Testimonies: abuse of children in armed forces training

The UK is highly unusual internationally in recruiting children from aged 16 into the armed forces, primarily into the army. Most 16- and 17-year-old army recruits train at the Army Foundation College in Harrogate (AFC), which has a long record of alleged bullying, abuse and sexual assault of recruits, including by its staff. CRIN has been working with former recruits and their parents to speak out about the abuse of young people at AFC; you can read their stories below.

CRIN has also produced a two-page paper outlining welfare concerns for under-18 recruits in the armed forces, and at AFC specifically.

Alison’s story

Alison’s son Nathan joined the Army Foundation College in 2016, aged 16.

“Nathan started his military career at the Army Foundation College Harrogate in 2016. Nathan was a confident, resilient lad who wanted nothing more than to be a soldier. He did a lot of research into joining the military and was more than prepared for the discipline and everything that was expected of him during training. In fact he welcomed the routine and way of life the military offered.

During the first phase of his training Nathan reported serious incidents to me; he told me he was hit, slapped, pushed, kicked and verbally abused by staff. He said he felt humiliated by this treatment and he never expected to be treated this way. He knew the training would be tough but this was abuse and the staff were power crazy.

During one exercise, Nathan and his platoon were doing a swim in full combat gear and equipment. One of his closest friends suffered from a phobia of water. The staff were aware of this and held his head under the water. Nathan was extremely angry about this and told me about it in a phone call. When home on leave he told me about it again and I could see how angry and distressed he was. I have heard reports from other lads on that exercise that this kind of treatment happened to a lot of them, Nathan included. 

Nathan felt uncomfortable talking about what was happening to him but I often pushed him to open up and talk to me. He did tell me about witnessing abuse of his peers and commented on his dislike and distrust for some of the staff. He did however point out not all staff were abusive but said that none of them could be trusted. He told me all staff knew what was going on but turned a blind eye. 

He had family photos on display in this dorm as all the lads did. He got fed up with his corporals making vulgar comments regarding me and my daughter. He said this happened to everyone but what started out as banter became so crude he had no option other than to put the photos away.

After the initial six weeks of training we travelled to Harrogate for Nathan’s first passing out parade and brought him home on leave. He was not the same happy confident lad who started six weeks previously. He started drinking heavily and was very withdrawn. It was very difficult getting him to return to Harrogate and he told me he wanted to leave the army. 

When he returned to Harrogate he rang me to tell me he was handing in his letter to leave. He told me his request was ripped up in his face. He was only 17 years old and devastated at not being able to leave. He repeatedly told me he wanted to be a soldier and expected training to be tough but couldn't cope with the way they were mistreated. He was clearly very frightened for his safety and I shared his fears.

Whenever he was on leave it became increasingly difficult to get him to return to Harrogate. I would take him to the train station and by the time I arrived home Nathan wouldn't be far behind me. He was genuinely very fearful of being at Harrogate and things just got worse. There were so many occasions I would put Nathan on the train and believe he had gone back to Harrogate only to receive a phone call from staff days later asking if I knew of his whereabouts. They would inform me I had 24 hours to get him back or he would be posted AWOL. I would then have to locate him and persuade him to return but he was always so afraid of the repercussions. He didn't mind the legitimate punishments, it was the abuse he was scared of. 

I spoke to his commanding officers after every occasion and expressed my concerns. Each member of staff basically said the same thing: if Nathan didn't return he would be posted AWOL. They all assured me that although Nathan would be in trouble they were there to help him and would speak to him. I always told them I had concerns over his mental wellbeing and that he wanted to leave. I was repeatedly told that once he had completed the first six weeks he had no way of leaving. They said no matter how he felt he had to complete the four years.

I would always reassure Nathan and encourage him to talk to the staff and get help. Nathan told me every time they were lying to me and were just telling me what I wanted to hear. He said I had absolutely no idea what he was being sent back to. The officers told me that if Nathan didn't return then the seriousness of the situation would escalate and the punishments would be more severe. I expressed again and again how he felt in danger but was repeatedly told this was not the case and that if he felt there was a serious threat to him he should raise his concerns. Nathan of course did not do this as nobody could be trusted. He also told me that by speaking up I had made things a whole lot worse for him.

