In 1860, having traveled with his young sister from New York to a foster home on a farm near St. Joseph, Missouri, ten-year-old Danny plots to get his newly-widowed foster father to send for and marry his mother.
Deeply unhappy about her family's separation because of poverty, Megan gradually finds contentment and purpose in her new home on the Kansas prairie with a kind and loving adopted family.
In 1863, eleven-year-old Peg Kelly is drawn into the dangerous activities of a mysterious young woman who had come to her home in Missouri after fleeing the raid of William Quantrill and his raiders on Lawrence, Kansas.
Eleven-year-old Michael Patrick Kelly from New York City is sent to a foster home, a Missouri farm with a sadistic owner, a bullying son, and a number of secrets, one of which may be murder.
Nineteen-year-old Frances Mary Kelly, herself an orphan train rider six years before, returns to New York and agrees to escort a group of orphans west to find new homes.
After being taken in by Captain Taylor and his wife in Kansas, twelve-year-old Mike Kelly and his friend Todd Blakely join the Union army as musicians and see the horrors of war firsthand in Missouri.
When their mother can no longer support them, six siblings are sent by the Children's Aid Society of New York City to live with farm families in Missouri in 1860.
In 1861, while living with his foster parents at Fort Leavenworth, Kansas, twelve-year-old Mike Kelly and his best friend Todd Blakely join the Union army as drummer boys but their dreams of glory end when they experience the full horrors of war at the Battle of Wilson's Creek in Missouri.
In 1863, eleven-year-old Peg Kelly is drawn into the dangerous activities of a mysterious young woman who takes refuge with the Kelly family in Missouri after fleeing the attack on Lawrence, Kansas, by William Quantrill and his Confederate raiders.
In 1860, having traveled with his young sister from New York to a foster home on a farm near St. Joseph, Missouri, ten-year-old Danny plots to get his newly-widowed foster father to send for and marry his mother.
