John Burns

John L. Burns is one of the most famous civilian warriors in American history. On July 1, 1863, he left the shelter of his Gettysburg home and joined in the fighting west of town. Wounded and captured, he survived the battle to become a national celebrity. In the months that followed, he was visited by reporters and photographers; he received the personal thanks of Abraham Lincoln, and Congress passed a special act granting him a pension. As his tale spread across the land, some of its details became distorted, and today much of what happened is shrouded in myth and legend. In this, the first full-length biography published on Burns, Smith has attempted to sort fact from fiction and tell the true story of "The Hero of Gettysburg."