Joseph Plumb Martin was 15 in 1776 when he enlisted in the revolutionary army for what became seven years of military duty of a sort he could never have imagined at the outset. Typical Revolutionary War history available to the young does not picture the unromanticized ordinary soldiering endured by Joseph and others of his time. Murphy's well-documented, carefully developed narrative is divided into eight chapters and abundantly illustrated with reproductions of engravings, several early maps, a handbill, and a painting. A three-page chronology of the American Revolution, three-page bibliography of additional sources, and five-page index complete the singular book. (Ages 9-14)