Summary

The Civil War is coming to an end, and the 32nd Pennsylvania Colored Infantry Regiment is digging a trench around an ammunition factory. Each day they observe a group of 18 orphans under the care of a nun as they toddle past the factory to the Freedman's Bureau to get rations. There is a five-year-old mixed race boy called Abraham Henry Lincoln that the soldiers tease, telling him his is really Abraham Lincoln's son. A.H. Lincoln, not knowing who Abraham Lincoln is, believes them.

A.H. Lincoln runs away from the orphanage and is discovered some ways away by a member of the 9th Louisiana Colored Infantry Regiment, who mistakes him for a possum in the night. Young Lincoln tells the regiment he is looking for his “pa” (148). When he learns that one of the soldiers is named Abe Porter, A.H. Lincoln...