"That's our sea wall," resident Ricky Trahan said, pointing to the marsh less than a mile from his home. "The surge was about six feet." Trahan works for one of the nearby oil refineries.

Evacuated residents returned to homes filled with mud, sludge and sewage, and yards covered with dead fish.

Mayor Kirk Roccaforte estimated only 14 homes in the city were unaffected by the surge. Most don't have flood insurance.

"My mother has lived here since before the town was called Bridge City," Trahan said. "It's never flooded before."

Trahan is one of the lucky ones. He has flood insurance. He pointed to four of his neighbors' houses. None of them have flood insurance.

The recovery work is hard, but the residents are tougher still.

"The town's been able to pull together and do what we need to do," Trahan said.

"My father was a carpenter," said Patty Franklin, pointing to the house where Southern Baptist disaster relief mud-out crews were working. "He built this house -- all the cabinetry and built-ins." Franklin's father isn't around to see his handiwork covered with black sludge -- he died in January.

Franklin added, "This has been a tough year for my mom," Joann Goodwin, who was staying at her daughter's house in Houston when Ike made its furious way to shore, filling her home with water.

"We've been down here three times since the storm and haven't made a dent," Franklin said. "And then the mud-out crew showed up. These guys have made a big difference."

Disaster relief volunteers from Texas and South Carolina helped clear out the house and ripped out the soggy molding, sheetrock and insulation.

"We're taking out their whole life here," said Charlie Satterfield, a leader with the South Carolina Baptist disaster relief recovery team.

"Mrs. Goodwin's been sitting out in the driveway, and we've been bringing things by her so she can decide what to keep and what to throw away," said Ann Gaskins, a disaster relief volunteer with the Southern Baptists of Texas Convention. Most of it is unsalvageable.

"They've lost everything they have, and we're just trying to help them out," Gaskins said. "I love being able to help homeowners get a fresh start and help get them on their way to rebuilding their home."

As workers in yellow hats continued to carry out debris from the house, Franklin carefully picked through her mother's jewelry cabinet, looking for pieces worth saving -- items like her father's wedding ring.

Residents of Bridge City have been without power for three weeks now. So the Salvation Army canteen in the parking lot of First Baptist Church is a welcome site. Continued...