Having a Bit of Home

The night of May 3, J. E. and I read Mother's favorite Psalm, the 121st, and went to bed. Before retiring, J. E. heated some bath water and got a clean change of clothes for me. I had had only two baths in five months and wasn't too clean. I kept noticing J. E. would leave the room and then return. I asked him, "What's wrong, J. E.?" And he said, "Mark, you stink!" I disagreed with him, but when I stood up and realized that the hot water had loosened the body oil and the stench that I had endured for months, I readily agreed with him. We had lived in the filth so many weeks that I had become accustomed to the odor. Five days later, when I returned to the camp, to join the other prisoners for transportation home, I could hardly bear the stench we had lived in so long.

I enjoyed the days I spent with my brother and the men of the 86th Division Artillery. They were all kind to me. J. E. and I had two services together.

On the way to one service, I saw something which made a lasting impression on me. On the front of a church in Austria, we saw Hitler's picture and a number of other characters with the Nazi flag praising Hitler. I told J. E. I wanted to get our pictures in front of that building. The Austrians had been liberated only a few hours. When we returned from the service, to get a picture, we found about a hundred civilians around the church. They had ladders and brushes. They were trying to rub from their church the marks of Nazidom. We thought that made an even more impressive picture. My prayer is that the Church of Jesus Christ in Europe may soon erase the harm done by Nazi power. They can if they seek God's help.