How did northern communities cope when their men and boys went off to the Civil War? When we think of the American Civil War, we usually recall battlefields, heroes, monuments, books and movies. It is difficult to relate such a horrendous war with the ordinary folks who remained at home and tried to maintain some semblance of normal life while waiting for their young men to return. Through these short accounts we get a glimpse of the political and emotional turmoil back home while the boys of Licking County were away fighting. Although not a thorough treatise of Licking County in the war, the stories represent a fair cross-section of the life and times of this small country population, which had only been an Ohio county for 53 years. Its soldiers were sons and grandsons of pioneers from New England and the southern states, so their politics spanned the gamut from abolition to Copperhead Democrats to outright racism. They left a legacy of both glory and heartache for their families and communities, just as in thousands of other small towns across the nation.