On a farm outside Gettysburg, Pennsylvania, Samuel Wade grows up believing his mother, Caroline, is a widow. That she is not is only one of her many secrets. In addition to rearing Sam and taking care of her farm, Caroline also oversees a burgeoning shoe manufacturing business. For the sake of her son - who hopes to attend West Point - and her business, it is critical that the truth of her past remains closely guarded. Simon Thornton, first-born son of politically powerful Alabama state senator Henry Thornton and his Ohio-born wife Victoria, grows up as the privileged child of a genteel plantation family of the antebellum South. Simon attends the Virginia Military Institute, graduating just in time to accept a commission in the fledgling Confederate army.