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THE DRAMATIC STORY
OF OLD GLORY
THE N'EW YORK
PUBIIC LIBRARY
ASTOR, LEN»X
TILDEN FOUX^DATIONS
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*
THE COLOR-BEARERS.
(Bronze Memorial Seventy-Ninth Pennsylvania Infantry, Chickamauga.)
THE DRAMATIC STORY
OF OLD GLORY
BY
SAMUEL ABBOTT
MEMBEB, AMERICAN HISTOBICAL AB80CUTI0N;
SONS OF THE AMERICAN REVOLUTION,
ETC.
FOREWORD BY
JAMES M. BECK
NEW YORK
BONI AND LIVERIGHT
1919
I PUBLIC UBRARY
^H'^9 .'1
Copyright, 1919,
By BONI & LIVERIGHT. Inc.
TO THE MEMORY OF
MY FATHER
SAMUEL WARREN ABBOTT
WHO GAVE ME, WHEN A BOY,
A BLOOD-STAINED FRAGMENT OF
A STARS AND STRIPES OF '63
CONTENTS
CHAPTEB PAGE j
I "Run Up Above Them All" 1 |
II The Forerunners OF THE Stars AND Stripes 5 \
III The Grand Union Flag of 1776 ... 12
IV Last Days of the Grand Union Flag . . 21 j
V Benjamin Franklin and the Stars and
Stripes 27
VI The Betsy Ross Tradition 35 v^
VII Old Glory Floats Over a Field of Battle 40
VIII The Flag and the Soldier of the Revolu- \
tion 48 j
IX A Few Flag Problems 54 ]
X The Stars and Stripes on the Sea ... 63
XI The Stars and Stripes and Paul Jones . 67 |
XII The Flag and the Poets of the Revolu- ]
TION 72 I
XIII France Salutes the Stars and Stripes . 76 i
XIV The Flag at Valley Forge 80 j
XV Old Glory Crosses the Alleghanies . . 84 |
XVI The Flag Sinks INTO THE Sea Unconquered 88 |
XVII Stars and Stripes, Union Jack and Fleur- i
DE-Lis ,93 j
XVIII Flag Episodes of 1781-1783 99 j
vU
viii CONTENTS
CHAPTEB PAGE
XIX The Stars and Stripes Goes Abound
THE World 105
XX The Flag Supplants the Tricolor
Over Louisiana 110
XXI Old Glory Goes Overland to the Pa-
cific 114
XXII The Flag Floats Over An African
Fortress 121
XXIII The Stars and Stripes Seeks the
Source of the Mississippi .... 129
XXIV Discord Among the Three Tricolors . 139
XXV The Stars and Stripes Raised Over a
Log Schoolhouse 145
XXVI The Flag on the Sea in the War of
1812 147
XXVII The Flag Finds Victory in Defeat . 155
XXVIII The Flag on Land in the War of 1812 161
XXIX The Flag Assumes Permanent Form . 167
XXX "Old Glory'' 172
XXXI Two Women, the Flag and the Book . 174
XXXII Old Glory Seeks the Ends of the
World 178
XXXIII The Flag Flies Over the Halls of
Montezuma 185
XXXIV The Flag Goes Down the River Jor-
dan TO the Dead Sea 189
XXXV Stars and Stripes at Fort Sumter . 194
XXXVI The Flag Goes to the Front ... 205
CHAPTEB
XXXVII
XXXVIII
XXXIX
XL
XLI
XLII
XLIII
XLIV
XLV
XLVI
XLVII
XLVIII
XLIX
CONTENTS Ix
PAGE
Old Glory's Devoted Followers . . 213
The Immortal Color-Bearers . . . 222
The Flag Comes Home 240
The Stars and Stripes Goes to the
Heart of Africa 244
Old Glory at Samoa 247
The Flag in the War with Spain . 250
Old Glory at the Top of the World . 254
Territorial Acquisitions Under the
Flag 256
The Stars and Stripes and the World
War 260
The Flag at the Front in France . 265
Concord Among the Tricolors . . . 279
Patriotism and the Flag 281
Old Glory and the Schoolhouse . . 292
LIST OF ILLUSTRATIONS
The Color-Bearers Frontispiece
FACING
PAGE
The Grand Union Flag at Boston 10
Stars and Stripes and Fleur-de-Lis at Yorktown, 1781 . 94
The Peacock Flag in the Arctic Regions 182
The Lynch Expedition on the River Belus .... 192
Independence Day in Paris 260
The Stars and Stripes reaches Coblenz and the Rhine . 274
An Old Glory Made in Secret by the Frenchwomen of
Metz 278
FOREWORD
IF "good wine needs no bush" and a "good play needs
no epilogue," similarly a good book needs no fore-
word. This restraining reflection naturally suggests
itself to one who is asked to write a foreword for
another man's book.
Mr. Abbott has done a real service in bring-
ing together all available knowledge with reference to
the American Flag.
The events of the last four years have demon-
strated the vital necessity of reviving the spirit of Amer-
icanism. Thoughtful Americans sadly realize that our
nation in the last fifty years has, in the matter of im-
migration, swallowed far more than it has been able
to assimilate. It is suffering from racial indigestion.
This led Colonel Roosevelt, in his forceful and original
way, to suggest that America had become a "polyglot
boarding-house," and in the earlier stages of the world
conflict, it did seem to many that America was a con-
geries of peoples and, as such, apparently lacking in the
spirit of national consciousness and patriotic unity,
which generally characterizes more homogeneous na-
tions. The event proved that these misgivings were
exaggerated and that America, when summoned to a
great duty, did not lack unity of spirit. The call to
arms did much to weld the United States into an effi-
cient unity, and, as this result is one of the greatest
rm FOREWORD
advantages which America has gained from the war,
it is eminently desirable that full advantage be taken
of the changed psychology of the American people to
realize more fully that sense of national unity without
which America could never completely realize its des-
tiny as one of the "master states of the world."
As the Cross is the symbol of the Christian religion,
so the Flag is the most concrete evidence of national
unity. Other nations may find the outward manifesta-
tion of their unity in the person of a monarch ; but, in
this country, despite the immense power of the Chief
Magistrate, his tenure is too fleeting to make him the
symbol of national unity. Moreover, his function as
the leader of the party of the day would make it im-
possible for him to occupy the peculiar relation to the
State which a hereditary monarch, who is above party
politics and who has little real power, enjoys in con-
stitutional monarchies.
The Flag, therefore, is the most effective emblem of
national unity.
There is need for the inculcation of such spirit of
respect; for it has been frequently noted in the great
public parades of the last four years in our large cities,
that young and old have too often failed to respect the
Flag when it passes. An old veteran of the Civil War
once told the writer with indignation how he had re-
buked a crowd of young men who had shown such lack
of respect when the Flag was borne aloft in the streets
of New York.
We should begin with teaching our children the his-
tory of the Flag; for it is not easy to arouse their in-
terest and enthusiasm if they are only taught that the
FOREWORD ^flC
Flag stands for one hundred millions of people com-
posed of many races, classes, creeds and parties. The
appeal must be addressed to the imagination of men,
especially of the youth of the land. This explains the
undying popularity and also the special utility of our
national song: 'The Star Spangled Banner." It is
connected with a thrilling incident when, in one of the
darkest hours of the Republic, when its fortunes were
at their lowest ebb since the days of Valley Forge, a
little band of Americans held out against a superior
power. The poet caught the spirit of the occasion and
found his inspiration in the fact that, over the smoke of
battle, the Flag "was still there."
Mr. Abbott has, therefore, done a public service in
narrating in an interesting way the history of the Amer-
ican Flag, and it is to be hoped, not merely because it is
a readable book, but because it should be a potent
weapon for a quickened patriotism, that the book will
have a wide circulation and that, through its interesting
pages, thousands of Americans may better know their
country and its Flag.
JAMES M. BECK.
New York, March 30, 1919.
THE DRAMATIC STORY
OF OLD GLORY
THE DRAMATIC STORY OF
OLD GLORY
"Run Up Above Them All"
THIS book is concerned wholly with the history
of the Flag of the United States from the days
of its existence as the national ensign of an infant
State confined to a narrow fringe of sea-board backed
by a rampart of hills, to the hours of a mighty People
whose gates are on two oceans and whose Will for
Liberty has been impressed upon the world. The
chronicle of our Flag from 1777 to 1917 dealt with
a record that exemplified a Nation content to obey a
political maxim of its first President, maintaining a
proud remoteness from international troubles beyond
the field of its hemisphere. But the Stars and Stripes
of 1917 to 1918 was, and is, a living thing thrilled
through all its threads with nerves of sympathy for
peoples tyrannically oppressed. It could not droop
on its staff when every wind from oversea came laden
with the weeping of women and children and the can-
non-roar of lines entrenched for endangered Liberty.
Over the very waters that ebb and flow above the
shattered Lusitania sailed Paul Jones in 1778, flaunt-
ing before the eyes of Europe a Flag made by women
2 THE DRAMATIC STORY OF OLD GLORY
and girls of the young Republic of the United States.
On a night in 1918, in a little Scottish hut, inspired
women made an Old Glory from a design tattooed on
the arm of a sailor, that the men of the Tuscania might
go to their graves under their national symbol. In
the darkness that shrouded that hut were ghostly mem-
ories of the same heroic Jones as he sailed the Ranger
to meet the Drake off a Scottish headlrnJ, the Red,
White and Blue of his ensign glimmering against a
hostile coast.
The Flag has followed an old sea-trail in its journey
across the Atlantic to take a stand at the apex of the
wedge of tricolors thrust into the heart of Kingship.
