Following being left for dead after the defeat at Minersville, Sergeant Elbert King of Reynolds’ Battery recovers and hides on the boundaries of a Southern home. He first encounters Jean Denslow here, and hears her furious outpouring of opposition to her forced marriage to a Southern officer that night. He also learns that the victorious Southerners are planning a flank attack on Rosecrans’ entrenched and withdrawing army. In the same twenty-four hours, his efforts to warn his army of its perils land him in a more close than friendly relationship with this Lady of the South, and he is promoted to lieutenant.
Excerpt:
‘I now recall our part in the battle merely in a series of detached pictures, having dull, blank spaces between. Nevertheless, how vividly bright with color each separate scene photographed itself upon the retina of the eye. I remember our battery first going into action along the western edge of the old cemetery, among the billowy graves, the cracked overturned stones; I recall the mass of green leaves, checkered by red blossoms, where the vine clambered over the large monument at one rear and how I entangled my foot in the creepers and nearly fell. I shall never forget the ghastly white face of Rosecran’s side.’
About the author
Randall Parrish (1858–1923) was an American lawyer, journalist, and writer, in particular, author of dime novels, including Wolves of the Sea. He wrote popular potboilers and historical novels and was trained as a lawyer. He also spent many years as a newspaper journalist, with a stint as a railroad worker and sheep driver in between. His experience on the road from Las Vegas and Albuquerque informed his Western romance writing style.