Army Specialist Christopher A. Journeau
March 10, 1987 ~ June 22, 2010
Operation Iraqi Freedom
1st Battalion, 21st Infantry, 2nd Stryker Brigade Combat Team
Schofield Barracks, HI
23, of Stratham, NH; died as a result of service to our country.
Operation Iraqi Freedom
1st Battalion, 21st Infantry, 2nd Stryker Brigade Combat Team
Schofield Barracks, HI
23, of Stratham, NH; died as a result of service to our country.
Christopher "Chris" Allen Journeau, 23, died unexpectedly on June 22, 2010 in Hampton, NH. He was the son of Merrill Clark and Jo-Ann (Trueman) Clark. Chris grew up in Stratham, attended school there and also in Exeter. After high school, he worked two years (as "Gepeto") for his Uncles Glen and Scott at Trueman Building & Remodeling.
Chris then enlisted in the US Army and served in infantry for one year overseas in Iraq. When he returned, he was stationed at Schofield Army Base in Hawaii until his discharge. Chris returned to NH and became re-employed as a framer for his uncles.
In his spare time, Chris enjoyed being outdoors, bonfires, mountain biking, camping, and playing his guitar. His passions were working out in the gym and body building. Chris was very proud of his Veteran vanity plate that simply read "SCREWY" on his pride and joy 2007 souped up Dodge Charger.
*If you have information about Chris's awards, please contact us.
Chris survived by his parents, Jo-Ann and Merrill Clark; maternal grandmother, Beverly Cartmill and his extended family.
Chris then enlisted in the US Army and served in infantry for one year overseas in Iraq. When he returned, he was stationed at Schofield Army Base in Hawaii until his discharge. Chris returned to NH and became re-employed as a framer for his uncles.
In his spare time, Chris enjoyed being outdoors, bonfires, mountain biking, camping, and playing his guitar. His passions were working out in the gym and body building. Chris was very proud of his Veteran vanity plate that simply read "SCREWY" on his pride and joy 2007 souped up Dodge Charger.
*If you have information about Chris's awards, please contact us.
Chris survived by his parents, Jo-Ann and Merrill Clark; maternal grandmother, Beverly Cartmill and his extended family.
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A soldier's suicide
Stratham parents say their son suffered from effects of war
By Christopher Cheney - seacoastonline.com
Posted Nov. 3, 2013
There are reminders of Army Spec. Christopher Journeau everywhere at his parents' house in Stratham.
His blue Dodge Charger is parked in the driveway. An embroidered Gold Star hangs in the picture frame window on the front porch.
When Journeau's mother recently invited a Seacoast Sunday reporter into the couple's home to share her son's story, she sat on the living room couch surrounded by more poignant reminders. Jo-Ann Clark had collected dozens of photos of her son from across the house. A large zip-lock bag in her lap held his medals and ribbons. There was a collection of binders and file folders strewn on the couch and coffee table in front of her that held his Army service records.
She also had his suicide note.
"I had no idea of what he was going through," she said at the beginning of an emotionally wrenching two-hour interview. "I don't want him forgotten."
During his nine-month tour of duty in Iraq, the only son of Jo-Ann and Merrill Clark saw comrades killed. He saw the dismembered bodies of U.S. troops and Iraqi civilians. Hyper-vigilance helped him survive multiple missions in the restive Sadr City section of Baghdad.
Journeau came home in January 2010 with commendations for his service as an infantryman in his Stryker unit. He also came home with illnesses neither he nor his parents were prepared to face, including post-traumatic stress disorder and alcoholism.
"He didn't talk to anybody about what he had gone through," his mother said. "Everybody thought if he wasn't talking about it, he's alright." But Journeau was far from alright. He was caught in a spiraling descent into isolation and depression that began soon after his unit returned to the United States in 2009.
When the Seacoast native moved back into his parent's house, he couldn't shake the hyper-vigilance that had been so useful in Iraq. While with a friend at Hampton Beach, someone set off firecrackers and he came unglued in a violent rage. While with his aunt at Onway Lake in Raymond, there was a clap of thunder and he threw his arms around his head then ducked for cover. There were repeated seemingly irrational outbursts of anger, family members said.
"He had a lot of anger issues," Jo-Ann Clark said. She said he stabbed his laptop computer with a knife when a conversation between mother and son provoked a fit of rage. She said his anger flashed once while they were watching "Supernatural." "I can't remember what I said; he took the CD out of the player."