From now on we, as Americans awake to the meaning
of our heritage, can never refuse to follow the Stars
and Stripes into any field of the globe that demands
the instant appearance of an unquestioned sign of Lib-
erty. And so, this book, to be complete, is to follow,
step by step through a trail of dramatic and romantic
incidents, the thrilling story of our Flag from the days
of its birth in a quiet street of old Philadelphia down
to the hours of its triumph in the cannon-roar of the
highway of the trenches in France.
The American Flag has called forth a number of
books on its history. Geo. Henry Preble's "History
of the Flag of the United States of America," which
first appeared in 1872, is still the authoritative work
in the field, though many of its conclusions require
revision in the light of recently acquired knowledge.
Peleg D. Harrison's 'The Stars and Stripes and Other
American Flags," published in 1906, may be ranked
''RUN UP ABOVE THEM ALL" 3
second as a carefully prepared history of Old Glory.
The National Geographic Society issued in 1917 an
excellent handbook on the Flag, giving much of its his-
tory, and there are at least eight or ten other books that
cover the story of Old Glory, all of them presenting
practically the same historical matter, with little devi-
ation into paths of new and important research.
It is curious that, while the record of our Flag is
one of thrilling, dramatic episodes, no writer has
grasped the idea of a book that would give these epi-
sodes in their true light, not exaggerated, and linked
together in a running narrative. All predecessors in
this important field have either written books contain-
ing disconnected series of salient related events, or pre-
pared booklets juvenile in atmosphere. Yet there is
a Story of Old Glory that moves onward majestically
and through a chain of associated episodes. To move
in current with these episodes, has been the plan of
the author of this history.
The reader will find matter in "The Dramatic Story
of Old Glory" that has not hitherto been given in any
history of the Flag. The explanation of Trumbull's
errors in his famous paintings; the complete account
and the significance, of the raising of Old Glory over
Fort Stanwix; the proof of the Flag's being unfurled
over the camp of the Continental Army on the eve of
the battle of the Brandy wine; the interesting theory
as to Benjamin Franklin's being the originator of the
Stars and Stripes; the grandly romantic drama of the
Flag through the Civil War; and the story of Old
Glory at the front in France at the close of the late
war; all this is new and important material.
4 THE DRAMATIC STORY OF OLD GLORY
Every school-house has, or should have, a Stars and
Stripes over it. This history has been written with the
school-house and the community in view. By making
use of the Table of Flag-Topics at the end of the book,
a teacher, or a leader in community work, will be able
to correlate certain great events in the history of the
Nation and of the Flag, with school-room work in
American History or with patriotic and civic exercises.
As a handbook in Americanization, "The Dramatic
Story of Old Glory" has a field of distinct service.
The story of Old Glory is not wholly one of war.
Practically all other histories of the Flag err in an
overemphasis of the Flag as an emblem of battle.
The splendid stories of humane work under its folds,
and of the extension of knowledge of the globe through
discovery under its lead, are given in this volume in
adequate detail.
The sole aim has been to give Americans, old and
young, in "The Dramatic Story of Old Glory," the
thrilling, inspiring history of their Flag, in a manner
that should create a nation-wide reverence for it as
a symbol of patriotism. To-day it fulfills Whitman's
prophecy written fifty years ago:
"O hasten, flag of man,
O with sure and steady step,
Passing highest flags of kings,
Walk supreme to the heavens, mighty symbol;
Run up above them all,
Flag of stars, thick-sprinkled bunting."
If we are to maintain it on high, a world-sign of
Democracy, we must know intimately the story of its
growth to power and dominion.
II
The Forerunners of the Stars and Stripes
THE Stars and Stripes had many forerunners on
American soil, banners that were local in their
significances. If one were able to place one point of
a gigantic pair of compasses on Pennsylvania, the true
keystone Colony and State, lying with six of the orig-
inal historic thirteen to the North and six to the South,
he would be in a position to diagram the real drama
of the inception of Old Glory. For, by extending the
other point until it touches the heart of Maine and then
swinging it to the South, still pivoting on Philadel-
phia, until it rests on the Carolinas, he will reach the
three historic fields of as many historic flags, each a
tribal or a national symbol. We say "tribal," for
the Pine Tree Flag that undoubtedly went with Ar-
nold and Morgan into the snows of a Maine winter,
on that daring march to Quebec in 1775, was the sign
of New England at war. And the Palmetto Flag of
Fort Moultrie and the heroism of Sergeant Jasper,
was an emblem of the Southern tier of Colonies in
arms. The Stars and Stripes, in perfect form, sprang
into being at Philadelphia, the medial city of the old
Atlantic line of cities and towns, the home of the
Declaration of Independence. There were other fiags
in those stirring days, called into life by the ardor of
S
6 THE DRAMATIC STORY OF OLD GLORY
zealous patriots seeking a sign under which to rally
and to fight. But we leave it to other historians and
other pages to record the stories of such banners as
the Bedford, Westmoreland, Pulaski and Eutaw flags.
We will now take up the story of the flags that were
actually displayed in the camp of the Continental
Army around Boston, six months after the battle of
Bunker Hill. It is the morning of January l, 1776.
We are on Prospect Hill to the northwest of Boston,
with an army of almost 16,000 muskets, beleaguering
Howe and his British grenadiers in the old Puritan
town. Lexington and Concord, with their skirmishes,
in which the Bedford flag figured, are already down
in the type of history. Bunker Hill has been fought,
to give heart to a raw militia and a sad lesson to certain
famous regiments of King George the Third.
We are not sure if any American flag was carried
into action on Bunker Hill. John Trumbull, in his
painting, "The Death of Warren at the Battle of
Bunker's Hill," shows two flags in his picturing of the
crucial moment of the struggle; a Pine Tree Flag,
which may have been on the hill, but probably was
not there, and a regulation British ensign, which un-
doubtedly was present. In a later page of this book,
will appear an explanation of the reason for doubting
Trumbull's accuracy in regard to flags.
There is to-day, however, in Chester Cathedral, Eng-
land, a fragment of a blue battle-flag which, it is
claimed, was captured from Americans at Bunker Hill.
If you ever visit Chester Cathedral, the verger will
point to a British flag hanging on the wall of the
nave, and tell you that it was borne up the fire-swept
THE FORERUNNERS 7
slope of Bunker Hill by one of the King's regiments.
This flag has one other glorious memory. In its folds
was wrapped the body of the young Wolfe after his
death a victor at Quebec in 1759.
But to go back to that first day of January, 1776.
To our east the Charles river glides by to Boston
Harbor where, in 1775, a Pine Tree Flag floated over
a floating battery, the first American ensign to go
above a fighting ship, if so that battery may be termed.
Near us, coming in from the west, is the old "Post
Road" from New York and Philadelphia, over which
tramped with Washington, to this siege, the Colonial
troops. Fanning describes them, in his memoirs, as a
motley line of uncouth, undisciplined men, carrying
their flint-locks at all conceivable angles. It is on rec-
ord that an escort of the Philadelphia Light Horse ac-
companied the Commander-in-Chief as far as New
York, on this march. Their banner deserves a descrip-
tion in these pages. It is of bright yellow silk forty
inches long and thirty-four inches wide. The canton,
or upper corner next to the staff, where the stars will
later appear in the Stars and Stripes, is twelve and
a half inches in length and nine and a half inches in
breadth. It is made up of thirteen alternating blue
and silver stripes. The center of this flag is adorned
with a blue shield with a gold edge. A horse's head
forms the crest; and this rather heraldic center is sup-
ported on one hand by an American Indian, and on
the other by an angel. We wonder what Ben Franklin
thinks of this combination of angel and Indian.
We will now walk through the long line of trenches
that gird Boston on the north, the west and the
8 THE DRAMATIC STORY OF OLD GLORY
south, and visit men from the fringe of Colonies from
New Hampshire to Virginia and beyond. These Co-
lonial forces have flags emblematic of colonial variety
and modes of life. We note the crimson silk flag of
the Hanover Battalion from Lancaster County, Penn-
sylvania, with its figure of a frontier rifleman, gun
in hand, beneath the motto, ''Liberty or Death."
Connecticut men are here with standards that distin-
guish each regiment, made in solid colors; yellow, blue,
scarlet, crimson, white, azure, blue again, and then
orange. Their Colony motto is "Qui transtulit sus-
tinet," meaning that God, who transferred men of
Massachusetts Bay to Windsor, Wethersfield and
Hartford, to become the founders of a great Common-
wealth, will uphold them. This motto appears on
some of their flags.
We wander on through the camp, and are greeted
by the predominant Pine Tree Flag of Massachusetts,
with its words, "An Appeal to Heaven" ; by the white
banner of New York, with a black beaver stitched to
its center; by the Rhode Island white flag centered
with a blue anchor with the word, "Hope," and most
significant in its blue canton with thirteen white stars.
If we look further, we may see the Rattlesnake Flag
of Virginia and the Carolinas. As to-day is the first
of January, 1776, we have fresh in mind the reorga-
nization of the Continental Army commenced this
morning. The Rifle Battalion has been made the First
Regiment of that Army, and its flag is described by a
soldier as follows : "Our standard is to be a deep green
ground, the device a tiger partly enclosed by toils,
attempting the pass defended by a hunter armed with
THE FORERUNNERS 9
a spear (in white) ; on crimson field the motto 'Do-
mari nolo!' (I refuse to be subjugated)."
