Stories of generals and battles of the American Civil War have been told and retold but relatively little has been written about the common soldiers who fought in the war.

In his thoroughly researched history of the Civil War soldiers and families of the upstate New York town of Newark Valley, Jerry Marsh sheds light on the lives of three hundred and nineteen soldiers of the town. He tells of the preacher's son who prayed to be a faithful soldier under the "Stars and Stripes" and the "Banner of Jesus," the eleven families who sent their father and son(s) to the war, the seventy sets of brothers who served, the youths and older men who misrepresented their ages to enlist, the seventy-four men killed or wounded in battle and thirty-nine who died of disease, the families who brought their dead or dying sons back to be buried at home, and the veterans who became productive citizens in New York and across the expanding nation.

Marsh's narrative is enhanced by photographs, letters, diaries, and anecdotes from descendants of the courageous soldiers who fought to save the Union and ensure the freedom of all citizens of the "new nation."