Soon after North Carolina seceded from the Union in May 1861 Jacob Nathaniel Raymer enlisted in the Confederate Army as a private and pledged to serve the duration. He faithfully wrote letters, often signed simply 'Nat'. This book is a collection of his reports.

Preferring anonymity, Murdoch John McSween wrote over 80 letters under the pseudonym "Long Grabs" to the Fayetteville Observer (North Carolina), serving as their unofficial war correspondent. For the first two full years of the war, 1862-1863, he was a sometimes drill master at Camp Mangum, in Raleigh, and a wanderer among the regiments in North Carolina and Virginia. What he wrote was varied--the fighting in eastern North Carolina and at Fredericksburg and Petersburg in Virginia, the conditions of the soldiers, the hardships of the civilians, the history of places he visited, and...

North Carolina sent more than 125,000 men and boys to fight the Civil War. It is estimated that about 40,000 lost their lives. This compilation of obituaries from North Carolina newspapers documents the date and cause of death for hundreds of soldiers, with many providing place of burial, surviving relatives, last words, accounts by comrades and details of military service.