James McCaskey was my great uncle. A bundle of his letters lay in my mother's attic for over a century. When I read them, I knew I had to find out more about this young soldier, who joined a Pennsylvania regiment during the Civil War. What bothered me most was discovering that he and his comrades believed so strongly in the doctrine of predestination that they went fearlessly into battle, often standing up to see where all those bullets were coming from. And, or course, they suffered the consequences. James McCaskey died in his first battle. I wanted to know why.