Nathan was a strong willed and resilient lad who wanted nothing more than to be a soldier. He said he didn't expect to be faced with the disgusting way they were mistreated at Harrogate. He described the staff as animals that got off on hurting and humiliating people and that Harrogate should be shut down.

Nathan died last year while still serving in the army. There is an ongoing Service Inquiry and in due course an inquest is expected to be held. I have asked the Service Inquiry to look into these matters.”

Charlotte’s story

Charlotte’s son Marc joined the Army Foundation College in 2016, aged 16.

“My son, Marc, was never a very academic child, but he had lots of hobbies and loved sport. He never really knew what he wanted to do as an adult but he was always a happy child with a positive outlook on life.

Just before he turned 16 Marc had a recruiting day at school for the army. He came home that evening elated and full of enthusiasm to sign up. My husband and I tried to convince Marc to get a trade or to join the army later in a skilled role, but he wanted to join up as soon as possible. He was full of thoughts of seeing the world, of travel, independence and high wages.

Marc trained very hard, and went running twice a day carrying bottles full of water on his back. After he passed his physical assessment, we took him to an open day at the Army Foundation College in Harrogate. All the staff were charming and made Marc feel like all his dreams could come true, so at the time there appeared to be no better career for him.

Regrettably I signed Marc up on that day and the following month, in 2016, with an ironing board in the boot, we dropped him off at Harrogate. During the first few months we didn’t hear much from him, but when he did call home all appeared positive. 

After Marc turned 17 he came home for a week or two, and it was during this time that I realised all was not well at Harrogate. I overheard several conversations with his fellow recruits discussing “bathroom beatings” and “things going too far”. Marc also let slip he had been in several pubs, bars and clubs in Leeds, and was actively encouraged to attend strip clubs by the staff members in charge of his group.

Marc struggles to talk about what happened at Harrogate, and will not go into detail with me and his father about a lot of the things we witnessed, but we know that staff bullied and abused the young recruits, as well as encouraging fighting amongst peers. Marc and his fellow recruits were also made to spend many hours alone on guard duty, which affected their mental health. He and his fellow soldiers often reported feeling very low, but this was ignored by the staff. 

Marc is a completely different person since his time at Harrogate. He has attempted suicide and his mental health is permanently damaged. He also sustained injuries while in army training which may turn out to be life-changing. Marc had to go AWOL [Absent Without Leave] from the army, and was only discharged on mental health grounds after a long fight, just over one year ago.

I strongly believe that the Army Foundation College does not look after children’s mental health or well being. It is an outdated institution where bullies thrive and adults seek pleasure in seeing children broken. Knowing what institutions have done to children and to vulnerable adults in the past, I am amazed the place is still allowed to ruin children’s lives. They govern themselves and the children are far too scared to speak up.

The adverts and the so-called ‘reality TV’ program which was aired on Harrogate are completely fake and promise a life which few young people can resist. I would like to see an independent investigation into the College, and would love to see an undercover expose of Harrogate to prove that institutionalised bullying and abuse of children is very much happening today. 

I would plead with any parent not to sign your child over. I wish I hadn’t, and I have spoken with mothers who have lost their sons to suicide and believe that signing that document allowing them to join up was like signing a death warrant. I hope and long for this to change.”

Kevin’s story

Kevin’s son joined the Army Foundation College in 2015, aged 16.

“Growing up, my son was a bright, sensitive lad, with a penchant for drama and drawing, and a great sense of humour. When he hit adolescence he became interested in wrestling, bodybuilding and his diet. One of his friends became interested in joining the army, and meanwhile my son began to express dissatisfaction with school. He was doing next to no revision and he joined no extra-curricular activities, preferring to get home to play Call of Duty. His teacher called us, pleading with us to encourage him, but to no avail.

