Midnight, October 20, 1864 somewhere in the Virginia woods. The young Union spy, Captain Horatio Cooke (“Harry” to his men) and his six compatriots have been captured - out of uniform no less - by a band of the notorious Confederate rangers known as Mosby’s Guerrillas. They have been stripped of their weapons, money and personal effects, and now find themselves tied up to trees with their collective backs to the Potomac River. The leader of the rebel cavalry squad has informed them that they are all to be executed in the morning after another Confederate group joins them; that band will be bringing even more Federal prisoners with them. Their deaths will be in retaliation for a dozen rebel POW’s who were recently hung by General Custer. Ironically, only a few short weeks earlier, President Lincoln himself had personally told Cooke that “The 'Johnnie’s would have to 'go some' to hold you if you should fall into their hands”. That statement had been in response to a rope escape trick that the soldier and budding escape artist Harry Cooke had just presented to the Commander-in-Chief during a meeting with several generals, including Cooke’s boss, General Sheridan. But on this night, it isn’t a command performance. On this night, Cooke’s ability to extricate himself from ropes or not will determine whether he and all of his men will live or die… No, this is not a make-believe novel. This is in fact the INCREDIBLE TRUE STORY of the brave and resourceful young captain of the Civil War’s super-secret LINCOLN SPECIAL SCOUTS, Harry Green Cooke. Based upon the personal diary and scrapbook of Harry Cooke, as well as additional recently discovered information, this is the first time that this amazing story has been printed into a book—finally fulfilling the promise the author made to Cooke’s daughter in 1981. • Herein is the full account of Cooke’s exploits as the captain of the Lincoln Special Scouts—the elite secret scout and spy entity formed two years before the US Secret Service and assigned the most dangerous missions of all during the Civil War… • Cooke’s first-hand witness account of the assassination of President Lincoln. • Cooke’s survival of his own assassination attempt at the hands of a mad man. • Cooke’s creation of the “Spiritualism De-Bunking” act as well as the “Escape Artist” act. • Cooke’s subsequent mentorship decades later to a guy named Harry Houdini… This is a very large book, measuring approximately 8.25 x 11.5 inches. Includes well over a hundred full-color and black and white reproductions of photographs, playbills, newspaper articles, signed Houdini letters and creations from Cooke’s personal scrapbook as well as material from contributors.