Courtesy Mary Humphries and her young daughter survey part of the American base that had been destroyed by a rocket the night before. In the background are her two older sons.

On April 22, 1971, Mary Humphries walked up to the group of Vietnam protesters in the lobby of the House of Representatives, where her husband had given the opening prayer.

“Have you ever been to Vietnam?” she asked one protester.

“No.”

“Well, I’ve lived there,” she said.

Jim and Mary Humphries, now 87 and 80, served as missionaries to Vietnam with the Southern Baptist Convention from 1966 to 1973. Missionary life in a war zone was different from missionary life in other places, an experience Humphries said being a WWII veteran prepared him for.

On the day that Humphries asked his then-pregnant wife if she wanted to go to Vietnam as a missionary, she thought he was joking.

“I didn’t think he was serious, so I laughed and said, ‘Sure, let’s also go to Timbuktu,'” she recalled in a journal entry.

Vietnam had been in the news at the time because of the escalating conflict there. But Humphries learned of an English-speaking church in Saigon, Trinity Baptist Church, which needed a full-time pastor.

“Of course we were concerned for our children,” Mrs. Humphries said. But the couple prayed about it and felt “peace” about the decision.

“In a quiet place, all by myself, I prayed, ‘Dear Lord, we feel that you are calling us to Vietnam,'” she wrote in her journal. “You know the situation there is dangerous at this time, and you know how concerned we are about taking our children into that danger. If we will be unwisely subjecting our children to danger, don’t let us go. Close the door.”

When their children were 8 years, 3 years and 7 months old, they were on their way to Vietnam.

“God did not close any doors,” reads the journal. “Instead, He opened them so quickly that they almost fell off their hinges.”

The Vietnam War is known for being a deeply unpopular conflict.

“More than 3 million people (including 58,000 Americans) were killed in the Vietnam War; more than half were Vietnamese civilians,” according to The History Channel’s website. “By 1969, at the peak of U.S. involvement in the war, more than 500,000 U.S. military personnel were involved in the Vietnam conflict.”

But for the Humphries, the Vietnam War was necessary to stop the spread of Communism.

The couple didn’t recall soldiers who attended the weekly church service having a crisis of conscience.

“They were just doing their job,” Mrs. Humphries said.

Every Friday, the couple hosted a gathering in their home for the congregation of about 100, often giving soldiers a taste of American food they missed, like barbecue, cornbread or banana pudding.

Humphries recalled one story of Major Hadley Foster. Foster, who usually attended the church faithfully, hadn’t been in a few weeks. One day he knocked on the Humphries’ front door.

“I came to bring a check for last month’s tithe. I will be going home in 30 days,” he said.

He left and returned 10 minutes later.

“I may not be back to church before I go home, so let me give you next month’s tithe as well.”

Foster and his friend got back in their jeep. Less than 30 minutes later, a B-40 rocket hit the vehicle, killing them instantly.

As the conflict intensified, the military chaplain approached Humphries and asked that he stay in his office at the military base. Saigon might fall soon.

Humphries asked that they stay in their house one more night.

“I just had a feeling about it,” he said.

The next day, the Humphries awoke to find that the office had been decimated by a rocket.

Much of the Humphries’ home is decorated with Asian-influenced pieces, some from special friends, like Phi Minh Hoang and his family. After the Hoang family escaped Vietnam, they came to stay with the Humphries church in San Marcos until they got on their feet.

One of the Hoang children, now grown, just had a baby.

“It’s like we’re grandparents again,” Humphries said with a smile.