Have you seen my mother?

Author’s Note:  War Comes to Willy Freeman had lots of action on Willy’s path to try and find her mother.

In every plot there is a conflict in the beginning of the story and at the end you figure out if the conflict was resolved or not.  In the Historical fiction book War Comes to Willy Freeman by James Lincoln Collier and Christopher Collier, the main conflict is that Willy’s mother was taken by the British and Willy is trying to find her, but on her way she runs in to a little trouble.  

Willy Freeman is a girl but in most of the story is she is pretending to be a guy.  The reason she is doing this is because if she was a girl looking for her mother or even walking around town she would get yelled at for being out of the house and not cleaning or cooking or sewing.   So this is why Willy is pretending to be a guy which is not hard for her because she looks like one any way.  Since Willy’s father died in the war and her mother was taken by the British, Willy decides to go looking for her mother in New York.  Willy gets there is her father’s jolly boat and stops at her Aunts Betsy house where she is staying with her owner Captain Ivers.  Willy goes there because she wants to tell them what is going on.  Also this is the first time she has ever seen them but Wily has heard a lot about them from her mother.  Willy becomes a slave to Captain Ivers even though she is free.  After staying there for a night Willy decided to run away to New York.  So she does but once Willy is out for just a little while the British find her and think she is a spy.  They take her to long island where she plans a way to escape from them.  After escaping by making them think that there was someone in the woods by throwing rocks to detract them, Willy escapes to New York.  Willy runs into some trouble there to by the officers thinking she was a spy now Willy had a great idea to just be a boy so she could to more things.  After sleeping in barns and the side of the road Willy finds a boy named Horace and takes Willy back to Mr. Fraunces who is his owner.  Mr. Fraunces agrees to have Willy stay and work in the house.  The only one in New York that knows Willy is a girl is Mr. Fraunces so far.  Every so often Willy and Horaces would go out to look for Willy’s mother but every time they were not successful. 

Finally Willy got word that her mother was found and was with Willy’s Aunt.  So as soon as Willy could get out of New York she was gone headed to her Aunts to see her mother.  The only catch was that Captain Ivers could not see Willy otherwise Willy would be put back into slavery.  So Willy had to find a way to get inside without Captain Ivers seeing her and Willy found a way when Captain Ivers was gone.  When Willy saw her mother it brought her to tears because she looked so bad.  And Willy knew that the only way that her mother could be saved would be if a doctor came.  Willy told her Aunt this and her Aunt said yes I know but Captain Ivers will not allow it.  Willy eventually got to the doctor and got some medicine that might work but she was too late.  When Willy got down where her mother was she was gone.  Willy’s mother was cold as stone.  In the end Willy did get to see her mother for a short time until she died.