"Abner Small served as a noncommissioned officer in the Third Maine Infantry during the summer of 1861, experiencing battle for the first time at First Bull Run. As a recruiting officer, he helped to raise the Sixteenth Maine Infantry and served as its adjutant. The Sixteenth Maine gained fame for its heroic delaying action at Gettysburg, where it lost 180 of its 200 men. It went on to serve in Grant's Overland Campaign in Virginia.".

"Small was an articulate observer of all this. He wrote his memoirs with a keen sense of the irony of life during wartime, and with a gift for expression. His descriptions of the dead at Gettysburg, his characterizations of famous men such as Major General Oliver Otis Howard, and his reflections on the emotions of men under fire are outstanding. His account of prison life at Libby, Salisbury, and Danville is gripping.

His book reveals more of the inner soldier than almost any other account written by a Union veteran."--BOOK JACKET.