He began to say he wanted to join the army. We tried to sit down with him and encourage him to consider alternatives, but he just stormed out, slamming doors and shouting that he didn’t want to stay on at school. We sought counsel from friends and family, some of whom suggested that if he stuck it out in the army for two years it might give him a trade of some kind. So we began to accept it and I took him to the recruitment centre in town, where he picked up the literature and signed a form for the next stage. 

At school, we were encouraged by reports suggesting that he was in the running for 5 GCSEs, including maths and English, and we hoped that he might have been put off the army at this stage. But he did a week’s work experience with the army, where he got to handle a rifle and try out some of the training that he was going to get at the Army Foundation College (AFC) in Harrogate, and the experience made him want to join up more.

The day of his enlistment will forever be etched in our minds. We drove up to Harrogate on a beautiful day in 2015, my son smartly dressed in his new suit. On arrival we were ushered into a large hall to complete further paperwork. As our son was asked to sign papers, it became evident that what was written and said to us required longer to read and to take in than we were given, but it was hurriedly signed off.

We had various presentations from staff. One officer said homesickness was a common experience, stating that if recruits said they missed home then he would tell them to ‘f**k off’. All that day, I had an instinct that something was awry with my son’s behavior; he was unusually quiet, and when we left him, tears welled up in his eyes, even as he tried to put on a brave face.

We had no contact with him for two days. When eventually he phoned us the line was broken and it was difficult to talk. He sent a text message, which simply said; ‘I’ll text you tomorrow night so ring on Thursday and don’t say to them that I want to leave.’ A second text message followed asking us to ‘ring up during the day saying that you want me to come home due to family matters, try to make something up because I want to come home. I miss you all too much x’. I replied ‘OK son, are you sure about this?’ I could sense his heartbreak and sorrow. 

My wife had to speak to four staff members before getting through to a Major. They prevaricated and kept asking why he should have to come home, but eventually the Major conceded and told my wife that our son would be put on a train on the Friday of the first week. We waited on Friday, but there was no contact from him until 7pm, when he said that no one had delivered the message to him to return home. We were naturally incensed and after more remonstration, one of the instructors drove him to the station and paid for his fare back home. My son said later the instructor was one of the ‘better’ ones. I waited up for him. He arrived home broken, exhausted and you could tell that he had been crying. He was also frightened, saying that it was ‘AWOL’ and that he didn’t want to be in the army anymore. 

It transpired that on the second day of his training it dawned on our son that he wouldn’t see his family for a long time. He had also been bullied verbally; he and the other recruits were talked down to, called c**ts and f****ers constantly, which seems at odds with AFC’s good Ofsted rating for health and well-being. The short films that we had been shown on enlistment day gave the impression that AFC Harrogate was a ‘college’ with many opportunities and extra-curricular activities, but my son found that there was very little ‘education’ – an hour a week, so he was informed. 

My wife phoned the Major the next morning, and told him that my son had changed his mind and didn’t want to be in the army. In our conversations, we had to constantly remind officers that he was only sixteen, and in our care, even though he had sworn an oath to the British Army. The Major conceded in the end, but then another officer indicated that our son would be charged with AWOL, and said that he would never get a job or go to another college or university. Again, we were incensed – more phone calls. 

We wanted the paperwork to be sent to us but the army insisted our son had to return to Harrogate to go through with the discharge, and we conceded. After the fraught and stressful negotiation to get our son out, all sorts of worries were still going through my mind. I was afraid that they could still detain my son, citing rules and regulations laid down in paperwork that we may not have read or had passed us by. 

As I waited for him to sign the release papers, I was able to see first hand how the young soldiers were marched and drilled, brought into line. I saw lads who were limping, some with crutches, also being drilled and marched, trying in vain to keep up with the rest of the platoon. My son said that some keeled over and fainted as they marched and stood to attention. I wondered how many of those fresh faces were feeling the same as my son. What a relief it was to get back on the A59 and head for home with him.

I’m sure many parents would recognise this story. I would fully support any campaign that stopped the recruitment of 16-year-olds into the armed forces, on the grounds that they are still children and unable to make realistic decisions about their futures. The issues are not fully explained at school career events and army recruitment offices. There seems to be a glorification of army life that is at odds with the realities of on-the-ground training and education of young recruits.”

