One Signal Mountain Tennessee man is cleaning up after a fire took everything from him.

It happened on Oak Street Monday afternoon around 3:30.

Henry Estill left to go to his sister’s home on Monday to help fix her plumbing, but just minutes after he left. “She picked me up at 2:30 and at 3 I got a call that my house was on fire,” said Estill. “By the time I got home it was in flames, there was nothing left.”

Estill says he had been welding before leaving his home. He believes a spark may have caught a pile of pine wood on fire and spread to his home.

“I’ve been trying to clean this mess,” said Estill. “I’m going to have to tear it down.”

Estill had lived in the home on Signal Mountain for 34 years.

“It makes ya sick,” said Estill. “Everything in it was coals. All the pictures and everything was burned up.”

Everything but. “The Bible, it didn’t burn the Bible,” said Estill.

While he cleans the ashes of his life, he’s staying in his shed.

“It’s home to me. I need to stay home,” said Estill.

Estill did not have insurance on his home. He says he plans to tear it down and possibly move a trailer onto the property.