During the Civil War, Rachel Hayne, a young widow, is among those "held by the enemy" when her old family home is within the lines occupied by the Northern troops. Protected by Colonel Prescott from looters and the unwelcome attentions of Surgeon Fielding, Rachel begins to fall in love with the gallant Yankee officer. Their romance is disrupted when Rachel's husband Gordon, long reported dead, is captured as a spy and condemned to death. When Gordon is wounded during an attempted escape, Rachel's loyalty impels her to try to save him by feigning his death. As Gordon's stretcher is carried through the hospital, Fielding demands an examination of the body, charging that Prescott is involved in a plot to smuggle the spy out of the hospital alive. General Stanton lifts the cover from the body, only to find that death has really come, freeing both Rachel and Prescott.