Such is the array of flags under which the Conti-
nental Army at the siege of Boston has been guarding
lines that run over hills, valleys and streams, in a
semicircle of anxious vigilance. There is great need
of a more real unity of purpose, of a deeper sense of
the obligation of the soldier to his cause. "Can we
have a standard, a flag that embodies in itself the idea
of our cooperation as thirteen distinct political units
warring with a single purpose? As yet, there is little
or no desire to break away from our mother country,
Great Britain. It is appropriate that this flag should
symbolize our adherence to our common resolution to
stand to the death for certain inalienable rights and
privileges. It should also represent our loyalty to the
nobler elements of England's Constitution. It must
also express our own union in thirteen Colonies that
realize in themselves, in their aloofness from Europe
and in their instinctive gift of cohesion, a seed of Em-
pire that is individual."
And so, as a natural result of a desire to achieve an
Army that is to be one under a single standard, the
"Grand Union Flag" is about to be raised over the
trenches on Prospect Hill, this chill morning of the
first of January, 1776. The men are falling into line,
muflfled in homespun, some of them wearing the warm
caps of the frontier riflemen, made of the skins of
animals. Musket barrels have been polished. Accou-
terments have been made neat. The squat cannon,
thrust through openings in the trenches, have been
loaded. Suddenly the men look to the crest of the
10 THE DRAMATIC STORY OF OLD GLORY
hill where, accompanied by his Staff and mounted on
his horse, George Washington appears at the base of
a tall pole, a staff cut from a nearby forest. Near
him stands a little group of soldiers, one of them hold-
ing a flag whose stripes of red and white ripple from
his arms in the strong wind. There is a low word of
command. The new standard goes quivering, flutter-
ing and tugging at its halliards, to the top of the staff.
A wild cheer sweeps along the line of the Continental
Army of America. Cannon and muskets blaze and
bellow. Caps go whirling into the air.
Washington said, in a letter to Col. Joseph Reed,
his military secretary, written January 4, 1776, "On
the day which gave being to the new army — we hoisted
the Union flag in compliment to the United Colonies."
What is this Grand Union Flag*? How is it com-
posed? In the canton are the crosses of St. George
and St. Andrew, taken, with their blue field, straight
from the "meteor flag" of old England. But the
greater part of this new flag is contained in the thir-
teen alternate stripes of red and white, symbolic of
the thirteen leagued Colonies that stretch from New
Hampshire to Georgia. In years to come after this
January 1, 1776, historians will quibble over the ori-
gin of, or the inspiration that prompted, the thirteen
stripes. Some of them will point to the striped flag
of the East India Company, frequently seen in Ameri-
can waters. Others will produce the flag of the Phila-
delphia Light Horse, with its thirteen stripes of blue
and silver in the canton. What matters it who sug-
gested the design when Washington and his officers
..""iii::^v-
THE mW YORK
PUBLIC LIBRARY
Tl
ASTOR, LEN»X
LDEN FOUNDATIONS.
THE FORERUNNERS ii
conferred at headquarters? A flag with a meaning has
been fashioned.
From this snow-swathed hill near Boston, as this
flag comes rippling down at sunset, one can see the
shadowy dusk of evening brooding over hills and val-
leys and rivers. Throughout the coming night, will
blaze the eternal stars that ate to give superb beauty
to the stripes of red and white. The crimson glow of
sunset rests on the hill. It trembles on the white ridges
of the snow. With its last faint flare, the evening
star appears. Nature gives premonition of the great
world emblem of Liberty yet to come forth.
Ill
The Grand Union Flag of 1776
THE history of the Grand Union Flag from Janu-
ary, 1776, to June, 1777, is one of no little mys-
tery. There are but four episodes of the Revolution
during these eighteen months that stand forth as pre-
senting this flag figuring in historic scenes. One of
them is on land, two are on the sea, and one is on a
lake. There appears to have been some confusion in
the minds of historians and painters of this year and
a half in our history, as to the use of the Grand Union
Flag. John Trumbull, whose painting, "The Death
of Warren at the Battle of Bunker's Hill," we have
mentioned, was in the camp at Boston in 1775-76, at-
tached to Washington's Staff. He should have known
if the Grand Union Flag was carried into action dur-
ing the campaign around New York and, later, through
those swift and dramatic struggles at Trenton and
Princeton. But Trumbull, as he confessed, sought to
perpetuate the faces of the chief actors in the drama
of the Revolution, and had little concern for absolute
fidelity in painting his backgrounds. His "Bunker
Hill" and his "Declaration of Independence" are val-
uable only as groupings of portraits. They are of
little worth as presentations of the events as they must
have occurred.
12
THE GRAND UNION FLAG OF 177O 13
In TrumbulPs painting, "The Battle of Princeton,"
we have the Stars and Stripes prominently displayed,
although, as the artist knew, it was not adopted by
Congress as the national Flag until nearly six months
after the date of the battle. He was one of a group of
men who frequently included the Stars and Stripes in
their word-accounts or paintings of events that hap-
pened while the Grand Union Flag was the standard
of the Continental Army, before the Stars and Stripes
was ever thought of.
The only excuse for TrumbulPs peculiar anticipa-
tion of an historical truth, lies in his expressed wish
to depict men who were the champions of Liberty. He
placed them in groups that often defied the facts of
history, and accompanied them with certain signs and
symbols of the period. The Pine Tree Flag in his
'"Bunker Hill," and the captured British drum and
flags in his "Declaration of Independence," together
with his admitting the Stars and Stripes into his
* 'Princeton," are evidences of his carelessness. They
are permissible only under the excuse of his passionate
desire to hand over to posterity the faces and forms
of the men who gave us our country.
We take this opportunity to explain certain errors
made by other painters of the Revolution. The Stars
and Stripes is prominent in at least two well-known
paintings. It was the German Leutze who made the
crowning mistakes in his celebrated "Washington
Crossing the Delaware," a painting which, with Wil-
lard's "The Spirit of '76," has become classic. The
former of these two paintings fairly bristles with in-
accuracies. It is enough, for the second, to state that
14 THE DRAMATIC STORY OF OLD GLORY
the Flag revealed behind the three satisfactory figures
in the foreground is the Flag of '77 and not the Grand
Union Flag of '76; yet the combination of boy, men
and Flag is plausible, as Americans regard their Flag,
and properly, as the living symbol of the spirit of the
Declaration of Independence and our definite march
toward freedom.
Leutze, painting his picture on the banks of a Ger-
man river, where the cakes of floating ice gave him
his base of composition, worked in a mist of faulty
conception. George Washington was an athlete, but
it is doubtful if he could have stood in the prow of a
small boat in the heart of a howling storm that, ac-
cording to the records, threatened to throw men and
horses into the Delaware. The boat in this painting
is not the boat of the time and the occasion. The
costumes are not those of the Continental Army of
1776. The faces of the men are German and, 'tis a
horror to confess it, the countenance of the soldier
holding the Flag is said to be that of Frederick the
Great. The Stars and Stripes, on that wild night of
high adventure, was still to be designed in a room in
Philadelphia, thirty miles away.
It seems proper to make these corrections here, as
they naturally precede our stories of the Grand Union
Flag itself. In a way, they serve to accentuate the
lesson of a persistent error in putting down in the
black of type and the colors of the brush, a number of
curious misconceptions as to the true places of the
Grand Union Flag and the Stars and Stripes in history.
We are, at this stage in our book, on the threshold
of an era that puzzles and exasperates many a student
THE GRAND UNION FLAG OF 1776 15
of the Flag. It is a pleasure to be able to state, with
full confidence, that we have come upon certain records
of the Revolution, private journals, even sermons and
addresses, that serve to straighten out what has been
a rather crooked trail of investigation.
In March, 1776, Howe and his grenadiers left Bos-
ton, never to return. A detachment of the Continental
Army marched through the streets of the city, follow-
ing a Grand Union Flag borne by Ensign Richards.
An historian of the United States, who wrote nearly
one hundred years ago, said: "As the rearguard of
the enemy were leaving the city, Washington entered
it on the other side, with colours, now striped with
thirteen lists, floating proudly over his army, drums
beating and all the forms of victory and triumph."
It is of interest to note here that as the well-equipped,
splendidly uniformed regulars of stubborn George III,
officered by men who openly confessed a weakness
for the American cause, went sailing down Boston Har-
bor, they passed the Castle where, in 1791, an English
ship was to fire the first British salute in honor of the
Stars and Stripes. A more detailed account of this
salute will be found in a later page of this history.
Among the men who marched into Boston under the
Grand Union Flag were frontier riflemen who, on hear-
ing of Lexington and Concord almost a year before,
came through to the camp of the Continental Army
well-nigh at a dog-trot. With the Rhode Island troops
rode Greene, the blacksmith who had studied military
tactics at his forge. Later, he was to cross swords with
Cornwallis, Rawdon and Tarleton in the Carolinas.
Near him was his friend Henry Knox, the big, burly
i6 THE DRAMATIC STORY OF OLD GLORY
Boston bookseller who, during the past winter, had
dragged the captured cannon of Ticonderoga behind
eighty yoke of oxen, all the way from the Hudson to
the Charles, through the snow-mounded passes of the
Berkshires at Sheffield, and over the last stretch of the
old "Post Road," to plant them on Dorchester Heights
and discomfort Howe. As he rode by, Tory Mather
Byles hurled at him one of his awful puns, and re-
ceived a rapid verbal thrust in return. Impetuous
Putnam was there, with his fellow soldier from Con-
necticut, brave, faithful Knowlton, beloved of Wash-
ington, who was to fall at White Plains. Behind the
red and white stripes of the Grand Union Flag, on
that eventful March 17, 1776, were men who were
to rally beneath that greater, more perfect Flag to
come, the Stars and Stripes, and go down with it into
history as its creators and intrepid defenders.
