New Officers, New Hope, New Life

March brought warmer weather and also a number of other officers and men to our camp from another camp in the north. We had a spring house-cleaning and everyone began to feel better. Among the number that had been marched from North Poland in front of the advancing Russians was a man from Waco, Texas, by the name of Roger Cannon. When I was pastor in Waco, his sisters who were members of our Sunday school, told us about their brother who was missing in action that day. I stopped to see their mother, and had prayer with her. I met Lt. Batt fromWaxahachie, Texas, and he was telling me about this Warrant Officer from Waco. I went to meet him and as he came down the steps I recognized him from a picture and the first thing I asked was, "You are not Roger Cannon, who lived on Novelty Street in Waco, are you?" He said he was and then I told him about the time I had last seen his folks. That was an unusual experience, stopping to comfort his mother and later becoming a fellow prisoner with him. He had been a prisoner much longer than I and he knew a lot more about it. He helped me out several times. I heard he was killed in a tank battle that followed our meeting and I was much concerned about carrying the bad news back to his mother, but was glad when I met him again at Moosburg and found that he was very much alive.