Joe’s story

Joe joined the Army Foundation College in 2013, aged 16.

“It’s a teacher who first suggests I join the army. I’m 15 and want to get away from home so I check out the website of the Army Foundation College. It looks clean, well-regulated, as if Ofsted practically lives there, so I go with my dad to the recruitment office. The recruiters are friendly, charismatic, though vague. There’s no conversation about the contract or what the army’s actually like. They don’t make any effort to support me, as a 15-year-old child, to make a genuine choice with informed consent.

Dad warns me that joining the army could cost me my life, but I’m 15 - I can’t really have that kind of ethical conversation yet so I just nod, ‘Yeah, I get it.’ He supports me anyway but he’s keen that I don’t pick a combat job. I want to join the intelligence corps but you can only go to Harrogate for the more basic jobs like infantry, artillery, logistics. I’m accepted for logistics, but when the army calls, they say there are no jobs in that corps at the moment and I’ll be joining the artillery instead. I don’t know what the artillery do (it’s a combat job) but they say they need an answer that day and I say OK.

When dad and I arrive at Harrogate for the first day of training it all starts to feel real for the first time. The gym is full of children like me waiting to enlist and nobody’s saying a word - there’s a lot of fear in the room. When it’s my turn, the corporal puts the contract on the table - this is the very first time I’ve seen it. I don’t have time to read it - the corporal just points at the bottom of the form like I’m signing for an Amazon package: ‘Just sign here.’ So I sign. (If I’m honest, all the time I was in the army I never knew the terms of the contract I was on.)

After we’re enlisted, the colonel gives a presentation and his last slide says we have two minutes to say goodbye. Two minutes. The parents are crying and us kids are kind of shell-shocked. I hug my dad but I can’t look at him, then the colonel says it’s time to go. That night they let us have a five-minute phone call, then they take our phones off us and send us to bed. I’m lying there looking at the ceiling tiles, wondering, ‘What the f*** have I done?’ I can hear other recruits crying in their beds. That first night is rough as hell. Then bang, the door opens, it’s 6.30am and the corporal’s telling us to get up.

They keep us controlled all the time: ‘You’re going to lunch, you’re going back, okay now it’s bed.’ It’s all clockwork. Or there’s a line on the floor all the way down the hallway and they’ll shout, ‘Everybody on the line!’ And they’ll just leave you standing there for an hour doing nothing.

One corporal is ok, all the rest are cold and uncaring, or worse. They can see we’re new and we’re scared, but if you ask for help, it’s ‘Piss off, you,’ or ‘Shut the f*** up.’ It’s like they’re just pulled out of their regiments - there’s no sign they know how to work with 16-year-old children recruited into the army. A decent person would try to talk to you, ‘How are we feeling, gents - yeah, it’s hard isn’t it, right?’ But not these guys. I’d say the staff at Harrogate fall into three categories. The first is psychopathic. The second is just cold. The third is the good guy who’s being tough for show. 

And some of them are just foul, like this one physical training instructor who’s an animal to us. First time we meet him, he puts us all in the press-up position apart from this one kid he doesn’t like. He makes that kid say, ‘Raise, lower, raise, lower…’ It’s to turn us against that recruit, make us resent him. The corporal knows that when we’re all back together and the lights are turned off, things will happen, and they do, and they encourage that, the corporals.

See the thing is, they didn’t have to touch you to abuse you. For instance, a corporal would hold up a bin with just one thing in it. He knows none of us have put in there but he walks up to someone he doesn’t like and goes, ‘You put that there, didn’t you?’ ‘No Corporal,’ ‘Press up, position down. Let’s try this again. You put this in the bin, didn’t you?’ ‘No Corporal.’ And that goes on until you say, ‘Yes Corporal,’ and you’re released. It’s all to humiliate the recruits in front of each other.

Another time, they announce a tattoo check. We’re ordered to strip to our underwear and stand on the line, then to pull up our pants so they can see everything but our genitals. The corporal walks down the line bantering with those he likes and then he comes to me. And he tells me, as I’m almost naked, what he thinks of my body. He starts from my head and he goes down, and he laughs. He just makes fun of my body in front of the entire platoon. What a man.

