Submarines USS Skate and USS Seadragon rendezvous at North Pole. USS Thresher was lost at sea in 1963.
MY HUSBAND WAS ON THE THRESHER
Co
/ O
by Bettie Bierderman
After his assignment to the nu clear sub, Bob had little time for our four children and me. Sometimes, especially during the last month, he worked a 12-to 16-hour day. I be came discouraged myself. Usually he left before the children awakened and came home barely in time to tuck them in. One night about a week before the Thresher was due to go on sea trials, I became overwhelmed with discouragement. The tears came, but not wanting Bob to know how I felt, I quickly tidied up, opened the Bible, and was reassured that all would work together for good if I relied on God. When Bob came in, my anguish had gone. About one month before the Thresher disaster, we were attend ing an OCU meeting. The meeting was finished, and someone brought up the subject of physical death. After some discussion, one man re marked, “ I just can’t wait to meet the Lord.” His wife agreed, and though I did not hear Bob say it, a dear friend told me later that my husband said quietly, “ Neither can I.” The Thresher was due to leave on Tuesday, April 9. The day before I was tremendously busy. At 9 p.m. when Bob arrived home for supper, we were both exhausted. He ate lei surely and decided to do a few neg lected chores in the basement. When we retired, it was slightly after 11. “ What time do we have to get up?” I asked.
“ S ubmarines are the safest thing in the world,” my husband Bob used to say any time I showed appre hension about his underseas service in the United States Navy. Perhaps he was right. But Bob died April, 1963 when the nuclear sub USS Thresher sank to the bot tom of the Atlantic Ocean. The “ safest place in the world” couldn’t keep Bob from death; only the Lord could do that, and He chose to take Bob through death into His pres ence. Since then, God has sustained me in a way that I could never have imagined possible. I first met Bob in 1953, when he was in his last year at the Naval Academy in Annapolis, Md. We dated steadily, and shortly after his graduation in June 1954 we became engaged. We were married the fol lowing September. Bob served aboard a destroyer and a conventional submarine before training in nuclear power. He be came ship superintendent on the Thresher in January 1963. Bob felt a definite calling to serve God in the naval service. He and I both received Christ as our Saviour and Lord during Bob’s postgraduate training. We grew spiritually by our fellowship and Bible study with the members of the Officers’ Christian Union. Bob tried to witness for the Lord by his daily walk, and I know that the Lord gave him extra strength for the long hours of duty and tremendous responsibility on the Thresher.
“ I'll set the alarm for 5:30.” “ Ohhhhh,” I sighed, secretly, be cause I was so tired, I thought that when the alarm rang at 5:30 I would ask Bob if he would mind if I stayed in bed just this once. When the alarm rang, praise God, I dragged my tired body out of bed, and I wondered how I ever could have thought such a thing as not getting up with Bob. We breakfasted and prayed to gether. I recall my prayer vividly. After thanking the Lord, I asked that He would give the men keen minds to fix any minor discrepancies which might occur. I prayed that the Lord would bless Bob, and that He would bring him back safely if it
THE KING'S BUSINESS
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