John L . Burns John Lawrence Burns ( September 5 , 1793 – February 4 , 1872 ) , veteran of the War of 1812 , became a 69 - year - old civilian combatant with the Union Army at the Battle of Gettysburg during the American Civil War . He was wounded , but survived to become a national celebrity . Life . Burns was born in Burlington , New Jersey , of Scottish ancestry ; his father claimed a relationship with poet Robert Burns . He served as an enlisted man in the War of 1812 , fighting in numerous battles , including Lundy ' s Lane , and volunteered for both the Mexican - American War and the Civil War . He was rejected for combat duty in the latter war due to his advanced age , but he served as a teamster in support of the Union Army . He was sent home against his will to Gettysburg , Pennsylvania , where he was named constable . During Confederate Maj . Gen . Jubal A . Early ' s brief occupation of Gettysburg on June 26 , 1863 , Burns was jailed for his adamant assertion of civil authority in resisting Early . As the Confederates departed , Burns was released from jail and arrested some of the Confederate stragglers , continuing his opposition to the invading army until he was relieved by Federal cavalry under Brig . Gen . John Buford . On the first day of the Battle of Gettysburg , July 1 , 1863 , Burns took up his flintlock musket and powder horn and walked out to the scene of the fighting that morning . He encountered a wounded Union soldier and asked if he could use his more modern rifle ; the soldier agreed and Burns moved on with the rifle and with cartridges in his pocket . Approaching Major Thomas Chamberlin of the 150th Pennsylvania Infantry , Burns requested that he be allowed to fall in with the regiment . Chamberlin later wrote of Burns moving with deliberate step , carrying his Enfield rifle at a trail . His somewhat peculiar dress " consisted of dark trousers and a waistcoat , a blue ' swallow tail ' coat with burnished brass buttons , such as used to be affected by well - to - do gentlemen of the old school about 40 years ago , and a high black silk hat , from which most of the original gloss had long departed , of a shape to be found only in the fashion plates of the remote past . " Despite his skepticism about the request , Chamberlin referred him to the regimental commander , Colonel Langhorne Wister , who sent the aged Burns into the woods next to the McPherson Farm , where he would find better shelter from the sun and enemy bullets . In McPherson ( Herbst ) Woods , Burns fought with the 7th Wisconsin Infantry and then moved to join the 24th Michigan near the eastern end of the woods . He fought beside these men of the famous Iron Brigade throughout the afternoon , serving effectively as a sharpshooter , in one case shooting a charging Confederate officer from his horse . As the Union line began to give way and they fell back to the Seminary , Burns received wounds in the arm , the leg , and several minor ones in the breast ; the Union soldiers were forced to leave him behind on the field . Injured and exhausted , the old man was able to crawl away from his rifle and to hastily bury his ammunition . He convinced the Confederates that he was a noncombatant , wandering the battlefield seeking aid for his invalid wife , and his wounds were dressed by their surgeons . This was a narrow escape for Burns , for by the rules of war he was subject to summary execution as a non - uniformed combatant , or bushwhacker . He was able to crawl that evening to the cellar of the nearest house , and was later conveyed to his own home , where he was treated by Dr . Charles Horner . After the battle , Burns was elevated to the role of national hero . Hearing about the aged veteran , Mathew Brady ' s photographer Timothy H . O ' Sullivan photographed Burns while recuperating at his home on Chambersburg Street and took the story of Burns and his participation in the battle back home to Washington . When President Abraham Lincoln came to Gettysburg to dedicate the Soldiers National Cemetery and deliver his Gettysburg Address that fall , he requested to meet with Burns . Burns accompanied the president on a walk from the David Wills house to the Presbyterian Church on Baltimore Street on November 19 , 1863 . Burns ' s fame quickly spread and a poem about his exploits was published by Bret Harte in 1864 . According to Burns ' s biography in " Appleton ' s Cyclopedia " , during the last two years of his life his mind failed , and his friends were unable to prevent his wandering about the country . He was found in New York City on a cold winter ' s night in December 1871 , in a state of destitution , and was cared for and sent home , but died of pneumonia in 1872 . In memoriam . The popularity of John Burns ' s participation in the battle grew in the post war years . His home on Chambersburg Street was razed after his death and veterans of the battle remarked that something should be done to commemorate his services . Reacting to a proposal by a Pennsylvania chapter of the Sons of Union Veterans , the state enacted legislation to provide funds for a fitting monument . The Pennsylvania Board of Commissioners on Gettysburg Monuments desired that the monument be placed on the field where Burns had fought with the 150th Pennsylvania and 7th Wisconsin regiments , and a site was chosen on McPherson ' s Ridge next to Herbst Woods . Sculptor Albert G . Bureau chose to depict a defiant Burns with clenched fist , carrying his borrowed rifle . Placed upon a boulder taken from the battlefield , the monument was dedicated on July 1 , 1903 , on the occasion of the 40th anniversary of the battle . Burns is buried in Evergreen Cemetery in Gettysburg , one of only two graves there with permission to fly the American flag twenty - four hours per day ( the other being the grave of Ginnie Wade , the only civilian killed during the battle ) . His original gravestone was vandalized , but replaced by the local chapter of the Grand Army of the Republic in 1902 . It bears the inscription " Patriot " .