Disguised as a boy, pretty Sarah Edmundson volunteered in the Michigan Infantry and fought as a private in the Civil War. Field nurse, secret agent, dispatch rider, her courage and compassion made her a great heroine of the Union Army.

Born in the Canadian wilderness, Sarah could hunt and plough as well as any boy, and frontier families blessed her nursing skill.  At seventeen she fell in love with handsome James Vance, but learned that her father had promised her in marriage to a repulsive old man. She ran away and found refuge with friends in a distant town until her hideout was discovered. In desperation she fled to the United States, disguised as a boy. There she became "Franklin Thompson", earning her living as a book salesman. When Fort Sumter fell and volunteers mobilized for war, she made an extraordinary decision -- to fight for her adopted country, risking her life and the exposure of her identity.

It seems astounding that Sarah Edmundson survived death by disease and death under fire; that she lived with the soldiers but was never detected as a woman. Yet only a woman could have shown such tenderness toward the wounded in their fever-ridden tent hospitals. The months moved on from one brutal battle to another -- the nightmare slaughters of Bull Run, Fredericksburg, Vicksburg . . . . Then she chanced to meet James Vance, now a lieutenant, but despite their former closeness he failed to recognize her. She was ready to confess her identity when he was killed.

Sarah swore to avenge him. Meanwhile she embarked on the most dangerous and loneliest of missions -- that of secret agent. Many times she went behind enemy lines disguised as a Negro, an Irish peddler, a rebel cavalryman, a clerk. When she heard a Confederate spy brag that he had caused James' death she wrote in her diary, "He was a fated man from that moment; his life was not worth three cents . . . ."

For three years Sarah Edmundson perpetrated an heroic hoax -- one of such magnitude as to be almost incredible. Here are the fantastic facts, recreating all the horror, intrigue and suspense in the life of a gallant woman.

From the dust jacket