Charley Goddard has been through alot in this story. At first he wants to join the army and is ready for it. He convinces his mother into letting him join. He lies about his age just to get in. He wants to join the army so bad. This book starts by Charlie hearing the drums, songs and slogans. So this makes me think is that why he wanted to join the army? Charlie thinks that being in the war is going to be a glorious life. What he thinks is going to be a fun job, will turn out to be a nightmare.
When he signs up he thought he was getting a real uniform. He ends up getting a flannel shirt. He writes letters back home to tell his family what it is like there. When Charley is there the first couple months, he realizes that he keeps getting the same food over and over again. He hates the food. Then whenever they are training, he doesn’t like it because they would be trained by people that didn’t know what they were doing and were practicing…show more content… When he stops he sees people that could barely dress themselves. Then what he thought would be fun would really turn out really bad. Here it is, Charley’s first battle would actually become unexpected. He wanted the battle to stop even though it was the first couple of minutes. Here he is seeing bodies drop like flies. I don’t think that this is what Charley pictured whenever he wanted to join the army. He sees a commander tugging on his foot and tells them to retreat. When the battle is over he sees land filled with dead bodies. Before the second battle comes he meets this guy Nelson. He didn’t know much about the guy but he would do something good for him later on. The second battle starts they see the confederate line up and yell. Charley’s commander tells the army to form. The Union was losing. So they were forced back to retreat. When they were retreating he sees Nelson get shot in the belly. So Charley gives this guy huge favors and then left
