Bucky Culp thrashed in his bunk beset by hideous, staring faces with stringy hair, tree bark skin, and deadly dangling tongues. Baying frightfully, these Falsefaces darted back and forth at a dizzying pace. The more they howled, the higher Bucky's temperature soared. Only the tender care of his Bucktail squad could cure him of the fever that killed more Civil War soldiers than bullets.

The last year of Sergeant Culp's enlistment was his hardest yet. After deserting the army to marry his darling Sarah, Culp barely misses being shot by a firing squad. Upon returning to the Bucktails, he watches his pal Hosea Curtis brutally pummeled by a professional boxer. Embroiled in the Wilderness and Spottsylvania Court House Campaigns keeps Culp in harm's way until the day he's mustered out of service.

But the greatest test of Bucky's character awaited him at Sarah's place in Sharpsburg, Maryland. The way he handled this personal crisis is further testament to the fine fighting spirit instilled in him by the legendary 42nd Pennsylvania Volunteers. THE BUCKTAILS' LAST CALL ends with Sergeant Culp's greatest display of bravery.

William Robertson

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