Placing fictional characters in an exciting, historically accurate setting, this expert-approved novel unfolds in a small Pennsylvania town, where Confederate and Union troops converge for a decisive Civil War battle. A dramatic series of illustrated adventures ensues, featuring cameos by Lee, Lincoln, and other historical figures.

This is the fictional story of two children, brother and sister, orphans living with their grandparents on a farm just outside of Gettysburg, and what happens to them when the Civil War literally reaches their doorstep. It is biased from a Union perspective, but sympathetic to both sides. We get to meet a range of characters, mostly fictional, but with a few historical personages thrown in.

Like Huckleberry Finn, Jonathan is more an observer than a participant in the action, but he has his moments. Early in the story he ends up behind Confederate lines, is treated like a prisoner, has his clothing confiscated, and is incarcerated in the attic of a shed that later becomes a field hosptal. In the resulting confusion he manages to escape, puts on some discarded Confederate clothing, and is then mistaken for a boy orderly and ends up briefly meeting none other than Robert E. Lee himself. Later, in the wake of the Union army's retreat through the town of Gettysburg on the first day, he finds a drum and discarded Federal clothes and masquarades as a Union drummer boy, gaining access to their lines where he then finds a front row seat to watch the remaining two days of the battle.