Also, not many people know that they gas us - they put us in a small room and fill it with tear gas and tell you to get your mask on quickly so you don’t breathe it in. Which is exactly what happens to me. I start choking, the gas trapped inside my mask is burning my face and I’m suffocating. I panic. When I reach for the corporal for help he shoves me off, and when I feel for the door he drags me back. When I do get out I’m crawling on the ground, my ears and eyes are still burning, and when I finally manage to rip the mask off, I’m in pieces. I lie on the ground crying. Just a bit of ‘Are you alright?’ from the corporal would be good, but he can’t stop laughing at me.

This isn’t the public image of Harrogate, of course, because they fake that. One time, some visitors have arrived and the corporals make us wait by the obstacle course until these guests come round the corner. Then we’re all told to work like a team to impress them. It’s a stunt. We’re not being thrashed that day, of course - if civilians or TV cameras come into an army camp, you’ll have the best food of your life and you’ll get a completely different experience from normal. It’s all a performance, though. Like when we’re told to fill out a survey about our experience of training and there’s a question about whether I feel safe and I’ve answered ‘No’, but the company sergeant major is watching - he comes to read my screen and I change my answer and he walks away. 

So it breaks my heart that Ofsted has graded the place ‘outstanding’ for welfare. Apparently, Ofsted talk to recruits, but if they’d asked me, I wouldn’t have told them the truth - because the people I’d be talking about literally have the power to put me in prison. The truth is that the friends I met in that place were broken by it. It gave them PTSD, and me as well. Harrogate is dangerous but a recruit can’t just say that to a visitor - it’s too risky.

I’d have gone home - I wanted to - but in the first six weeks you don’t have a right of discharge. This ‘college’ can literally put you in prison if you leave it - we’re not students, we’re soldiers. Even leaving the camp gets you arrested. [Note: any recruit who tries to leave in the first six weeks is charged as Absent Without Leave and arrested.] And at the end of the six weeks, we’re all told that our right of discharge has come to an end, which is actually the opposite of the truth. So even when I do have a right to leave, I’ve been told that I don’t. 

And as for the education at this ‘college’, you do very basic Functional Skills courses in English, maths, and ICT - that’s the most that a recruit can walk out the door with. Compare that with going to a real college at 16 and studying for qualifications that offer a real pathway to university. It just baffles me that Harrogate can be considered a college at all. Education isn’t taken seriously - they even postponed our exams because on the day the drill shed needed sweeping!

Sometime after the first six weeks, our platoon starts to fall apart. It all starts with a conversation in the scoffhouse on the subject of killing people. Most of the recruits are like, ‘Sure, I’ll kill people,’ or, ‘I can’t wait to get a kill.’ All kinds of things are coming out of people’s mouths - bear in mind that we’re only 16 or 17. But I haven’t joined up to kill people - I’m not psychotic. So I say, ‘I don’t want to kill people, but I accept that I might have to.’ And that turns most of the platoon against me. 

The truth is, though, that I joined up to get away from home, as did most of the recruits. In the year I was there, I could count on my two hands the people who had passionately wanted to join the British army - out of maybe 600 recruits.

But escaping from home just isn’t a good reason to be in the army. For the few who come out reinvented, great, but it’s a tiny minority, absolutely tiny. Of the rest, some quit, some just get on with it, and some are left traumatised. It’s a very dangerous policy because you’re attracting all kinds of people who don’t want to be there, and they’re leaving more damaged than when they went in. That’s exactly what happened to me and most of my friends.

Meanwhile, the recruits are looking for fights more and more. There’s no support from the corporals, no concern about our welfare, so fights start to happen - never for good reasons, just fights. And bullying is everywhere. Like, one kid terrorises my mate every night with psychological and physical abuse. When the staff find out, they let it happen anyway, sometimes right in front of them. Sometimes the fight is everybody against everyone - just a massive brawl.

