The Mostly True Adventures of Homer P. Figg

The balloon soars over a battlefield. Homer watches as horsemen wave swords and fire guns. A sudden explosion makes many of them disappear “in a flash of blood-stained lightning” (164). The balloon catches fire, and Homer jumps from the basket into a frog pond.

He’s pulled out by a man in a gray uniform who hands him to a group of gray-clad soldiers. They talk with a lilt but Homer can understand them. The men decide Homer fell from the nearby flaming balloon and that he might be a Union spy. They present him to a man on horseback wearing a cape and a hat with a feather in it whom they call “General Jeb.” The general jokes that Homer might be a midget spy; Homer protests, and the general knows from his accent that Homer is a Yankee. He orders Homer sent to the bull pit.

The bull pit is a temporary jail set up in a barn. Imprisoned with Homer is a newspaperman, Jonathan Griswold, who says his town of Chambersburg is overrun by Confederates who have “requisitioned,” or stolen, grain and horses and equipment. Both he and Homer were caught by Stuart’s raiders; Homer says he spoke to a man with a feather in his hat; Jonathan says that’s Jeb Stuart, the leader.

Homer can tell the guards are listening, so he explains to Jonathan that he was with Reginald Crockett, a loyal Southerner related to Davy Crockett, and that Homer was the star of Crockett’s medicine show, playing Wolf Boy. He adds that he’s a member of the Figg family, “the richest family north of Boston” (169), owners of most of the timber, much of the mines, a fleet of schooners, farms, and factories, and many enslaved people. His tale is interrupted by screaming. The newspaperman says wounded soldiers are arriving. The barn doors open and screaming men come inside. 

Wounded soldiers arrive by the cartload or on stretchers until a hundred are at the barn. Some already are dead. The newspaperman says the battle of Gettysburg is under way, that Union forces have retreated, and that Lee might shortly win and travel south to take Washington and win the war. In the meantime, “the rebel surgeons are as busy as carpenters, prying out bullets and sawing off limbs” (173). The newspaperman says half the wounded will die, and half the survivors will also die from disease. Homer turns away and holds his ears from the sound of saws through bone. He worries that Harold might be wounded but clings to the hope that he’s still alive.

During the afternoon, a messenger arrives, announces that the Union forces are in retreat, and that all able-bodied soldiers are to return to the front. Excitement ripples through the rebel soldiers and guards, who grab their belongings and head out. Homer wants to escape, but the newspaperman warns that he’ll be in danger. Homer explains that his story about his slave-owning family was a ruse, and that his “side” is his brother. He pulls a horse from a stall and rides off.

Bullets fly past Homer’s head, but he escapes. A mile down the road, an artillery shell explodes, its heat brushing Homer. He rides across the rebel lines and through the smoke of exploding shells. He should have been killed six times but gets through. As he rides, he sees men and horses dying, explosions everywhere, trees burning.

Somehow, Homer makes it unscathed through five miles of battle to the Union line, where cannon point right at him. The horse rears and Homer is thrown but quickly grabbed by a blue-clad soldier who drags him to a trench below the cannon line. The men give him water and tell him that five sharpshooters fired on him but failed to kill him. All Homer wants to know is the location of his brother, and he tries to explain his situation, but this man is from Vermont, and he thinks Homer’s babbling about circuses and balloons is lunacy.

The Vermont soldier take him behind the lines, where the wounded are being carted away and exhausted troops grab hot coffee at campfires. The Vermont man gives him coffee and suggests he follow the wounded to safety. After he leaves, Homer goes to a group of soldiers, and another, and another, asking where they’re from, but none are from Maine, and many are suspicious of a boy on the battlefield out of uniform.

Near sunset, Homer finds a group from Maine, but they don’t know Harold. They warn him not to go wandering around at night lest he be shot by sentries. Instead, they offer him a hot meal and inform him that tomorrow all companies will arrive at Gettysburg, and Harold will surely be there. Homer wants to leave, but the food is good, and a band plays and soldiers take up a song, and his eyes grow heavy, and he sleeps. 

Homer’s sleep is interrupted by, of all people, Webster Willow, now a private in the army. Private Willow confesses that he was robbed and made a fool by the Nibblys. He joined the army to atone for his sins, learned that Homer was nearby, and now he begs Homer’s forgiveness. Willow informs the boy that he saw Harold on a troop train but was too ashamed to approach him. Harold is with Colonel Chamberlain of the 20th Maine Infantry Regiment, due in tomorrow.

Homer is on the road waiting for the 20th Maine when they arrive, and he asks for Harold. A sergeant tells him that Harold is in irons in a rear wagon. Shocked, Homer heads to the rear and finds Harold in a prison wagon. Harold sees Homer, hides his face, and begins to cry.

