Tabitha's Tale, " a companion piece to "The Real Yankee Doodle" is based on real people living real lives at the turn of the eighteenth century. Tabitha Simons and Peabody Utley growing up as nearby neighbors on the edge of the western frontier of the recently independent country of Vermont, find themselves as young adults in an unsettled political world facing an unwanted and ill prepared for war, not to mention a shattering dilemma of their own making.