After he moved out of his parents' house in May 2010, Journeau vented a portion of his anger on a new wooden desk in his Hampton apartment. "It was gouged all over with knife marks," his mother said. Two days after Father's Day, the Army veteran was alone at his apartment and drinking heavily the night he shot himself to death at age 23.
When Jo-Ann Clark shared her son's suicide note, she stood up from the couch holding the neatly folded piece of lined paper close to her chest. The heartbreaking pain of the final reminder was visible across her face. "If I do this I'm sorry," Journeau wrote. "I just can't and don't want to do this anymore. I'm sorry but I'm really sick of this. Good bye now."
"We don't know what 'this' was," his father said of the note. "We'll never know. It's a guess by anybody."
Despite stepped up efforts over the past decade to prevent suicide in the U.S. Armed Services and among veterans, suicide has remained a persistent problem in the military community. In 2012, the Army reported its highest number of annual suicides ever, with at least 325 Army, Army National Guard and Army Reserve soldiers taking their own lives.
Veterans accounted for about one-fifth of those who died by suicide in the United States from 1999 to 2010, according to a 2012 Department of Veterans Affairs report. VA research indicates suicide prevention efforts are having an impact. While the number of veteran suicides increased over the past decade, they increased at a slower pace than suicide in the general population.
"The percentage of people who die by suicide in America who are veterans has decreased slightly," the VA report concluded. "This provides preliminary evidence that the programs initiated by VA are improving outcomes. VA must continue to provide a high level of care, and recognize there is still much work to do."
Chris Journeau's childhood mirrors the youth of many Seacoast boys. He and his mother played practical jokes on each other. There were family outings to Onway Lake. He built "condos" for his pet ferret out of tissue boxes. And he was drawn to the beautiful open spaces of the Granite State.
"He loved anything that was outside," said Dustin Hoyt of Exeter, a friend of Journeau since the seventh grade. "Mountain biking, hiking, camping — he did it all."
One of Journeau's buddies for outdoor excursions was Kevin Lapointe. The pair met at Exeter High School, where Lapointe started an Army career in his junior year. They would often talk about military tactics and weapons during hikes or camping trips, said Lapointe, who served two Iraq War tours in the Army Military Police and now works as a firefighter in Lowell, Mass.
"He had a hundred and one questions about it," Lapointe said. "He was very interested in Special Forces."
The Exeter High graduate said he and Journeau viewed the military as a career path to positions in law enforcement. One of their goals was to serve together as U.S. marshals after both of them had served in the military.
"I had no idea how strong our friendship and brotherhood would become," Lapointe wrote in the funeral home guest book after Journeau died by suicide. "Chris and I called each other Recon Chris and Army Kevin."
Lapointe deployed to Iraq in June 2007. Journeau joined the Army two months later.
"He wanted paratrooper but they didn't have any openings," Jo-Ann Clark said, adding her son had scored high in the military testing during his recruitment. "He could have joined any service but he chose the Army."
In early 2008, Lapointe saw Journeau briefly in Kuwait. Lapointe was preparing to return to the States and Journeau was about to deploy to Baghdad.
"It was great to see him," Lapointe said. "I hadn't seen him for a year and a half, two years. His morale was great. He was very excited. He had a lot of confidence in what he was going to do. He had a lot of respect for his training."
Lapointe had seen his friend's attitude on display many times before, comparing it to a high school football player's game face after weeks of training for a season. "Finally when it comes, you get to prove yourself and see what you're worth," he said.
Journeau had plenty of opportunities to prove himself in Baghdad, witnessing an IED blast, kicking down doors in Sadr City, and riding in dozens of combat patrols with his Stryker unit, family members said.
Journeau's uncle, Glen Trueman of Exeter, said his nephew was once relieved at a guard position then saw the soldier who replaced him shot to death by a sniper.
"War was never meant to be a pleasant thing," Trueman said. "There are things you see that never go away."
After its nine-month deployment in Baghdad, Journeau's Stryker unit was sent to Hawaii.
"Apparently, that's when the symptoms started surfacing," Jo-Ann Clark said, noting her son was exhibiting anger and anxiety problems. "He was having a hard time with coming back."
The hard times included the beginnings of chronic alcohol abuse, insomnia, and temper tantrums featuring flying furniture and punched walls.
At first, Journeau's mood swings were diagnosed as bipolar disorder and he also was assigned to an alcohol treatment program. He was eventually treated for post-traumatic stress disorder.
Hoyt, his childhood friend, said he stayed in touch with Journeau by phone and e-mail while he was in the Army. "When he came back to Hawaii, he hated being there," Hoyt said. "There wasn't anything to do. At that point, he was done. He wanted to come home."
