Not quite twenty years old and already a cavalry combat veteran, William Lightcap was captured along with his Fifth Iowa comrades on McCook's Raid in 1864. His near escape from behind enemy lines is exciting and very nearly successful. But it was not to be. He was soon on his way to the hell that was Andersonville Prison. In one of the most graphic and detailed accounts of life in Confederate prison camps, Lightcap related the tactics he used to survive the brutality of everyday life. Surrounded by filth and death, with never enough to eat, the young man saw firsthand the cruelty of Captain Henry Wirz and his guards. But he also experienced unexpected sympathy and assistance from Confederate soldiers and civilians he encountered through months and months of suffering. In the end, he survived to tell the tale.