[Granville-Hough] 5 Jun 2009 - Our Father

[Trustees for Granville W. Hough]

Date: Fri, 05 Jun 2009 07:46:56 -0700
From: Granville W Hough <gwhough at oakapple.net>
Subject: Our Father -5 June 2009

Around Easter time I ran across this story. Part of this I shared with 
some of you this morning (Saturday morning Promise Keepers.) Here is the 
ôrest of the storyö as Paul Harvey might have said. Actually come to 
think of it he might have read this over the air when he was still alive 
and broadcasting. The author, Leo Thorsness, was one of those imprisoned 
at the Hanoi Hilton (during the Vietnam War). I found it an inspiring 
testimony to faith and courage in the face of certain torture (real 
torture, not the kind of things that are so casually and callously 
referred to as ôtortureö today). They could have remained silent and 
spared themselves but did not. We are truly blessed to have had such men 
then and to have such men now that serve our country with such honor. 
Steve (Lentz) (of Lutheran Church of the Cross).

æOur FatherÆ

Praying like you have never prayed before.

By Leo Thorsness

Sunday morning at the Hanoi Hilton was church time. To gather our 
ôcongregation,ö the Senior Ranking Officer (SRO) tapped ôcc,ö quietly on 
his wall. Each cell in turn tapped ôcc,ö and soon all have been alerted 
to Church Call. The service was a prayer and a reciting of Bible verses. 
If I was lucky, I was in a cell with one or two other POWs, and we could 
pool our knowledge of the Bible.

A failed rescue attempt led to the most memorable of our church 
experiences. It happened on November 20, 1970, when U.S. Special Forces 
staged a mission to rescue the POWs believed to be at Son Tay, one of 
the small prisons the North Vietnamese maintained outside Hanoi. The 
raid was brilliantly planned and executed perfectly. Our men landed at 
the prison in helicopters and came home without the loss of a single 
American. There was only one problem: All the POWs had been moved out of 
Son Tay about four months before the rescue effort so none of us went 
back with our rescuers. The mission still turned out to be a huge 
success for us, however.

Realizing that such rescue attempts could happen again, the North 
Vietnamese brought us in from outlying prison camps into the main Hoa Lo 
prison in Hanoi: the Hanoi Hilton. Within hours of the raid, we were 
moved into large cells ù 43 of us in my cell. It was the greatest day of 
our prison life. For the first time, we were meeting POWs whose names we 
had memorized years earlier. Many of us had formed intense friendships 
through the tap code with men weÆd never seen. As we met that night, ôSo 
this is what you look likeö was heard over and over throughout the cell.

We compared our treatment, and it seemed important to each of us to tell 
one another of our torture experiences. IÆve never seen more empathy in 
anyoneÆs eyes than when telling a fellow POW about being tortured. We 
each needed to tell our torture story ù once. We never told them again 
to the same POW.

The handshakes, back slapping, and bear hugs went on and on. Some of us 
had been tortured for the protection or benefit of a ôtap-code buddy.ö 
Now there was love and respect to be repaid. No one slept that first 
night; too much joy, excitement, and talk. The next morning, we needed 
to determine the SRO. The highest rank in our cell was O-4, which is a 
major. (ôOö stands for officer, so O-1 is second lieutenant or ensign, 
O-2 first lieutenant, O-3 captain, O-4 major, O-5 lieutenant colonel, 
O-6 colonel, O-7 brigadier general, and on up to O-10 for a four-star 
general.) We put all the O-4s together and then compared the date when 
the rank was attained and arrived at a hierarchy. We did the same with 
the O-3s, the O-2s, and the O-1s. When we were done, all 43 of us knew 
exactly where we stood in the command structure.

Our SRO turned out to be Ned Shuman ù a really good Naval aviator. The 
first Sunday in the large cell, someone said, ôLetÆs have church 
service.ö Good idea, we all agreed. One POW volunteered to lead the 
service, and we started gathering in the other end of the long 
rectangular cell from the cell door. No sooner had we gathered than an 
English-speaking Vietnamese officer who worked as an interrogator burst 
into the cell with a dozen armed guards. Ned Shuman went to the officer 
and said there wouldnÆt be a problem; we were just going to have a short 
church service.

The response was unyielding: We were not allowed to gather into groups 
larger than three persons and we absolutely could not have a church service.

During the next few days we all grumbled that we should not have backed 
down in our intention to have a church service and ought to do it the 
coming Sunday. Toward the end of the week, Ned stepped forward and said, 
ôAre we really committed to having church Sunday?ö

There was a murmuring of assent throughout the cell. Ned said, ôNo, I 
want to know person by person if you are really committed to holding 
church.ö

We all knew the implications of our answer: If we went ahead with the 
plan, some would pay the price ù starting with Ned himself because he 
was the SRO. He went around the cell pointing to each of us 
individually. ôLeo, are you committed?ö ôYes.ö Ned then moved to Jim and 
asked the same question. ôYes,ö Jim responded. And so on until he had 
asked each of us by name.

When the 42nd man said yes, it was unanimous. We had 100-percent 
commitment to hold church next Sunday. At that instant, Ned knew he 
would end up in the torture cells at Heartbreak. It was different from 
the previous Sunday. We now had a goal, and we were committed. We only 
needed to develop a plan.

Sunday morning came, and we knew they would be watching us again. Once 
more, we gathered in the far end of the cell. As soon as we moved 
together, the interrogator and guards burst through the door. Ned 
stepped forward and said there wouldnÆt be a problem: We were just going 
to hold a quiet ten-minute church service and then we would spread back 
out in the cell. As expected, they grabbed Ned and hauled him off to 
Heartbreak for torture.

Our plan unfolded. The second ranking man, the new SRO, stood, walked to 
the center of the cell and in a clear firm voice said, ôGentlemen,ö our 
signal to stand, ôthe LordÆs Prayer.ö We got perhaps halfway through the 
prayer, when the guards grabbed the SRO and hauled him out the door 
toward Heartbreak.

As planned, the number three SRO stood, walked to the center of the 
cell, and said, ôGentlemen, the LordÆs Prayer.ö We had gotten about to 
ôThy Kingdom comeö before the guards grabbed him. Immediately, the 
number four SRO stood: ôGentlemen, the LordÆs Prayer.ö

I have never heard five or six words of the LordÆs Prayer ù as far as we 
got before they seized him ù recited so loudly, or so reverently. The 
interrogator was shouting, ôStop, stop,ö but we drowned him out. The 
guards were now hitting POWs with gun butts and the cell was in chaos.

The number five ranking officer was way back in the corner and took his 
time moving toward the center of the cell. (I was number seven, and not 
particularly anxious for him to hurry.) But just before he got to the 
center of the area, the cell became pin-drop quiet.

In Vietnamese, the interrogator spat out something to the guards, they 
grabbed number five SRO and they all left, locking the cell door behind 
them. The number six SRO began: ôGentlemen, the LordÆs Prayer.ö This 
time we finished it.

Five courageous officers were tortured, but I think they believed it was 
worth it. From that Sunday on until we came home, we held a church 
service. We won. They lost. Forty-two men in prison pajamas followed 
NedÆs lead. I know I will never see a better example of pure raw 
leadership or ever pray with a better sense of the meaning of the words.

//ù Leo Thorsness is author of //Surviving Hell: A POW's Journey 
<http://www.nationalreview.com/redirect/amazon.p?j=159403236X>//, from 
which this chapter is excerpted.//