"Ellwood, the stately home of J. Horace and Betty Lacy, offered a touch of civilization in the middle of one of America's untamed landscapes -- The Wilderness. For more than seventy square miles it stretched, hills and hollows choked with dense undergrowth, scrubby pines and whiplash oaks, briars, vines, and thorn bushes. In the spring of 1864, nearly 200,000 soldiers, men from North and South, marched into that Wilderness -- two great armies on a collision course that would take them to the very heart of 'the dark, close wood.' For the Wilderness and the families who lived there -- and for the very armies themselves -- nothing would ever be the same"--Page 4 of cover.