Dulcie Wilson was eleven-years-old when the civil war started. With her parents and three siblings, she led an ordinary existence in the back country of Tennessee. Then her parents went to work on a plantation to help with the war effort. One evening, they did not return home. This left Dulcie the lone caretaker for her siblings. A week later, Dulcie returned from the back pasture to find that the prearranged children's wagon had come and taken her siblings to some unknown destination. Determinedly, she sets out to find her two younger sisters and brother. This book covers her search which continues for the duration of the war. On her journey she is befriended by many strangers and learns first hand the horrors of war.