Near the Old South Church, a mother and her little
son may have stood. Abigail, wife of John Adams,
could have come into town with the boy John Quincy
Adams, to witness the occupation by Washington's
army. On June 17, 1775, as she tells us in her letters,
from a hill in their home village they had watched the
smoke rolling up from Bunker Hill to the north. In
the decades to come, this boy, then in his ninth year,
was to be linked in history with the son of a Virginia
carpenter and mason, James Monroe, at that moment,
in his eighteenth year, busied with his books at college
in Virginia. They were to be the two Americans who
would father the Monroe Doctrine and warn the Im-
perial States of Europe that the Stars and Stripes
would not consent to the planting of any Old World
THE GRAND UNION FLAG OF 1776 17
flag on American soil without the permission of the
United States.
After the evacuation of Boston, the Grand Union
Flag and its field of action shifted to New York, New
Jersey and Pennsylvania. The Colonial fleet that
sailed from Philadelphia early in 1776 went to sea
under this flag. A letter written in Newburn, North
Carolina, Feb. 9, 1776, contained the following:
"By a gentleman from Philadelphia, we have received the
pleasing account of the actual sailing from that place of the
first American fleet that ever swelled their sails on the West-
ern Ocean.
"This fleet consists of five sail, fitted out from Philadel-
phia, which are to be joined at the capes of Virginia by two
more ships from Maryland, and is commanded by Admiral
Hopkins, a most experienced and venerable captain.
"They sailed from Philadelphia amidst the acclamations
of thousands assembled on the joyful occasion, under the dis-
play of a Union flag, with thirteen stripes in the field, em-
blematical of the thirteen United Colonies."
Esek Hopkins, of Rhode Island, sailed the fleet to
the West Indies and captured New Providence. In ad-
ditional verification of the statement that the Grand
Union Flag flew at his main-truck, we quote from a
letter from New Providence on May 13, 1776, by a
resident: "The colors of the American fleet were
striped under the Union, with thirteen strokes called
the Union Colonies," or, in other words, to repeat our
description, a flag of thirteen red and white stripes,
with the Union in the canton — the upper corner next
the staff when the flag is flying — showing the crosses
i8 THE DRAMATIC STORY OF OLD GLORY
of St. George and St. Andrew, representing England
and Scotland.
The dramatic story of the brig Nancy^ of Wilming-
ton, Delaware, enters at this point. She was com-
manded by Captain Hugh Montgomery, whose daugh-
ter Elizabeth published in 1851 a volume of reminis-
cences in which she claimed that the flag of the Nancy
was the Stars and Stripes, although the brig, after cruis-
ing in West Indian waters, was blown up on June 29,
1776, nearly a year before the adoption of the Stars
and Stripes as the national Flag. This error shows us
again how inaccuracies have crept into the story of the
flags used during the years of the Revolution.
Miss Montgomery amplified her claim with the ex-
traordinary statement that, while at St. Thomas in
the Spring of 1776, news of the signing of the Declar-
ation of Independence reached the officers of the
Nancy^ and was followed by an elaborate dinner ac-
companied by a daring display of the American flag
at masthead. This second claim spoiled the whole of
her narrative as an historical document. There have
been fugitive beliefs, in isolated quarters, that Betsy
Ross made a few sample flags of the famous design
of 1777, months before the time of the first appearance
of Old Glory, even ahead of the date of the Resolu-
tion in Congress that gave us our Flag. Miss Mont-
gomery probably was deceived by a tradition current
in her family, and undoubtedly was sincere in her claim
that Thomas Mendenhall, of the Nancy's crew, stitched
together a real Stars and Stripes from a design on paper
or from an oral description given by one who had seen
a premature edition of Old Glory. Of course, there
THE GRAND UNION FLAG OF 1776 19
is no basis in fact for Miss Montgomery's contention.
What may have happened is to be contained in the
suggestion that news of the adoption of the Grand
Union Flag, with a hint at independence from Great
Britain, traveled oversea to St. Thomas, and was
magnified in the passage. It must have been a Grand
Union Flag that young Mendenhall made. Even the
whole story is so cloudy that it merits oblivion, were
it not for its splendid finale in recorded history.
After a stirring escape from the West Indies, the
little Nancy pointed North for home waters. All went
well until the Delaware shores were reached. There,
surrounded by a British fleet, she was run ashore in an
effort to save arms and ammunition. But the English
were too active. A swarm of boats bearing armed
seamen swooped down upon her. For almost twelve
hours she. fought them off. All her rigging and spars
went by the board, shattered. Only the splintered
shaft of one mast remained. Her defenders decided to
blow her up, that the cargo might not be taken. A
fuse was laid to the store of powder. The captain and
four hands were the last to drop into a boat. And then
one of the four men, well named John Hancock,
chanced to glance up at the mast. He saw the Grand
Union Flag streaming defiantly in the wind. Without
a word, he leaped into the sea, swam to the Nancy,
climbed the shivering mast, unfastened the flag,
plunged into the waves with it, and swam ashore.
"Why did you do it?" he was asked. "To save the
beloved banner or perish in the attempt," was the
terse yet sufficient reply.
The picture of this man Hancock emerging from the
20 THE DRAMATIC STORY OF OLD GLORY
surf with the dripping flag in his arms, stands out in
sharp relief against the early and hazy history of the
flags of the Revolution. For here, as with Sergeant
Jasper at Fort Moultrie on the day before, June 28,
1776, there was an instant recognition of the meaning
of a flag as something much greater than merely being
a pretty thing of colored cloth. ''Beloved banner"
were the words of a plain man, uttered nearly a full
century before the day when the Flag became overnight
a thrilling Voice calling to men and women to surren-
der themselves in a passionate devotion of defense.
They call across the gulf of the years to the men of
1861 and 1918 who, wrapped in the eternal mantle
of the Stars and Stripes, entered the black silence of
Death without fear.
IV
Last Days of the Grand Union Flag
CONGRESS was In session In Philadelphia when
the Nancy went up in smoke and flame off Dela-
ware. Within a week of the day when the humble
sailor, John Hancock, dived into the sea with a flag
of red and white stripes around his waist, another and
more famous John Hancock took quill pen in hand and
affixed his name to the immortal Declaration that her-
alded a new Nation of thirteen States and foreshad-
owed a new Flag of as many stripes and glorified with
stars.
Shortly after the Declaration of Independence had
been signed in Philadelphia, the Continental Army,
then engaged in the campaign around New York, was
drawn up in line to hear the reading of the document.
There is no official record of a display of the Grand
Union Flag on this occasion, but it is reasonable to
believe that it was unfurled over the lines of men. A
number of illustrations of the event, by various ar-
tists, include the flag among the essentials of their
compositions.
One historical Inaccuracy persists In the majority
of these paintings and drawings, an error that first
found pictorial expression in the picturlngs of the Con-
tinental Army as assembled at Cambridge in 1775j
21
22 THE DRAMATIC STORY OF OLD GLORY
when Washington assumed command. We refer to
the habit of presenting an imposing array of bayonets
at the muzzles of the rows of muskets. It is doubt-
ful if one man in a hundred, in the Continental Army
before Monmouth, had a bayonet for his flint-lock. It
was one of Steuben's chief duties to inform the Ameri-
can soldier at Valley Forge that a bayonet had a pur-
pose more vital than the serving as a spit in the broil-
ing of steak. In connection with the need of accuracy
in regard to the history of the Flag, in this book, we
shall strive to correct incidental mistakes such as this
of the bayonet.
One finds a more satisfactory treasury of sketches
and paintings, even cartoons, that concern the story
of our flags, in the contemporary records of the Amer-
ican navy in the Revolution. From the very opening
of the war, our little armed fleet flung out ensigns
that were unmistakably of the Colonies and up-to-
date. An English print of Esek Hopkins shows him
with two flags in the background, one the Liberty and
Pine Tree Flag of New England, with the words "An
Appeal to Heaven" upon it, and the other the Rattle-
snake Flag of the South, with the snake twisting over
the thirteen stripes, but without the Union. Before
going into action, a ship always displayed its national
colors, and Englishmen had many opportunities to see
and copy in sketches, very rarely to take by hand, the
flags of the bold little American fleet. The designs
of these flags became current property in Europe.
It is with no small satisfaction that we turn to an
illustration in which the Grand Union Flag figures, a
mere water-color hastily executed, of the Royal Sav-
LAST DAYS OF GRAND UNION FLAG 23
age^ one of the ships that took part in Arnold's re-
markable fight on Lake Champlain in October, 1776.
The record of the Grand Union Flag in this battle
gives us one of the most dramatic flag-stories in Amer-
ican history.
In the Fall of 1776, England planned to split the
Colonies by a drive down the line of Lake Champlain
and the Hudson River. In anticipation of the threat-
ened invasion, Benedict Arnold was placed in charge
of the campaign of defense. He improvised and col-
lected a flotilla of fifteen small ships and boats, armed
with eighty-eight guns and manned by seven hundred
men, all under the Grand Union Flag. His two lead-
ing ships were the Royal Savage and the Congress,
The menace of this flotilla compelled the British to
prepare a fleet of twenty-five vessels, armed with
eighty-nine guns, and carrying a force of six hundred
and seventy picked men.
On October 11, Arnold assembled his fleet behind
Valcour Island, and was at once attacked by the Brit-
ish flotilla. The fight was sharp and deadly. The
Royal Savage^ flying the Grand Union Flag, became
unmanageable under fire and was run aground on the
island. During the night, she was burned by the Brit-
ish. Arnold, on the Congress, "pointed almost every
gun with his own hands and cheered on his men." The
flagship was struck seven times between wind and
water, and twelve times below the water-line. On the
Washington, Gen. Waterbury, who was in command,
was the only officer left alive. The New York lost all
her officers save Captain Lee.
