Using excerpts from letters and diaries written by boys between the ages of 12 and 18 who served in the Confederate and Union armies, the author provides an intriguing history of the Civil War which focuses on the experiences of the War's youngest soldiers. Some of the boys were "tall 14 year olds who lied about their ages" and others were drummer boys who took up arms on the battlefield. The fifty accompanying documentary photographs were carefully chosen; in most of them, the youthfulness of the soldiers pictured is obvious, sometimes shockingly so. (Age 9 and up)