Building a life in the marshlands of coastal North Carolina in the mid-1860s was never easy for anyone. Mary Whearthon, a gently bred young Christian lady from the city, found herself in these marshlands with the man she loved. She faced many trials and tribulations but never looked back. Her story is one of courage, strength, love and faith. Brittie, one of Mary's daughters, suffers pain and untold difficulties, even after Timothy Carmel comes into her life. Together they learn what deception can create in a family. This is the first two of five stories of the Jones/Carmel families; beginning in the eighteen- sixties and taking their stories to the early nineteen- seventies. These stories contain love, hardships, murder, deception, war and rising above it all as a family.