After nightfall one of the most daring escapes in
24 THE DRAMATIC STORY OF OLD GLORY
American history was effected. One by one, with
shaded lanterns in their sterns, the broken remnants
of the little Continental fleet sailed right through the
British lines, unmolested. At dawn the astonished
Englishmen saw the masts of the American ships at
the upper reaches of Lake Champlain and, aided by a
favoring wind, came up with Arnold and resumed the
action. Again there was desperate fighting and a reck-
less defense, ending with the running of the wrecks
of the American fleet ashore and setting them afire with
colors flying. The finish was a sacrifice, with Arnold's
riflemen, posted behind rocks and trees, protecting with
their deadly fire the Grand Union Flag until "all was
consumed." These men, bent on keeping the flag
from falling into the hands of the enemy, stood by it
to the last minute. What a shame that Arnold, who
had led them so ably and heroically, should later prove
a traitor to his colors !
There are historians who assert that the fight at
Valcour Island saved the Colonies from destruction.
It put an abrupt stop to British attempts at invasion
until reenforcements could arrive and a new plan be
evolved. Gardner W. Allen, in his "A Naval History
of the American Revolution," has this illuminating
passage: "By the time the British had taken Crown
Point the season was far advanced. This fact and the
presence of a formidable American force deterred them
from at once attempting the capture of Ticonderoga.
They withdrew to Canada for the winter, and their
purpose of occupying the valley of the Hudson and
separating New England from the other states, was
put off. They returned the next year under Gen. Bur-
LAST DAYS OF GRAND UNION FLAG 25
goyne, but the opportunity had passed. Howe had
gone to Philadelphia, and Burgoyne, unsupported from
the south, was forced to surrender his army at Sara-
toga. The French alliance followed as a direct con-
sequence. The American naval supremacy on Lake
Champlain in the summer of 1776 had compelled the
British to spend precious time in building a fleet strong
enough to overcome it. The American defeat which
followed was a victory. The obstruction to the Brit-
ish advance and a year's delay saved the American
cause from almost certain ruin. It thus came about
through a singular instance of the irony of fate, not
altogether pleasant to contemplate, that we owe the
salvation of our country at a critical juncture to one
of the blackest traitors in history."
With the ashes of a Grand Union Flag falling into
the waters of Lake Champlain, the curtain is rung
down on the story of the immediate predecessor of the
Stars and Stripes. Three stray evidences of its active
part in the Revolution close our history of its career.
The water-color sketch of the Royal Savage^ found
among the papers of Gen. Schuyler, shows it stream-
ing in the wind over the stern of the ship. Ambrose
Searle, Confidential Secretary of Admiral Lord Howe
of the British Navy, in a letter written July 25, 1776,
spoke of the Grand Union Flag at New York as fol-
lows: "They have set up their standard in the fort
upon the southern end of the town. Their colours are
thirteen stripes of red and white, alternately, with the
English Union cantoned in the corner." The third
piece of evidence is a strip of Carolina paper currency
of the time of the Revolution, with this flag printed
26 THE DRAMATIC STORY OF OLD GLORY
upon it. Save for these three fragments and the his-
toric episodes already described, we have scarcely a
shred of evidence that supports any statement of the
Grand Union Flag^s appearance again as an emblem
of revolt. Its brief life was a romantic one. The men
who fought and died under it gave warrant that the
true Flag of the united Colonies knit together in a defi-
nite bond of independent States would not lack heroic
defenders.
Benjamin Franklin and the Stars and Stripes
WE are confronted with a most perplexing and
alluring problem when we attempt to discover
the sources of inspiration for the Stars and Stripes as
we see it to-day. Historians who approach the sub-
ject with confidence, come to conclusions that differ.
Some of them, of the school of Parson Weems, are em-
phatic in their belief that the coat-of-arms of the
Washington family, with its stars and horizontal
stripes, or bars, gave the idea of the design for the
Flag. This is a pretty conceit, that meets with a sharp
rebuff in the personality of the Father of his Country.
The man who fled precipitately from the room in In-
dependence Hall when John Adams proposed him as
Commiander-in-Chief of the Continental Army, would
have made impossible any effort to perpetuate his fam-
ily crest in his country's emblem. Washington said,
much to the point, "We take the stars from Heaven,
the red from our mother country, separating it by
white stripes, thus showing that we have separated
from her, and the white stripes shall go down to pos-
terity representing liberty."
It has been suggested, and the suggestion is seconded
by one or two investigators, that the Grand Union
Flag may have been formed by placing six white
27
28 THE DRAMATIC STORY OF OLD GLORY
strips of cloth across the red ensign of Great Britain.
This hint at the possible method of fashioning this
flag late in 1775, is strengthened by Washington's
poetic analysis of Old Glory, especially in his words,
"the red from our mother country, separating it by
white stripes." Two logical steps in procedure read-
ily come to mind. First, the spreading a red British
ensign, with its crosses in the Union, on a table and
laying six strips of white cloth across the red field, to
obtain the thirteen stripes, seven red and six white.
The result gives us the Grand Union Flag.
Now go over the months to the Spring of 1777, and
imagine a Committee in Philadelphia determined on
eliminating every trace of Great Britain and George
the Third from the Flag. As Endicott, in old Massa-
chusetts days, cut the cross from the English ensign,
deeming it an obnoxious ecclesiastical symbol, so, in
a milder mood, that apochryphal Committee — History
has hidden them behind her curtain — took shears in
hand and cut the Union from the Grand Union Flag,
with its crosses of St. George and St. Andrew.
Then, quite naturally, arose the question, "What
can we place in that significant corner of the Flag?
What device will typify the new United States?"
Some writers found in the constellation Lyra, the
Harp, which signifies harmony, the inspiration that
led the Committee to the stars. One of them, if our
memory is not askew, gives John Adams credit for
the suggestion. There is a measure of ingenuity in this
guess, for Lyra is near the zenith in June, the month of
the adoption of the Stars and Stripes.
Peleg D. Harrison contributes this paragraph on
FRANKLIN AND THE FLAG 29
the source of the stars: "The idea of the adoption of
the stars as a device for a national standard may have
originated in Boston, as the earliest known suggestion
of a star for an American ensign appeared in the Mass-
achusetts Spy of March 10, 1774, more than three
years prior to the establishment of the Stars and
Stripes. In a song written for the anniversary of the
Boston Massacre, March 5, 1770, the author gives
his poetic prophecy in these words:
*A ray of bright glory now beams from afar,
The American ensign now sparkles a star
Which shall shortly flame wide through the skies.' "
If we had been in the composing room of the Massa-
chusetts Spy during the first ten days of March, 1774,
those three lines would not have gotten by us without
a comma after the word "sparkles." The meaning of
the poet is plain. He used the word "star" as a meta-
phor; and it gave him a plausible rhyme for "afar."
Yet, when all's been said, we confess to a wonderment
as to what that rhymester was driving at, what he had
in mind, when he wrote those three lines a year and
more before Lexington and Concord. What was his
"American ensign"?
These theories do not seem at all sound. We are
about to exploit a new one, add another little chapter
to the story of the quest for the originator of the star-
hint. In "The Jumel Mansion," by William Henry
Shelton, is found this paragraph : "A curious piece of
chintz, made in France at this early period, its pattern
evidently inspired by Franklin, shows Washington
30 THE DRAMATIC STORY OF OLD GLORY
driving a pair of leopards to a chariot, in which Amer-
ica, an Indian maiden, is seated behind him, holding
a shield on which is the date 1776. In front of the
leopards are two Indians, one carrying a flag bearing
the Franklin device of the snake divided into thirteen
parts, and the other a flag of thirteen stripes. Pass-
ing in the opposite direction, beyond the chariot and
turning to fall in behind it, is the Philadelphia First
Troop, at its head a flag of thirteen stripes alongside
the French standard showing the fleur-de-lis. Above
this group and completing the pattern is Franklin him-
self, with the Goddess of Liberty, following the thir-
teen stars on a shield borne by Mercury up to Fame,
who is blowing two trumpets at the entrance to the
temple."
We go back over twenty years. In 1754, Benjamin
Franklin, in his effort to impress on the Colonies the
need of concerted action against the forays of the
French and Indians, published in the Pennsylvania
Gazette an engraving representing a rattlesnake curved
and severed into eight parts. The head was marked
"N. E.," for New England, and six of the remaining
sections bore the initials, "N. Y.," "N. J.," "P.,"
"M.," "V." and "N. C." The tail stood for South
Carolina and Georgia. The versatile Philadelphian,
according to Paul Leicester Ford, in his "The Many
Sided Franklin," "made diagrams and sketches to il-
lustrate and explain his writings. . . . Long after his
retirement from active printing, the Continental Con-
gress secured his aid in the designs of the currency.
. . . During the Stamp Act times he made a symboli-
cal print which had considerable vogue. While serv-
FRANKLIN AND THE FLAG 31
ing in the Continental Congress he was appointed a
member of the committee to prepare devices for a
great seal."
In Franklin's own writings we find that, during the
early wars of the eighteenth century, the women of
Philadelphia, "by subscription among themselves, pro-
vided silk colors which they presented to the compa-
nies, painted devices and mottoes, which I supplied."
There is in existence to-day a picture of a flag which
Franklin designed in the years before the Revolution.
There is a tradition, not accepted by historians as
authentic, that Congress' appointed a committee in
1775 to go to the camp at Boston and consult with
Washington in an attempt to decide upon a flag that
would meet the demands of the hour. On Sept. 30,
1775, Congress did select Benjamin Franklin, Benja-
min Harrison and Thomas Lynch, as their represen-
tatives, and this committee reached Cambridge near
the middle of October. They remained for conference
on war matters for nearly a week, and then returned
to Philadelphia. In their report to Congress, no men-
tion was made of a flag for the army.