When Journeau moved into his parents' house in January 2010, he had plans to go to trade school, get an American Indian dog, and buy a truck and a house.
"Initially, he was just so happy to be home," Jo-Ann Clark said. "There didn't seem to be anything out of the ordinary."
But Journeau couldn't get a house loan and his other plans faded. "A few months passed, and he didn't seem to have any interest in going back to school," his mother said.
He was drinking, but it didn't seem unusual for a 23-year-old. He was occasionally short-tempered, but it also didn't seem unusual given what he had experienced in the Army, family members said.
But Journeau's behavior in the winter of 2010 provided glimpses of the mental health crisis that would erupt in the spring. His parents didn't know the symptoms of PTSD then. They do now.
"All the signs were there," his mother said.
Others remember the signs, too. "He was super quiet. He was kind of withdrawn," said Trueman, who had employed Journeau as a carpenter for more than a year before his nephew joined the Army. "He was having a hard time sleeping."
Trueman said his nephew took pride in being "tough" after returning from the Army.
"He'd say, 'I can take it.' But, obviously, he couldn't," Trueman said. "He didn't want to talk about his combat experience, but he couldn't stop thinking about it when he was alone. ...; Tough only goes so far."
Journeau had learned how to play guitar while he was in Hawaii. In his first weeks home, he spent a lot of time hanging out with friends around bonfires in the neighborhood.
"He just wanted to do the same things he liked to do before he left," Hoyt said. "You could see that he was frustrated. ...; He was definitely struggling. He definitely knew he had a problem. He just didn't know how to fix it."
The problem was PTSD, self-medicating with alcohol and a growing sense of isolation, friends and family members said.
In a decision that haunts them to this day, Journeau's parents encouraged him to get an apartment in Hampton. "We wanted him to take responsibility," his mother said.
Never one to drink and drive, Journeau spent more and more time drinking alone in his apartment, family members said.
Every suicide is the result of a complex set of individual circumstances.
Friends and family members have thought of Journeau's suicide from every possible angle."I honestly believe he didn't want to die," Jo-Ann Clark said, adding alcohol abuse was a decisive factor in her son's suicide. "The night he passed away, he was drinking, he was alone. The drinking gave him the courage to do what he did."
Lapointe said he heard little from Journeau in the weeks before the suicide and the conversations often turned to drinking.
"I realize now that when I did talk with him, we were talking all hours of the night, talking about drinking," Lapointe said. "I didn't put that together until after."
Jo-Ann Clark also pointed to a sense of isolation her son endured after leaving the Army. "Chris didn't have anything or anybody he had to take care of," she said.
Trueman also saw that his nephew was adrift after coming home. "They thrive on being a team; they're brothers. When they come home, they're alone," he said of veterans. "He stayed to himself a lot. He couldn't sleep a lot. He drank to go to sleep."
Hoyt said his childhood friend needed more of the kinds of treatment he had been receiving from the Army in Hawaii.
"There was nobody forcing him to do it. He just didn't know how to deal with it," Hoyt said. "I wish he would have continued with his treatment. He needed to be with someone who knew what he was going through."
Clark said everyone has a role to play helping veterans like her son. "There needs to be some awareness," she said. "Had we known what to look for, I truly believe the outcome would be different."
On Sept. 11, Chris Journeau's name was added to the Global War on Terrorism Memorial Monument in Hampton.
Stratham parents say their son suffered from effects of war
By Christopher Cheney - seacoastonline.com
Posted Nov. 3, 2013
There are reminders of Army Spec. Christopher Journeau everywhere at his parents' house in Stratham.
His blue Dodge Charger is parked in the driveway. An embroidered Gold Star hangs in the picture frame window on the front porch.
When Journeau's mother recently invited a Seacoast Sunday reporter into the couple's home to share her son's story, she sat on the living room couch surrounded by more poignant reminders. Jo-Ann Clark had collected dozens of photos of her son from across the house. A large zip-lock bag in her lap held his medals and ribbons. There was a collection of binders and file folders strewn on the couch and coffee table in front of her that held his Army service records.
She also had his suicide note.
"I had no idea of what he was going through," she said at the beginning of an emotionally wrenching two-hour interview. "I don't want him forgotten."
During his nine-month tour of duty in Iraq, the only son of Jo-Ann and Merrill Clark saw comrades killed. He saw the dismembered bodies of U.S. troops and Iraqi civilians. Hyper-vigilance helped him survive multiple missions in the restive Sadr City section of Baghdad.
