One of Gettysburg's most haunted inns

The bucolic fields surrounding Gettysburg are ripe with ghosts.
No wonder. A lot of people died there during three hot July days in 1863. But, apparently, many of these soldiers have chosen to hang around — maybe to help the local tourism industry. Even Lincoln has been spotted in these parts (and he died at a theater).

I’ve bicycled and walked the expansive, pastoral (it is damn beautiful) battlefield many times, but haven’t seen anything more interesting than playful red fox and grazing white-tailed deer. I did see a Robert E. Lee look-alike a few times; a re-enactor.
But I admit I was once spooked during an overnight stay at the Farnsworth House Inn, a small inn hugging one of the main roads through this central Pennsylvania town.
I didn’t sleep a wink. The truth is I was frightened before I checked in. A few weeks earlier, my mother was awakened during an overnight stay by a man in a blue uniform. He was standing over her, holding her arm out, apparently admiring her jewelry. My father snoozed through it all.
This inn, built in 1833, may not have been in the thick of things during the battle, but it felt its heat. More than a hundred bullet holes litter its brick walls. Confederate sharpshooters secured the attic as a strategic post. Some believe they’re responsible for the only civilian death during the battle. A young woman who lived nearby was killed by a stray bullet while baking bread in her kitchen.
I had toured the inn long before my night there. An otherwise festive evening turned gray when I peeked into one of the second-floor bedrooms. It was as if someone had pulled a blanket of sadness over me. I felt like crying. The hostess, noticing a change in my demeanor, explained that a woman had died giving birth in the room.
So, I had good reason for my insomnia.
With just four rooms, the inn is intimate place. You can hear other guests opening and closing doors. The innkeeper doesn’t spend the night and guests come and go through a side-door entrance, down a steep set of stairs. Once the dining room and tavern close, you’re on your own.
The next morning as my ex-wife and I walked into the dining room for breakfast, the other three couples turned toward us, surprised. As we began chatting over French toast and bacon, we learned why.
“We expected to see two men come down the stairs this morning,” explained one of the women. “The last two voices we heard coming up the stairs last night were two guys.”