We hold that Franklin was the man, when the per-
sonnel of the Continental Congress of 1776-77 is con-
sidered, to be most greatly interested in the movement
toward having a flag that should represent the United
States and their purpose. The incontrovertible facts
of his making "a symbolical print" during the Stamp
Act troubles, his service as a member of the Congres-
sional Committee appointed to ''prepare devices for a
great seal," and his supplying "devices and mottoes"
in connection with the making of early battle-flags,
32 THE DRAMATIC STORY OF OLD GLORY
to the women of Philadelphia, are enough to set him
apart as the man best equipped for the task of invent-
ing a flag interstate in its meaning.
We believe that the committee, of which Franklin
was the head, that conferred with Washington in the
camp near Boston in October, 1775, did discuss a new
flag, and did, at the time, decide upon the Grand Union
Flag as an opportune standard. And we go beyond
that statement of flag-creed, to the much more im-
portant expression of faith, that Benjamin Franklin
was the creator, or one of the creators, of the Stars
and Stripes. If one of a group, he was undoubtedly
the dominating figure.
Now see how beautifully this bit of Parisian chintz
fits into our argument. Franklin arrived in Paris, on
his mission to France, on Dec. 22, 1776. Sydney
George Fisher reminds us that "the French always be-
lieved that Franklin was the originator of the Revo-
lution." We know he carried Paris by storm, that a
perfect volume of elaborate prints was published re-
vealing him as a being on the slopes of Olympus, just
a few feet below the immortal Gods. Anything and
everything that had to do with Franklin's life as phi-
losopher, scientist, writer and statesman, was trans-
lated into the graphic formula of the copper-plate.
Franklin drawing lightning from Heaven; Franklin
rescuing America from destruction; Franklin hobnob-
bing with Jove; there was much illuminated apothe-
osis of the shrewd old Philadelphian.
Franklin invented the rattlesnake, cut into sections,
as a device typifying the Colonies sadly needing co-
hesion during the French and Indian wars. The Rat-
FRANKLIN AND THE FLAG 33
tlesnake Flag appears on this piece of chintz. Frank-
lin knew the composition of the flag of the Philadel-
phia Light Horse — it was from his home town — and
could describe it to Frenchmen. He must have done
so, or it never could have been included in this inter-
esting design we are studying. Did he go a step be-
yond that *? Were the thirteen stripes and the thir-
teen stars associated in his mind as the proper elements
for a flag yet to be sewed together *? Did he write
to Philadelphia, to friends in Congress, telling them
of his inspiration?
We conclude that this extremely interesting bit of
chintz with the date 1776 was made soon after Frank-
lin arrived in Paris, late in December, 1776, or in the
opening months of 1777. It was intended to extol him
as the "originator of the Revolution," the man who
wrested the thirteen Colonies from Great Britain. As
he surely gave its designer the scheme of the Rattle-
snake Flag and that of the flag of the Philadelphia
Light Horse, he may have hinted at the thirteen stars
and the thirteen stripes as appropriate parts to be com-
bined in a flag soon to be a reality.
Harrison, following Preble's lead, tells us in his
history of the Stars and Stripes that the Grand Union
Flag went across the Atlantic with Franklin. We
quote a paragraph: *The Continental Union flag was
first shown in European waters by the Reprisal^ Cap-
tain Lambert Wickes. She sailed from Philadelphia,
for France, in September, 1776, with Dr. Benjamin
Franklin, who had recently been appointed United
States minister at the court of France, on board as pas-
senger. While on the trip across she took several
34 THE DRAMATIC STORY OF OLD GLORY
prizes, which were disposed of in France, being the
first English captured ships to be carried to France
since the beginning of the war for American Independ-
ence."
So Franklin, on this voyage, had more than one
graphic picture of the Union Jack of Great Britain
fluttering against the sky near the Grand Union Flag
of the United States. His mission to France was to
impress Frenchmen with the full force of the fact that
the Colonies had severed all links that had bound them
to England. He must have recognized how utterly
out of place were the British crosses of St. George and
St. Andrew in the recognized American Flag that flew
from the mast above him. He had designed flags in
the years that had gone before. He may have seen
in his mind's eye a vision of Old Glory when the stars
of evening came out above the swaying topmasts of
the Reprisal.
VI
The Betsy Ross Tradition
BEFORE we emerge from the field of speculation
as to the origin of the Stars and Stripes, we must
get through the thicket of the Betsy Ross problem.
This last difficulty is not an easy one to face, for the
tradition of the making of our first complete national
Flag in old Arch Street, Philadelphia, has become al-
most a fetish with good Americans. There are count-
less thousands of men and women in the United States
who accept an historical narrative, especially if colored
with a hue of romance, without a moment's investiga-
tion into its merits as truth. The Betsy Ross story,
first given to the public in 1870, almost a century after
the event it is supposed to prove, has gone into book
after book as solid truth. Like the legend of the boy
George Washington and his hatchet, it is neat but sus-
picious.
Recently a perfectly sane man came into our office
and, with the air of one who had a real message to
unfold, told us that near his home in a city in West-
ern Massachusetts lived a niece of Betsy Ross. The
estimable woman, gifted with a keen memory, had a
fund of anecdotes of the life of the real Betsy, and
was accepted by her neighbors as a bona fide link with
a wonderful Past. Betsy Ross was born in 1752, one
35
36 THE DRAMATIC STORY OF OLD GLORY
hundred and sixty-seven years ago. We handed our
visitor a scrap of paper, on which was the result of a
little example in subtraction in terms of years. "How
old would your niece of Betsy Ross have to be, to have
memories of the living Betsy Ross^" we inquired. He
never had thought of that. Like many others, he had
accepted as fact what a few minutes of analytical
thought would have shown to be an impossibility.
We are not on the verge of an effort to demolish
the story of Betsy Ross and the making of the first
Stars and Stripes. The weight of the evidence appears
y to be in favor of this tradition of the making of the
^ original Old Glory. Were it not for the injudicious
claims of certain members of the Ross family, claims
utterly unnecessary and even dangerous to the life of
an episode accepted as fact, though fragile, we should
be inclined to set the whole matter down in this book
verbatim, in accord with the evidence as presented
by counsel for the defense.
The story, in brief, is as follows: According to at
least one historian, Betsy Ross made State colors for
ships before the Flag-Resolution of Congress, of June
14, 1777, determined the Stars and Stripes as the na-
tional standard. She was engaged in flag-making for
the Government after that date, and her daughter, Mrs.
Clarissa Wilson, to whom we owe much of the accepted
tradition, succeeded her in business and supplied ar-
senals, navy yards and the mercantile marine with flags
for years.
The main elements of the story are in the fragments
we now present. Betsy Ross was the widow of John
Ross who died from the effects of injuries received
THE BETSY ROSS TRADITION 37
while guarding cannon balls and military stores which
had been made by his uncle, George Ross, a signer of
the Declaration of Independence. She had embroi-
dered shirt ruffles for Washington in the days before
his appointment as Commander-in-Chief of the Army,
for she was famous for her work with the needle. It
was natural that Washington, with her uncle, George
Ross, and Robert Morris should go to her for the
making of a sample flag. These three men are sup-
posed to have formed the committee, authorized by
Congress or self-appointed, to "design a suitable flag
for the nation."
It is a pretty picture. We can imagine the three
men bowing graciously to the young widow, then in
her twenty-sixth year, and, after being seated, pre-
senting, in the hands of Washington, a rough drawing
of the proposed flag. The design shows stars with six
points, to which Mistress Betsy objects. She folds a
piece of paper and produces, with clips of her scissors,
a perfect five-pointed star. Washington redraws the
sketch, and the committee unanimously votes to give
her the commission to make the first true American
Flag.
As George Washington was not in Philadelphia at
any time during the first six months of 1777, it is a
real problem to fit him into this picture. We are to
find out, at once, how one man solves this problem
by getting a Stars and Stripes made by Betsy Ross at
some time in 1776, and thus making the great George
a possible actor in the little scene.
The claims of Mr. William J. Canby, a grandson
of Betsy Ross, assert that she made flags of the Stars
38 THE DRAMATIC STORY OF OLD GLORY
and Stripes pattern as early as June, 1776, when
Washington chanced to be in Philadelphia, and that
they were in common use soon after the Declaration of
Independence was signed. Mr. Canby was eleven years
old when Betsy Ross died in 1836, yet he waited until
1857 before crystallizing in writing her relations of
reminiscences of events associated with the Flag. That
gap of twenty-one years before the committal of his-
torical data to the stern rigidity of printed words, in-
jures the value of Mr. Canby 's interesting contribution
to the literature of the Flag.
Another argument against the possibility of the
Stars and Stripes being in use as early as June, 1776,
is found in the words of John Paul Jones, "The flag
and I are twins," uttered when he was told that his
appointment to the command of the Ranger was of the
same date as the Resolution in Congress, of June 14,
1777, that adopted the Stars and Stripes as the na-
tional emblem. Paul Jones loathed the Rattlesnake
Flag, frequently displayed on ships of our little navy
of 1776-77, and was precisely the man to seize upon
and run to a masthead such a glorious emblem as Old
Glory, were it in existence prior to June, 1777. You
may scrutinize all the records of the Revolution, Con-
gressional files, daily papers, prints, documents in
European museums and libraries; you will not find a
scrap of evidence the size of a ten-cent piece in sup-
port of the Canby theory. This claim is a distinct
drag on the progress of the Betsy Ross legend, for it
stresses an argument based on hearsay, oral transmis-
sion, when the truth we seek is that lodged in the writ-
ten or printed memorials of the period.