Journeau came home in January 2010 with commendations for his service as an infantryman in his Stryker unit. He also came home with illnesses neither he nor his parents were prepared to face, including post-traumatic stress disorder and alcoholism.
"He didn't talk to anybody about what he had gone through," his mother said. "Everybody thought if he wasn't talking about it, he's alright." But Journeau was far from alright. He was caught in a spiraling descent into isolation and depression that began soon after his unit returned to the United States in 2009.
When the Seacoast native moved back into his parent's house, he couldn't shake the hyper-vigilance that had been so useful in Iraq. While with a friend at Hampton Beach, someone set off firecrackers and he came unglued in a violent rage. While with his aunt at Onway Lake in Raymond, there was a clap of thunder and he threw his arms around his head then ducked for cover. There were repeated seemingly irrational outbursts of anger, family members said.
"He had a lot of anger issues," Jo-Ann Clark said. She said he stabbed his laptop computer with a knife when a conversation between mother and son provoked a fit of rage. She said his anger flashed once while they were watching "Supernatural." "I can't remember what I said; he took the CD out of the player."
After he moved out of his parents' house in May 2010, Journeau vented a portion of his anger on a new wooden desk in his Hampton apartment. "It was gouged all over with knife marks," his mother said. Two days after Father's Day, the Army veteran was alone at his apartment and drinking heavily the night he shot himself to death at age 23.
When Jo-Ann Clark shared her son's suicide note, she stood up from the couch holding the neatly folded piece of lined paper close to her chest. The heartbreaking pain of the final reminder was visible across her face. "If I do this I'm sorry," Journeau wrote. "I just can't and don't want to do this anymore. I'm sorry but I'm really sick of this. Good bye now."
"We don't know what 'this' was," his father said of the note. "We'll never know. It's a guess by anybody."
Despite stepped up efforts over the past decade to prevent suicide in the U.S. Armed Services and among veterans, suicide has remained a persistent problem in the military community. In 2012, the Army reported its highest number of annual suicides ever, with at least 325 Army, Army National Guard and Army Reserve soldiers taking their own lives.
Veterans accounted for about one-fifth of those who died by suicide in the United States from 1999 to 2010, according to a 2012 Department of Veterans Affairs report. VA research indicates suicide prevention efforts are having an impact. While the number of veteran suicides increased over the past decade, they increased at a slower pace than suicide in the general population.
"The percentage of people who die by suicide in America who are veterans has decreased slightly," the VA report concluded. "This provides preliminary evidence that the programs initiated by VA are improving outcomes. VA must continue to provide a high level of care, and recognize there is still much work to do."
Chris Journeau's childhood mirrors the youth of many Seacoast boys. He and his mother played practical jokes on each other. There were family outings to Onway Lake. He built "condos" for his pet ferret out of tissue boxes. And he was drawn to the beautiful open spaces of the Granite State.
"He loved anything that was outside," said Dustin Hoyt of Exeter, a friend of Journeau since the seventh grade. "Mountain biking, hiking, camping — he did it all."
One of Journeau's buddies for outdoor excursions was Kevin Lapointe. The pair met at Exeter High School, where Lapointe started an Army career in his junior year. They would often talk about military tactics and weapons during hikes or camping trips, said Lapointe, who served two Iraq War tours in the Army Military Police and now works as a firefighter in Lowell, Mass.
"He had a hundred and one questions about it," Lapointe said. "He was very interested in Special Forces."
The Exeter High graduate said he and Journeau viewed the military as a career path to positions in law enforcement. One of their goals was to serve together as U.S. marshals after both of them had served in the military.
"I had no idea how strong our friendship and brotherhood would become," Lapointe wrote in the funeral home guest book after Journeau died by suicide. "Chris and I called each other Recon Chris and Army Kevin."
Lapointe deployed to Iraq in June 2007. Journeau joined the Army two months later.
"He wanted paratrooper but they didn't have any openings," Jo-Ann Clark said, adding her son had scored high in the military testing during his recruitment. "He could have joined any service but he chose the Army."
In early 2008, Lapointe saw Journeau briefly in Kuwait. Lapointe was preparing to return to the States and Journeau was about to deploy to Baghdad.
"It was great to see him," Lapointe said. "I hadn't seen him for a year and a half, two years. His morale was great. He was very excited. He had a lot of confidence in what he was going to do. He had a lot of respect for his training."
Lapointe had seen his friend's attitude on display many times before, comparing it to a high school football player's game face after weeks of training for a season. "Finally when it comes, you get to prove yourself and see what you're worth," he said.
