Christmas Eve, 1944, somewhere in northern France … Twenty-year-old Lloyd Batson and some of his Army buddies, pausing in their frigid march toward a titanic clash that later will come to be known as the Battle of the Bulge, are holed up in a small railroad car, “something akin to an ancient caboose.”
“We lit the one candle I had been saving for some special need. Some of us in the feeble light tried, with stiffened fingers, to write a note home. All of us talked about home and Christmas.
Writer Evelyn McCollum is pictured with some of the military veterans from Easley First Baptist Church whose stories are recounted in “Our Heroes.”“The single candle, never big, but lasting longer than we believed it would, finally flickered out. In the darkness, we sat for a time, saying nothing, but acutely aware of our loved ones at home thousands of miles away.
“I listened more than I spoke. Then in the darkness I began to quote Luke’s beautiful story of the birth of Jesus. I prayed out loud. A few of the others joined me in halting, stumbling, but genuine prayers.”
Batson would later come home and become a Baptist pastor. His vivid memory of a peace-filled Christmas Eve set in the midst of a devastating war is one of many unique stories recounted in “Our Heroes,” a collection of wartime memoirs by 48 military veterans from Easley’s First Baptist Church.
The idea for the book was conceived after a group of veterans from the church traveled to the World War II memorial in Washington, D.C., in August 2004. “Our Heroes” was compiled and edited by Evelyn Nalley McCollum, an author and newspaper columnist and a member of Easley First.
The 200-page book contains the accounts of military veterans – 47 men and one woman – who served during World War II, the Korean war, the Vietnam war and Iraq war.
Garvin Hunter, now a retired insurance man, served part of his Korea-era enlistment in the Coronado Islands. While recovering from surgery, he “experienced the saddest part” of his four years of service. He saw hundreds of American casualties, “boys whose bodies were mangled beyond recognition … a sight that I have never been able to overcome.”
Jack Mooneyhan, a retired instructor at Tri-County Technical College, served in both Korea and Vietnam. During a five-week search-and-destroy mission in Vietnam, his rations consisted of a bag of rice and a live chicken, which he strapped to his gun belt. Despite the scarcity of provisions, he and his mates considered mail from home to be even more important.
Sandy Myers, serving in 2003 as a nurse with an Army Reserves unit at a military hospital in Landstuhl, Germany, writes of attending a fallen comrade, a 28-year-old reservist from Mississippi, mortally wounded in Iraq.
“In so many ways, his family reminded me of my own. My assistant in the case also happened to be one of my roommates. He mentioned to the family that I sang in the choir at my home church, and they begged me to sing to their soldier. They said that he loved the old hymns. Finally, on his second night there, with tears streaming down all of our faces, my roommate and I sang “Amazing Grace” for that little family. Before I knew it, a few other nurses who had heard us singing came and joined us, and a small choir was able to sing a soldier’s favorite hymn to him.
“He was certainly not the only patient I saw die while I was there, but his death was some personal to me. I think it is one that I will remember until I am gone myself.”
“Our Heroes” was dedicated in a special worship and patriotic service on July 3. Recounting the ceremony in her weekly newspaper column, McCollum wrote: “A new member said that you never know what the man sitting on the pew beside you has been through. Quiet, unassuming, these ‘heroes’ walk among us daily.”
In his foreword to the book, John Adams, pastor of Easley First Baptist, described McCollum’s willingness to compile and edit the book as a “labor of love.”
He also thanked the veterans for contributing their stories: “Your stories, now written, will be an ever present reminder of your sacrifice for our country – for each one of us called an American. We thank God for you.”
McCollum, a freelance writer and journalist who, tongue in cheek, describes herself as her church’s “writer in residence,” remembers feeling inspired to pursue her dream of becoming a writer while lying on her bed on a Sunday afternoon in 1974 and hearing a Norman Vincent Peale sermon. Since then, she has seen her work published in several magazines, including Home Life and In Touch. She also has written or edited three other books and has written a play that was produced by the Foothills Playhouse in Easley.
She said she was “pleased and flattered” to be asked to compile the book. “These stories needed not only to be told, but also to be written down” so that future generations will understand the church’s veterans’ personal sacrifices in service of their country, she said.
Adams said the book has had a positive impact on his church, and he recommends that other churches consider publishing a similar book to honor their veterans.
Copies of “Our Heroes” are available at Easley First Baptist Church by calling 864-859-4052. The cost is $15.