Howard Unruh, 88, Dies; Killed 13 of His Neighbors in Camden in 1949

I just want to go home. Yesterday I turned 28 sitting in a muddy ditch outside of Da Nang with my best friend dying in my arms. You know I don’t care about birthdays but this one had been creeping up on me in a strange way, had me thinking about it more than I care to admit, and sure enough it turned into the second worst day in my life. When that man came into my house and murdered my family he was 28 years old. That was 16 years ago, and at the time he had seemed like an old man to me, or just a monster with no age. But over the years I started to think about it and the closer I got to turning his age the more scared I got. ‘Cause in the end even though I’m here doing what I’m doing I still feel like a kid. Now I realize that he was just a kid too. They said he lived with his mother, didn’t have a job. That morning before he went out and killed all those people his mother made him breakfast, fried eggs and cereal, they said. I don’t know why they told me that then, but since that day I haven’t been able to eat a fried egg without thinking about that old woman setting the table for her 28 year old little boy right before he up and killed thirteen people. Thing is he had seen the shit himself. That part of it I only started to understand now, of course. He was a tank soldier and he was at the Battle of the Bulge. He was a nobody back home, probably had no friends to speak of, people made fun of him. But he was a good soldier and he came home from that war with a chest full of medals and I’m sure that was hard to top. They said he used his basement in Camden for target practice after he came back, and I recognize what he was thinking about every time he pulled that trigger down there. If he was crazy before the war, I don’t know. If he was, it probably helped him on the battlefield and only got worse after. I know he didn’t kill my dad because of the argument they had a couple weeks before, he killed him because he was crazy. But why he was crazy is what haunts me now more than ever. Last thing he said before they locked him up was “I’d have killed a thousand if I had bullets enough.” That sentence keeps coming back to me, I can’t get it out of my head. I’m sorry I’m writing about this right now, I’m sure you’d like to hear about our situation over here and how I’m doing and all, but this is what’s been on my mind. I just want to go home after yesterday. I feel like maybe I brought it on myself thinking about this so much for the past few months. It would have been bad enough if it wasn’t on my birthday and I didn’t have all of this churning in my mind. All these details that I thought I had forgotten came back yesterday when I was laying in that ditch. I could hear my mother gasping for her last breath inside the closet. I’m sorry, I don’t want to upset you, but you’re the only one I can talk to about this. I miss you terribly. I wish I could just lay with you on the couch next to the fireplace. I don’t think I’ve been dry since the day I got here. Funny thing is, that’s one of the memories that came back yesterday, was how bright that day was. A beautiful day really. Hard to remember that, considering. Over here it’s always a wet hell, and even when the sun comes out you know it’ll get dark and pour on you in the blink of an eye. But sitting there in that ditch, on my birthday, in the rain, I could see that bright sun beating down on the streets of Camden, I could remember sitting in the back of the police car, not knowing what to think. Mom, dad, grandma. Just like that. You have a beautiful life, it’s a beautiful day, and then suddenly this other person’s past comes rushing out of them and changes the rest of your life, creates your own past you can’t escape from. Over here that happens everyday, and people are starting to get used to it. You have to live now, they say, and worry about it later. But I’m scared of what will happen when I can’t forget this. I’m scared of getting used to it, and I know that’s the only way. Have to go now. Will try to write again soon. Love, Charles.