THE BETSY ROSS TRADITION 39
On June 14, 1777, the Continental Congress passed
the following Resolution :
Resolved, That the flag of the thirteen United States of
America be thirteen stripes, alternate red and white; that
the union be thirteen stars, white in a blue field, representing
a New Constellation.
With that date and that Resolution, began the his-
tory of the Stars and Stripes as a living symbol of
Nationality. There will be a few events associated
v/ith the early records .of the Flag, as we are to give
them, that will require careful attention, as they are
not presented clearly in other histories of the Flag,
or have been neglected. But we are out of the period
of extreme uncertainty that prevailed during the years
of the Continental standards of 1775 ^^^ 177^.
VII
Old Glory Floats Over a Field of Battle
THE affair at Fort Stanwix in the summer of
1777 gives us a singularly dramatic, even ro-
mantic, initial chapter in our history of the real Stars
and Stripes. A vivid flame of patriotism sprang spon-
taneously into glow in the midst of that garrison in
central New York, then the heart of the Northwest-
ern wilderness. It was fitting that the contributing
elements in the brief story of August 6, 1777, should
have been loyalty to country and heroic courage in the
face of seemingly inevitable disaster. The Stars and
Stripes literally blossomed forth suddenly on that day,
an unheralded sign of independence and a will to fight
to the sternest extremity.
Our main source of authority for the presence of
the Flag at Stanwix is "A Narrative of the Military
Actions of Colonel Marinus Willett," published in
1831. Secondary sources are, a journal of the siege
kept by a private soldier, a letter written by Captain
Abraham Swartwout, and at least one passage from
histories published during the first half of the nine-
teenth century. It is necessary, in covering a short
ground of preface, to state that in March, 1777, Wil-
lett led in a quick attack on the British at Peekskill,
a bayonet charge that drove the red-coats to their ships
40
OLD GLORY OVER BATTLEFIELD 41 j
on the Hudson. In the booty captured were "a few ]
blankets and cloaks." Now note the following: "A 1
blue cloak, taken here," as Willett tells us, "served i
afterwards to make the blue stripes of the flag which |
we hoisted during the siege of Fort Stanwix." The •
''blue stripes" is a slip of memory. We are to find the
correction in a later page of the Colonel's narrative.
There is reason to believe that, in distributing the \
booty, this blue cloak was given to Captain Abraham \
Swartwout. {
The narrative of the first appearance of our Flag iii
in battle demands consideration of the whole chain of ^
events connected with the investment and relief of 'v
Fort Stanwix. We shall use Colonel Willett's journal \
freely. As he reminds us in a sentence to follow, this
fort controlled the entire valley of the Mohawk. Situ- >
ated in a wilderness, described by British writers of the ' '
period as a network of ravines and dense forests and tl
thickets, it was the only barrier in the way of invasion
from Canada by way of Oswego and the river-valley.
Stanwix once in the hands of a hostile force approach- *'V
ing from the northwest to effect a union with Bur- \,c4
goyne coming down from the direct north to strike
the upper reaches of the Hudson at Albany, the result
meant the annihilation of the loyal militia of central ;
New York, the rallying of thousands of Indians under i
the standard of Great Britain, and the probable over-
throw of the Continental Army guarding the river-
approach to New York City. Stanwix, held and main- ;
tained as a base for American operations, would al- |
ways be a thorn in the flank of major British opera-
tions.
42 THE DRAMATIC STORY OF OLD GLORYi
In the spring of 1777, a few hundred men were sent
to Fort Stanwix, under Colonel Peter Gansevoorto
When warnings of a possible advance by the British
from Canada by way of Oswego began to come down
from New York, it was decided to reenforce the little
garrison and put the fort in condition to endure a
siege. No mistake was made in selecting Col. Marinus
Willett as the man to lead what appeared to be almost
a forlorn hope. Now for Willett's journal: "Upon
Col. Willett's arrival, the fort was in a weak and un-
tenable state. This fort, built where the village of
Rome now stands, was considered to be at that early
period the principal key to the whole of the Mohawk
country. It had been built by Gen. Stanwix, in the
year 1758. It was a square fort, with four bastions.
— But since the conclusion of the French war the fort
had fallen into decay ; the ditch was filled up, the pick-
ets had rotted and fallen down." Willett at once dis-
charged the engineer who had been in charge of repairs,
and set to work to strengthen the fort.
During July the first premonitions of the coming
storm began to appear. "Scouts of Indians, belonging
to the enemy, had been frequently discovered in the vi-
cinity of the fort." On July 3, three little girls were
outside the gates, picking blackberries. Two of them
were killed by the Indians, and the third, who escaped,
"had been shot through the shoulder; the wound
proved slight, and she soon recovered,
"On the last day of July, advice was received that
a number of batteaux loaded with ammunition and
provisions were on their way under a guard of two hun-
dred men. — These boats arrived about 5 o'clock P. M,,
OLD GLORY OVER BATTLEFIELD 43
on the second day of August. — The fort had never
been supplied with a flag. The necessity of having
one had, upon the arrival of the enemy, taxed the in-
vention of the garrison a little; and a decent one was
soon contrived. The white stripes were cut out of
ammunition shirts; the blue out of the camlet cloak
taken from the enemy at Peekskill; while the red
stripes were made of different pieces of stuff procured
from one and another of the garrison."
Permit us to interpolate a motion-picture of what
probably happened in the little story of the making
of that Flag. One account tells us that the two hun-
dred men who came up the Mohawk in boats brought
with them a printed description of the Stars and
Stripes as adopted by the Resolution of Congress of
June 14, 1777. This description had appeared in a
Pennsylvania paper. If ever a body of men needed
a banner under which to fight to the death, it was that
small garrison miles removed from military aid, cut
off, surrounded by British regulars, Hessians and
Indians commanded by St. Leger and Sir John John-
son. We find the audacious courage of Gansevoort
and Willett, and their men, voiced in the simple words
"The fort had never been supplied with a flag," and
in their determination to have one. One little acre of
Americanism would show its colors and defy an enemy
present in superior force to do his worst. So they
taxed their wits and scoured the fort for material from
which to fashion an impromptu American Flag, the first
Stars and Stripes to face a foe. Some woman's fingers,
or perhaps those of the little girl with the bullet-scar
in her shoulder, stitched together that crude Flag, with
44 THE DRAMATIC STORY OF OLD GLORY
the sunburned, lithe Continental officers and men look-
ing on, in sunlight or by the flare of flickering candles.
And Abraham Swartwout gave up his beautiful blue
British cloak to furnish the field for the stars. For-
tunately for us, to verify our pointing at Abraham as
the man, we have to-day his letter of August 29, 1778,
in which he reminds Col. Gansevoort that he had been
promised eight yards of broadcloth, to make good "my
blue cloak which was used for colors at Fort Schuyler,"
for so Stanwix was called in '78. Captain Abraham
Swartwout must have been as thrifty as he was pa-
triotic.
To return to the narrative from Willett's journal.
By the morning of August 4, the Indians had increased
to one thousand in number, and had completely en-
circled the fort. They commenced ''a brisk rifle-fire"
accompanied by "terrible yelling, which was continued
at intervals the greater part of the night." To meet
this force, greatly augmented by the British and Hes-
sians on hand, there were in Stanwix the five hundred
and fifty soldiers of Gansevoort and Willett, reenforced
by Lieut. Col. Mellon's two hundred men of Colonel
Weston's Massachusetts regiment of the Continental
line, who had brought in with them the word-picture
of the Stars and Stripes.
To the East of Stanwix, there was assembling a band
of men under lion-hearted Gen. Herkimer, determined
on marching to the relief of the fort. A messenger
from Herkimer got through the British lines during
the morning of August 6, with a letter bearing the date
August 5. Willett says, "Arrangements were imme-
diately made to effect a diversion in favour of Gen-
OLD GLORY OVER BATTLEFIELD 45
eral Herkimer by a sally upon the enemy's camp. Ac-
cordingly two hundred men were ordered on parade for
this purpose, and placed by Col. Gansevoort under the
command of Col. Willett; but a heavy shower of rain
coming up at that moment delayed the sally near an
hour.
"Gen. Herkimer, however, without waiting for the
signal from the fort, which was to notify him that his
express had been received, and that a sally had been
made, advanced prematurely." You know the sequel
in that terrific fight of the ambuscade at Oriskany,
where men fought hand-to-hand, with a howling tem-
pest of rain, thunder and lightning, swooping down
upon them. Herkimer was ahead of the time set for
his advance, and Gansevoort and Willett had delayed
their signal gun, which was to announce the sally from
the fort.
"As to the sally," continues Willett, "it was com-
pletely successful. As soon as the rain ceased. Col.
Willett lost not a moment in sallying forth from the
gate of the fort" with his two hundred men, one hun-
dred from New York and one hundred from Massa-
chusetts. "The camp of Sir John Johnson, and that
of the Indians, were taken." Seven wagons, stored
in the fort with horses, were three times loaded with
plunder. "Among other articles, they found five Brit-
ish flags. — Upon his return, the five flags, taken from
the enemy, were hoisted on the flag staff under the Con-
tinental flag; when all the troops in the garrison, hav-
ing mounted the parapets, gave as three hearty cheers
as, perhaps, were ever given by the same number of
men."