Journeau had plenty of opportunities to prove himself in Baghdad, witnessing an IED blast, kicking down doors in Sadr City, and riding in dozens of combat patrols with his Stryker unit, family members said.
Journeau's uncle, Glen Trueman of Exeter, said his nephew was once relieved at a guard position then saw the soldier who replaced him shot to death by a sniper.
"War was never meant to be a pleasant thing," Trueman said. "There are things you see that never go away."
After its nine-month deployment in Baghdad, Journeau's Stryker unit was sent to Hawaii.
"Apparently, that's when the symptoms started surfacing," Jo-Ann Clark said, noting her son was exhibiting anger and anxiety problems. "He was having a hard time with coming back."
The hard times included the beginnings of chronic alcohol abuse, insomnia, and temper tantrums featuring flying furniture and punched walls.
At first, Journeau's mood swings were diagnosed as bipolar disorder and he also was assigned to an alcohol treatment program. He was eventually treated for post-traumatic stress disorder.
Hoyt, his childhood friend, said he stayed in touch with Journeau by phone and e-mail while he was in the Army. "When he came back to Hawaii, he hated being there," Hoyt said. "There wasn't anything to do. At that point, he was done. He wanted to come home."
When Journeau moved into his parents' house in January 2010, he had plans to go to trade school, get an American Indian dog, and buy a truck and a house.
"Initially, he was just so happy to be home," Jo-Ann Clark said. "There didn't seem to be anything out of the ordinary."
But Journeau couldn't get a house loan and his other plans faded. "A few months passed, and he didn't seem to have any interest in going back to school," his mother said.
He was drinking, but it didn't seem unusual for a 23-year-old. He was occasionally short-tempered, but it also didn't seem unusual given what he had experienced in the Army, family members said.
But Journeau's behavior in the winter of 2010 provided glimpses of the mental health crisis that would erupt in the spring. His parents didn't know the symptoms of PTSD then. They do now.
"All the signs were there," his mother said.
Others remember the signs, too. "He was super quiet. He was kind of withdrawn," said Trueman, who had employed Journeau as a carpenter for more than a year before his nephew joined the Army. "He was having a hard time sleeping."
Trueman said his nephew took pride in being "tough" after returning from the Army.
"He'd say, 'I can take it.' But, obviously, he couldn't," Trueman said. "He didn't want to talk about his combat experience, but he couldn't stop thinking about it when he was alone. ...; Tough only goes so far."
Journeau had learned how to play guitar while he was in Hawaii. In his first weeks home, he spent a lot of time hanging out with friends around bonfires in the neighborhood.
"He just wanted to do the same things he liked to do before he left," Hoyt said. "You could see that he was frustrated. ...; He was definitely struggling. He definitely knew he had a problem. He just didn't know how to fix it."
The problem was PTSD, self-medicating with alcohol and a growing sense of isolation, friends and family members said.
In a decision that haunts them to this day, Journeau's parents encouraged him to get an apartment in Hampton. "We wanted him to take responsibility," his mother said.
Never one to drink and drive, Journeau spent more and more time drinking alone in his apartment, family members said.
Every suicide is the result of a complex set of individual circumstances.
Friends and family members have thought of Journeau's suicide from every possible angle."I honestly believe he didn't want to die," Jo-Ann Clark said, adding alcohol abuse was a decisive factor in her son's suicide. "The night he passed away, he was drinking, he was alone. The drinking gave him the courage to do what he did."
Lapointe said he heard little from Journeau in the weeks before the suicide and the conversations often turned to drinking.
"I realize now that when I did talk with him, we were talking all hours of the night, talking about drinking," Lapointe said. "I didn't put that together until after."
Jo-Ann Clark also pointed to a sense of isolation her son endured after leaving the Army. "Chris didn't have anything or anybody he had to take care of," she said.
Trueman also saw that his nephew was adrift after coming home. "They thrive on being a team; they're brothers. When they come home, they're alone," he said of veterans. "He stayed to himself a lot. He couldn't sleep a lot. He drank to go to sleep."
Hoyt said his childhood friend needed more of the kinds of treatment he had been receiving from the Army in Hawaii.
"There was nobody forcing him to do it. He just didn't know how to deal with it," Hoyt said. "I wish he would have continued with his treatment. He needed to be with someone who knew what he was going through."
Clark said everyone has a role to play helping veterans like her son. "There needs to be some awareness," she said. "Had we known what to look for, I truly believe the outcome would be different."
On Sept. 11, Chris Journeau's name was added to the Global War on Terrorism Memorial Monument in Hampton.
