In the opening scene, a lieutenant is dividing coffee for his troops in a camp behind their battlefield. The men wait eagerly as he draws portions on his blanket with a sword. Suddenly he is shot, but it takes everyone a minute to understand what just happened. The lieutenant tries to brandish his sword, but, unable to do so with his arm wounded, he tries even more awkwardly to sheathe it. The men stare helplessly, looking first at the lieutennant and then toward the distant forest where the bullet originated, until an orderly-sergeant nervously steps up to help him. The man’s over-carefulness captures the general feeling of vague fear, awe, and respect that surrounds the newly wounded lieutenant.
Sad, silent, and humiliated, the lieutenant departs slowly for the field hospital, glancing at the woods as he does so. As he passes the growing battle, he notices things that he never could before. The spectacle of war starts to appear beautiful and poetic. A general and his aide—an otherwise unremarkable sight—now appear colorful and remind him of a historical painting. The appearance of a battery, as gunmen launch it into battle, captivates him. He dwells on its sights and sounds even as it fades well beyond his sight.
As the lieutenant makes his way to the hospital, he passes two groups of off-duty soldiers who make him feel increasingly ignorant and helpless. Incredibly, a group of stragglers seems to know everything about the fight, even facts that the lieutenant himself never learned while in the front lines.
A while later, another group of officers belittles the lieutenant further when they ask him questions he can’t answer. Worst of all, one officer from this gathering scolds the lieutenant like a parent for not dressing his wound. Brashly, the man rips open the lieutenant’s sleeve and attempts to dress it, all the while making the lieutenant feel silly and ignorant.
The lieutenant finally arrives at the chaotic field hospital, which is a converted schoolhouse. A surgeon is kind to the lieutenant at first, but then, noticing his wound, becomes mean and cold, begrudgingly tending to him. He mocks the lieutenant’s inadequate bandage and calls him a baby when he shows fear. But the lieutenant, reduced and embarrassed, stops cold at the doors of the schoolhouse and refuses to enter. Despite the surgeon’s insistence, the lieutenant is terrified of amputation.
Crane jumps forward in time to the lieutenant’s return home. He has lost the arm after all, and his family weeps. He stands in shame as he tries to brush off their grief, insisting—unconvincingly—that the injury isn’t as bad as it looks.
