Photographic operator Robert McEntee's routine is upended when Colonel Ellsworth's New York Fire Department Zouaves arrive in Washington, D.C. at the outset of the Civil War. They are uncooperative sitters by day and set off false alarms by night-and they've enlisted his younger brother, Andrew! Rob is rapidly enmeshed in murder, espionage, and the Battle of First Manassas, encountering along the way Alan Pinkerton, Andrew Carnegie, Mathew Brady and the infamous Rose O'Neal Greenhow. Jean West recreates Washington as capital town, rather than city, where the famous and powerful rode upon unpaved streets and mingled with their neighbors. The story is illustrated with Civil War photographs and woodcuts. Mayhem at Manassas is the first in a series of Civil War mysteries featuring photographer-sleuth Rob McEntee. Look for the second, as the Monitor and Merrimack draw Rob into Peril on the Peninsula.