The papers are attributed to Flashman, who is not only the bully featured in Thomas Hughes' novel, but also a well-known Victorian military hero.

As Flashman cannot tell the truth to the Queen without offending her, he reminisces about the First Sikh War, 1845 and 1846, and how he acquired Koh-i-Noor (The Mountain of Light).

Returning to the relative safety of the British forces, Flashman arrives just in time to become an unwilling participant in the attack on Ferozeshah.

Injured, he attempts to avoid the rest of the war in a sick bed, but is called personally by the Maharani of the Punjab to attend to an urgent mission: smuggling her son Daleep Singh and the Koh-i-Noor diamond out of the country.

A review by Charles Solomon, of the Los Angeles Times, highlighted that Fraser's thorough knowledge of British imperial history enabled a realistic depiction of events experienced by Flashman, and that the book "abounds with swashbuckling thrills".