Lieutenant Colonel Joan Burton is a main character from the Lifetime television series Army Wives. She is portrayed by Wendy Davis.
Biography[]
Lieutenant Colonel Joan Burton was born and raised in the South Side of Chicago. When she was in high school, she briefly experimented with marijuana and that one of her good friends moved on to heroin and ended up dying of an overdose. A coach for the track team saw her athletic potential and track became her outlet and a way out of her impoverished background. She attended college on an Army ROTC scholarship and joined the U.S. Army shortly after graduating.
Joan is married to Dr. Roland Burton who is a phycologist. They have a daughter together name Sara Elizabeth and an adopted son David. Joan finally retired after 23 years in the Army and moved with Roland and the children to Baltimore in Season 7 so Roland can go for his career at John Hopkins.
Shortly after adopting David, Roland and Joan found out that David is HIV+. They (Roland especially) was treated differently after people on the base found out that David was HIV+. One day, David and Roland was at David's school and David was playing basketball with another child. David and the other kid collided causing each other to bleed. When the other child's parents found out about David's HIV status, they were furious. That's when Roland and Joan were started to get treated differently.
Army Wives[]
Season 1[]
Joan returned to Fort Marshall after two years in Afghanistan. She reunited with her husband, psychiatrist and counselor Dr. Roland Burton. She suffered from PTSD which exhibited through alcoholism, the use of sex to distract from real conversations, and dove into her work. She spent a drunken night at The Hump Bar when Roxy LeBlanc called Roland to pick her up. Joan lashed out at Roland and falsely accused him of having an affair, which made her realize the extent of her issues. She admitted to Roland that she woke up in the middle of the night and reached for her gun, mad to find her husband instead. Joan and Roland tried to work through their issues.
Joan was called to visit one of her men, Sergeant Peter Belgrad, who struggled to acclimate to being home. He exhibited severe PTSD, suicidal ideologies, and then turned the gun on Joan until she disarmed him. While she ensured he got psychiatric help, she left out his violence against her. Belgrad broke into Roland's office at Fort Marshall's Mercer Army Medical Center where Roland worked and held him and Claudia Joy Holden hostage at gunpoint to force Joan to apologize for decision she made in Afghanistan. Joan was forced to tell Michael Holden about the call she made in Afghanistan. An injured Belgrad was left with an Afghan family who helped him, and when the unit returned to repay the kindness, insurgents raided the village and dragged the ten year old girl who had tended to Belgrad's wounds into the open. The Army's code was to not get involved in civilian matters, so Joan gave the order to stand down. Belgrad was restrained by Joan and three others while the girl was raped and killed. Back at Mercer, Belgrad was killed by a sniper and Joan received reprimand for not disclosing that Belgrad had turned his weapon on her previously.
Holden threatened her with Article 15 action. Joan, who had given up hope, chose not to fight the Article 15 and put in her letter of temporary separation from the army - the first step to her retirement. Holden learned of Joan's PTSD and decided not to pursue the Article 15. Joan then admitted herself into a 30-day PTSD treatment center in Vermont.
Personality[]
Physical Appearance[]
Joan is about 5'9" and is athletic. She is African-American and has shoulder length brown hair and brown eyes.
Relationships[]
Roland Burton - Husband
Sara Elizabeth Burton - Daughter
David Burton - Adopted son
Claudia Joy Holden - Friend
Michael Holden - Friend/Boss
Frank Sherwood - Friend/Boss
Denise Sherwood - Friend
Pamela Moran - Friend
Chase Moran - Friend/Former Army co-worker
Roxy LeBlanc - Friend
Trevor LeBlanc - Friend/Former Army co-worker
Career[]
Joan is initially a Lt. Colonel in the Army, and leads a combat unit in Afghanistan. In the pilot episode, she returns home from a two year deployment, suffering from PTSD. Her career nearly ends with an Article 15 after a decision she makes causes a soldier with PTSD to hold Roland and Claudia Joy hostage. Although she considers retiring to avoid a court martial, Col. Holden eventually has a change of heart and destroys the Article 15. Throughout the first season, she struggles to cope with events that occurred while she was deployed, eventually leaving for a treatment facility. During the Season 1 finale, she discovers she is pregnant.
While waiting for orders to return to her unit in Season 2, she is offered a plush (but demanding) job working for General Holden as his Executive Officer. During this time, she hides her pregnancy while deciding whether or not to keep the baby. When she finally confesses that she is pregnant, General Holden hires Evan as a temporary replacement while assuring Joan that her job will be there when she returns. Evan does his best to undermine Joan's capabilities in front of General Holden. He almost succeeds, but is finally thwarted when Joan's unit soundly defeats his in a war games exercise.
Despite doing everything she had to do to keep the job working for General Holden, Joan realizes via the war games victory that her true value to the Army is in combat. She asks General Holden if she can return to the field in Iraq, which also causes much tension with Roland and a tearful goodbye moment with Sara Elizabeth. In Season 4, she is re-deployed to Iraq and suffers an eye injury after her patrol comes under attack from an IED. Upon her return to Fort Marshall, she is diagnosed with Traumatic Brian Injury (TBI). Joan Burton was promoted to Colonel, She was notified of her promotion to Colonel by her Commanding Officer and also received the additional duty of Garrison Commander in Season 5, a job that brings her into conflict withRoxy LeBlanc after TJ steals from the P/X.
Reception[]
Working Moms praised the Joan Burton character in a 2010 article, defining the character as a working mom balancing a military career with marriage and a newborn baby, and adding, "She defied expectations and became Fort Marshall's first African American female lieutenant colonel."
Wendy Davis has also received two NAACP Image Award nominations for her portrayal of Joan Burton.