Black Hawk Down: A Story of Modern War

by Mark Bowden

He was given a box of gifts from the Red Cross. One of the items in the box was a pocket Bible. Keeping track of time was one of the skills Durant had been taught in survival training. Prisoners of war in Vietnam had found that having some sense of time elapsed and ordering the events of each day, no matter how mundane, helped to keep them sane. Keeping a record was an act of faith. It implied you would eventually be released and have a story to tell. He was not an especially religious man, but Durant found his own use for the Bible. He began reconstructing the events of his captivity in the margins of it, using code words, beginning with his crash. He wrote: “Bump,” recalling the sensation of being hit by the RPG. “Spin.” “Horizon,” for the blurring of earth and sky as the chopper spun down. And so forth. He pressed on, eventually reconstructing the entire term of his captivity almost hour by hour. The margins of the Bible were beginning to fill with his jottings. Firimbi watched the pilot studying and making notes in his Bible and assumed Durant was a very religious man. “If you convert to Islam, you will be freed,” the captor said. “You pray to your God, and I’ll pray to mine, and maybe we’ll both be released,” Durant joked.