare and the past.
0:28:18 > 0:28:22And now only the lingering memory of this vast military hospital remains.