Special Messenger

Robert W. Chambers' Special Messenger is a Civil War romance charged with danger, longing, and divided loyalties. A sheltered young woman becomes an unexpected courier, moving from innocence into secret service as she carries messages through battlefields, river crossings, and enemy lines. At Red Ferry, she outwits a deserter who has stolen vital papers, detains the frightened ferryman, and turns an abandoned house into a lonely outpost, where a decaying wharf, a moored punt, and the warning sign "HOLLER TWICE" heighten the suspense. Amid the vast machinery of war, cavalry, artillery, and endless columns of men, she searches for Captain Stanley, the bandmaster she believed dead at Sandy River, only to learn he has survived. That revelation opens a tender, painful world of memory and hope. In another tense encounter, she is captured by a Southern officer who recognizes her from an earlier, emotionally charged meeting; mercy and duty collide as he lets her escape, then destroys his sabre and takes his own life. Blending adventure, suspense, and tragic romance, the novel reveals how war awakens hidden courage while exacting a devastating human cost. This edition has been fully restored with modern typesetting, custom cover design.