Old John Burns was another one of the many heroes of Gettysburg. John was over seventy years old when the battle was fought and lived in a little house in the town of Gettysburg with his wife who was nearly as old as he. Burns had fought in the war of 1812 and began to get more and more uneasy every day as the battle was joined at different points near where he was living. The night before the last day of the battle the old man went out to get his cow and found that a foraging band of Confederates had driven her off. This was the last straw. The next day regiment after regiment of the Confederate forces marched past his house and the old man took down his flintlock musket which had done good service against the British in 1812 and began to melt lead and run bullets through his little old bullet mould. Mrs. Burns had been watching him uneasily for some time. "John, what in the world are you doing there?" she finally asked. "Oh," he said, "I thought I would fix up the old gun and get some bullets ready in case any of the boys might want to use it. There's goin' to be some fightin' and it's just as well to get ready. There ain't a piece in the army that will shoot straighter than Betsy here," and the old man patted the long stock of the musket affectionately. "Well," said his wife, "you see that you keep out of it. You know if the Rebs catch you fightin' in citizens' clothes, they'll hang you sure." "Don't you worry about me," said John. "I helped to lick the British and I ain't afraid of a lot of Rebels." Finally the long procession of Confederate forces passed and for an hour or so the road was empty and silent. At last in the distance sounded the roll and rattle of drums and through a great cloud of dust flamed the stars and stripes and in a moment the road was filled with solid masses of blue-clad troops hurrying to their positions on what was to be one of the great battle-fields of the world. As regiment after regiment filed past, old John could stand it no longer. He grabbed his musket and started out the door. "John! John! Where are you going?" screamed his wife, running after him. "Ain't you old enough to know better?" "I'm just goin' out to get a little fresh air," said John, pulling away from her and hurrying down the street. "I'll be back before night sure." It was the afternoon of the last day when the men of a Wisconsin regiment near the front saw a little old man approaching, dressed in a blue swallow-tail coat with brass buttons and carrying a long flintlock rifle with a big powder-horn strapped about him. "Hi, there!" he piped, when he saw the men. "I want to jine in. Where'll I go?" The men laughed at the sight. "Anywhere," shouted back one of them; "there's good fightin' all along the line."