I’m too ashamed to tell my dad any of this. I do tell the people in the welfare office but they just say it’ll all be over soon, which is no help at all. The platoon staff can see as plain as day that I’m in a depression but I don’t even get a ‘How are you?’ - not even once. And if the last time I knocked on their door they told me to f*** off, I’m not going to that door again anyway.

So I fall off. For the first time I think about ending my life, taking a weapon when we’re on the range and firing shots in my head. If I’d known I had a right to leave, I’d like to think that that option would have been on my mind before the option of killing myself.

The year’s training finishes with a week in Scotland - ‘battle camp’. I’m dead inside by this point, as are many other recruits, and yet by now we’re so indoctrinated, so used to the abuse, that the things that are about to happen won’t even seem wrong, just a bit more extreme than normal.

It all kicks off about half way through the week - bayonet training day. The corporals come into the hangar where we sleep and they're wild-eyed, screaming, shoving people out. A massive sergeant lifts a recruit in the air and literally throws him into the wall. A corporal smacks me full-force around the head - I’ve got my helmet on but he hits me so hard that I’m knocked right over, I mean this man’s about 40 and I’m maybe 17 by then. A bit later, we’re crawling through mud and a corporal grabs me and drags me along the ground, half-way across a field. When he lets go I’m in that much pain that I’m whimpering on the ground. When the other corporal, the one who hit me, sees me crying on the ground, he just points at me and laughs.

For the bayonet training itself, they tell us, ‘You’re gonna get f***ing angry - show me your war face!’ And they get us screaming: ‘Kill! Kill! Kill! Kill!’ The bombardier, who’s seen pictures of my girlfriend, tells me to imagine that she’s just over there being raped. He goes into intimate details about this rape fantasy, and then, shouting at me, he wants to know whether I’m going to do anything about it. And I’m so angry that there’s no more Joe any more - I scream and charge and stab my girlfriend’s attacker, this stuffed sack, with the bayonet.

When we’re done that day, I see these boys - even the worst of the bullies - sobbing, crying, falling apart all around me. We’re terrified, shot to bits. We’re still children. And the officer in charge, a major, has watched it all, saying nothing.

Back in Harrogate, on the morning of the pass-out parade I come into the bathroom. My mate’s stood by a mirror trying to sort his tie out, and I stand next to him and we’re dressed up real nice. ‘That’s it, we’ve done it,’ he says. And then he bursts into tears. And he sobs like I’ve not seen anyone cry before or since. It’s the whole experience of Harrogate that’s on him. The parade happens. The parents get a lot out of it. But as grand as it looks, it means nothing to me. 

When I go to Larkhill for my artillery training, I’m not sleeping, I’m getting nightmares. I tell an officer I want to leave. I’m maybe 17½ by this point, so I still have a right to leave though I don’t actually know that because I don’t know the terms of my contract. My request is ignored for a while, then one day at random I’m sent to see the Battery Sergeant Major. ‘Right,’ he says, ‘so you want to leave, right?’ ‘Yes, sir.’ And he says, ‘The army has spent a great deal of money on you. You’re going to stay here and complete your training and go to regiment.’ He just yells at me for wanting to leave. And then he threatens me with prison. ‘If you try to leave this camp,’ - if I try to run, he means - ‘we will find you and you will be put in prison. You are not leaving.’

So I do something I completely regret now - I fake an injury - it feels like the only thing I have left to do to get out. And at the same time my dad writes to the head of the camp saying he’s withdrawing his consent for me to remain. [In fact, a parent has no legal right to withdraw consent once it has been given.] Still I’m not allowed to go and my 18th birthday is fast approaching [the point at which the right of discharge comes to an end for the next four years]. But after I completely break down in a PT session, I’m dragged into an office and I say I just want to go home. And finally, a guy comes in, senior rank, and says, ‘You’re going home on Friday.’

I still have nightmares about Harrogate, but I’ve rebuilt my life. It made me angry, I was a horrible human being for a time - I’d turn on everyone. I got made homeless, I was living out of bin bags, I came to London with nothing. But I got into acting. Now I’ve started a theatre company, been directing plays, studying, wanting more from life. I realise that the chances of me having an ordinary life are long gone, so I might as well go for something extraordinary.” 

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