For Homer, a world where Harold gets into this kind of trouble is a world upside-down. He reels. Then he crouches next to Harold and tells him that Squint lied to sell Harold for money. Harold says he discovered he enjoyed army life, but now it’s too late because he got into a fight with his sergeant: “I swore an oath and disobeyed. I must be punished” (194).

Homer imagines rescuing Harold from prison and running away with him to the frontier, where they become rich. Harold, though, confesses that he could have stopped Squint but wanted to be rid of him and of the obligation to care for Homer. Homer “sort of knew it all along” (195), and now it’s his turn to take care of Harold.

The guards kick him out of the wagon, and the 20th Maine moves out. Homer follows on foot. The 20th’s commander, Colonel Joshua Lawrence Chamberlain, rides up, points with his sword to a hill toward the left, and says it must be defended. He adds that any prisoner willing to fight will win his best efforts to get the charges rescinded. To a man, all the prisoners—Harold included—beg to fight.

Homer feels crestfallen. As Harold gathers a rifle, Homer tries to talk him into escaping, but Harold is adamant; he pushes Homer down, orders him to stay where he is, and says he’ll see him after the battle. Harold runs toward the hill. Homer follows. 

The men of the 20th Maine take positions at the crest of the hill, lying down among rocks and behind a few scattered trees. Shortly, an Alabama regiment begins firing from below. Bullets fly everywhere. Harold grabs Homer and drags him behind a rock. Harold fires his rifle musket at the rebels, then carefully reloads it and fires again, over and over. He has forty bullet cartridges and will be out of ammunition in 20 minutes.

Homer runs back down the hill to the supply wagons and drags an ammunition box up the hill to Harold, then does the same for other soldiers. Colonel Chamberlain strides back and forth along the ridge, indifferent to bullets flying past him, managing the hill’s defense. He sees Homer carrying ammunition and asks the boy if he knows what he’s doing. Homer replies that he does, and Chamberlain says, “Very good! Carry on! […] And keep your head down!” (202)

The Alabama force climbs slowly up the hill; near the top, they’re met with hand-to-hand resistance. Death is everywhere, and blood flows down the hill. Before long, Union ammunition is spent, and soldiers search the bodies of their dead comrades for a few extra cartridges.

Suddenly, Chamberlain orders his men to fix bayonets. Sword held high, he orders, “Charge!” The men rush forward, Harold among them, down the hill toward the Alabamans 90 feet away. Terrified, Homer follows, shouting at Homer to take shelter. Harold’s sergeant—the one whom Harold fought—holds aloft the regimental flag, but he takes a shot in the stomach and falls; Harold picks up the flag and continues forward.

Panicked, Homer shouts to Harold, “Get down or be killed!” (205) He reaches down for a rock to throw at Harold but finds the fallen sergeant’s pistol instead. He fires it toward Harold, hoping to scare him into stopping, but the bullet strikes a rock, and a chip flies into Harold’s leg. He falls.

Homer runs to him; instinctively, he grabs the flag to keep it from hitting the ground. A Southern soldier moves toward Homer, sword raised. Chamberlain appears at Homer’s side, his revolver aimed at the rebel, who falls to his knees and surrenders. Chamberlain retrieves the flag from Homer and tells him to tend to his brother. 

Homer stays that night in the surgery tent with Harold. In the morning, the battle continues listlessly, but in the afternoon the South launches a heavy bombardment on Union positions, the shells shaking the Earth “as if some mad giant was stamping his feet in rage” (208). Thinking they’ve seriously damaged the North’s forces, the Southern troops charge but are repelled, with half the attackers killed or wounded. General Lee retreats, and the battle is over. Among those in the final charge is Professor Fleabottom, who bribed his way out of arrest, hurried south, joined Lee’s forces, and dies in battle.

A few days later, Colonel Chamberlain visits Harold and tells him he’s relieved of duty on account of being too young to serve. Harold wants to fight; Chamberlain says he’ll call on them both in two years if the war continues. He asks Homer why he stayed with the flag; Homer can’t give an answer.

Harold’s leg begins to heal but becomes infected, and it’s cut off. Harold doesn’t blame Homer. The brothers work their way back toward Maine, taking odd jobs and searching for, but never finding, a medicine show to equal Professor Fleabottom’s. Mr. Brewster finds them, adopts them, and puts Harold in charge of the reopened tourmaline mines. Homer feels guilty about shooting Harold, but he realizes that “we got no choice but to keep marching into our tomorrows. Keep marching, boys and girls. Keep marching” (211).