ABSTRACT
This chapter describes the story of the capture, trial, and execution of a Hessian drummer boy by Americans during the Revolution. At the heart of the story is a Quaker family, who hide the boy after his landing party has been killed in an ambush. General Packenham was a vain and pompous man, well-fleshed with an imposing manner and a florid complexion. He was one of those men in whom nature and overeating combine to produce an aspect of substance and authority, a large head, a great beak of a nose, and a deep, rasping voice. His command in area was a tribute to the fact that the war had gone elsewhere; but the fact that he would preside at the trial gave no great hope for the boy. The story is told from the point of view of Evan Feversham, a doctor who has seen enough of death, and an outsider in the narrow world of Puritan New England.
