Veteran of Queen Victoria's wars and recent immigrant to America, Abel Jones believed he had left his days in uniform behind. Now, firmly rooted on the shores of his adopted land where American has taken up arms against American in this most terrible of conflicts he has signed on as a confidential agent to General George McClellan, the man touted as the savior of the Union, and begins an investigation into the murder of a young Union officer. Within hours Jones finds himself in a dark and unexpected world, where questions lead not to answers, but to other deaths. Set against the backdrop of battles and bordellos, of the intrigues of war-time Washington and the elegant mansions of old Philadelphia, FADED COAT OF BLUE reaches behind the myths and heroics to paint a ravishing, disturbing and deeply moving portrait of the United States in the midst of our harshest trial -- and introduces Abel Jones, a determinedly moral man in a troubled age, whose investigation triggers a drama involving greedy industrialists and corrupt generals, rag-clad immigrants and impassioned patriots, vicious politicians and the greatest president the country has ever known.