46 THE DRAMATIC STORY OF OLD GLORY
With those cheering men beneath the Old Glory of
Stanwix, stood a boy, Robert Wilson. When Com-
wallis surrendered at Yorktown, Ensign Wilson, of
Washington's army, was delegated to collect the cap-
tured flags, eighteen of them German Hessian, and
six of them British. In the four event-crowded years
from 1777 to 1781, that boy witnessed the drama of
the Stars and Stripes in the Revolution from that first
Act set in a little fort in a wilderness, to the final Act
at Yorktown when the curtain came down on the Red,
White and Blue aligned in triumph with the White
and Gold of France. There was much prophecy in
those five British flags "hoisted on the flag staff under
the Continental flag" at old Fort Stanwix.
All Americans of to-day who love their Flag should
never forget that picture seized from a vanished Past,
the Stars and Stripes fluttering in defiance against a
stormy sunset fringed with the dark deeps of a wild
forest, with seven hundred men cheering and looking
up at it from the parapets below. Two other forts,
to figure in the Nation's history to come, were to voice
the same brave, indomitable spirit: McHenry and
Sumter.
We close this chapter with three quotations. Ban-
croft, in his "History of the United States," says
"It was the first time that a captured banner had floated
under the Stars and Stripes of the republic."
A minor historian, writing early in the forties of the
last century, said
"Willett carried off many spoils, and raised a trophy under
the American flag floating over the wooden fort."
OLD GLORY OVER BATTLEFIELD 47
The diary kept by William Colbraith, a soldier of
Gansevoort's regiment, lately found in an old chest,
corroborates Willett's narrative. Colbraith says, defi-
nitely :
"Aug. 3. Early this A.M., a Continental flag was made
by the officers of Col. Gansevoort's regiment, was hoisted
and a cannon, levelled at the enemy's camp, was fired on
this occasion." — "Aug. 6. Four colours were also taken, and
immediately hoisted on our flag staff under the Continental
flag, as trophies of victory."
And so we have our first big dramatic picture in the
Story of Old Glory. The setting was admirable. The
old Mohawk trail, of which Stanwix was then the west-.
ern sentinel, was to become one of the highways that
led to the West and the Flag's vast Empire of con-
quest and settlement. All honor to the men who were,
in 1777, the wardens of the gate under a Stars and
Stripes made by their hands and defended with their
lives.
VIII
The Flag and the Soldier of the Revolution
WE have seen, in the story of the defense of Stan-
wix, that the American soldier of the time of
the Revolution had begun to comprehend the meaning
of the new Republic. He saw in the Flag "over the
comer of the fort nearest the enemy," something nmch
greater than pieces of red, white and blue cloth s^wed
together. When Col. Willett, referring to this Flag,
spoke of "the necessity of having one," he gave us the
keynote to the courage and the Americanism of the
men with him. Those regiments from New York and
Massachusetts, that defied St. Leger and his superior
force, knew that they were stationed at Stanwix not as
representatives of two Colonies recently become States,
but as a loyal part of the Continental Army of the
United States of America.
There are definite points in the orderly progress of
a nation's growth that may be called nodes. At these
points it is well to tie knots in the string of one's his-
tory. In our imaginary thread we fasten a tag to the
knot for August 6, 1777, and there is an Old Glory
pictured on this tag. We hope to acquaint thousands
of children with the story of Gansevoort and Willett
and their seven hundred men, for, if there is a calendar
48
THE FLAG AND THE SOLDIER 49
of great dates in the Story of the Flag, surely that day
in the summer of 1777 must not be overlooked.
We return to Stanwix. On the afternoon of Aug. 7,
1777, the day following the sally, the English sent a
white flag to the gate of the fort, and requested a con-
ference. Once more we take up Willett's narrative.
"Col. Butler, who commanded the Indians, with two
other officers, were conducted blindfolded into the fort
and received by Col. Gansevoort in his dining-room.
The windows of the room were shut, and candles were
lighted ; a table also was spread, covered with crackers,
cheese and wine. Three chairs, placed at one end of
the table, were occupied by Col. Butler and the two
other officers, who had come with him ; at the other end
Col. Gansevoort, Col. Mellon and Col. Willett were
seated. Seats were also placed around the table for
as many officers as could be accommodated, while the
rest of the room was nearly filled with the other offi-
cers of the garrison, indiscriminately; it being desirable
that the officers in general should be witnesses to all
that might take place."
A Major Ancrom, ''with a very grave, stiff air and a
countenance full of importance," rose and delivered
himself of a pompous speech, in the course of which he
said, "1 am directed to remind the commandant that
the defeat of Gen. Herkimer must deprive the garrison
of all hopes of relief, especially as Gen. Burgoyne is
now in Albany; so that, sooner or later, the fort must
fall into our hands. — Should the present terms be re-
jected, it will be out of the power of the Colonel to
restrain the Indians, who are very numerous and much
exasperated, not only from plundering the property,
so THE DRAMATIC STORY OF OLD GLORY
but destroying the lives of, probably, the greater part
of the garrison."
Major Ancrom lied when he said that Burgoyne was
in Albany. But Gansevoort and Willett did not know
that the British army of invasion was still many miles
from the upper waters of the Hudson. What they
did know was the temper of the Indians, who had lost
many warriors and not a few chiefs in the fighting at
Oriskany and around Stanwix. They realized that,
in all probability, the surrender of the fort meant as
many scalps carried off in fiendish triumph as there
were men and women within the shelter of the para-
pets. The splendid phase of their defense was their
profound sense of the importance of the fort to the
United States, their revealed feeling that it was Amer-
ican soil under an American Flag, and that they were
there to defend it to the last gasp of the last man.
Gansevoort nodded to Willett. The latter rose
from his chair and, "looking the important Major full
in the face," replied, "You have made a long speech
which, stript of all its superfluities, amounts to this,
that you come from a British Colonel, to the com-
mandant of this garrison, to tell him that if he does not
deliver up the garrison into the hands of your Colonel,
he will send his Indians to murder our women and
children. We are doing our duty and this garrison
is committed to our charge, and we will take care of
it. After you get out of it, you may turn round to
look at its outside, but never expect to come in again,
unless you come a prisoner." The room rang with a
volley of applause.
The history of the siege and the relief of Fort Stan-
THE FLAG AND THE SOLDIER 51
wix finds place in few books. It is unknown in most
schoolrooms in the United States where the nation's
history is taught. We suspect that the reader will
wish to share with us the story of the result of this
heroic defense. The British, with their Hessian and
Indian allies, settled down to starve the garrison into
submission, and began to dig trenches that zigzagged
toward the fort, preparatory to an assault. Something
had to be done, and that quickly. At ten o'clock on
the night of August 10, Willett and a Major Stock-
well slipped from the gate and crawled through the
British lines. When they reached the river, they
crossed on a log, and were then enveloped in black
darkness in a swampy wood. There is a quaint sim-
plicity in Willett's narrative at this point: "Placing
themselves against a large tree, they stood perfectly
quiet several hours. At length, perceiving the morning
star, they again set out." They actually got through
the wilderness to General Schuyler, and had the satis-
faction of witnessing Learned's Massachusetts Bri-
gade, with the First New York Regiment, under way
for Stanwix.
England was not slow to recognize Willett's exploit.
The British Annual Register for 1777 contained the
following: "Col. Willett afterwards (after the sally)
undertook, in company with another officer, a much
more perilous expedition. They passed by night
through the besieger's works, and in contempt of the
danger and cruelty of the savages, made their way for
fifty miles through pathless woods and unexplored
morasses, in order to raise the country and bring re-
52 THE DRAMATIC STORY OF OLD GLORY
lief to the fort. Such an action demands the praise
even of an enemy."
While Willett and Stockwell were in the deeps of
the wilderness, the British sent into Stanwix another
officer under a white flag, to demand its surrender.
Gansevoort's reply was terse and intensely American:
"It is my determined resolution, with the force under
my command, to defend this fort to the last extrem-
ity, in behalf of the United States, who have placed
me here to defend it against all their enemies."
On August 23, 1777, the vanguard of the little
army of relief appeared. Colbraith's diary tells us
that this force numbered "near one thousand men,"
and that there was "a discharge of all the cannon from
the bastions, amounting in the whole to thirteen."
Rather significant that volley from thirteen guns, in
truth a national salute to the unconquered Old Glory
that waved over the northeast bastion. But even the
echoes reached no enemy. Word of the coming relief
had filtered through to St. Leger's force and, one and
all, they had decamped in haste. Once more a pas-
sage from the British Annual Register for 1777:
"Nothing could have been more untoward in the pres-
ent condition of affairs, than the unfortunate issue of
this expedition."
Stanwix was a portent. Some chord of brotherhood
as men partners in one Nation found its dominant in
that Flag over "the comer nearest the enemy." Ganse-
voort's resolution "to defend this fort to the last ex-
tremity, in behalf of the United States," gives us all
the text we require when we seek to ascertain the spirit
of the American soldier at Stanwix. He was American
THE FLAG AND THE SOLDIER 53
to the core. He seized upon and made vivid the cen-
tral idea of this Nation,— Independence resolutely
maintained beneath the Stars and Stripes, itself a per-
fect figure of Democracy.
IX
A Few Flag Problems
ON May lo, 1779, Richard Peters wrote a letter
to General Washington from the War Office in
Philadelphia. Here is the portion of this letter that
interests us:
"As to Colours we have refused them for Another Reason.
The Baron Steuben mentioned when he was here that he would
settle with your Excellency some Plan as to the Colours.
It was intended that every Regiment should have two Colours
— one the Standard of the United States which should be the
same throughout the Army, and the other a Regimental
Colours which vary according to the facings of the Regiments.
But it is not yet settled what is the Standard of the United
States. If your Excellency will therefore favor us with your
Opinion on the Subject, we will report to Congress on the
Subject and request them to establish a Standard, and so
soon as this is done we will endeavor to get Materials and
order a Number made sufficient for the Army."
That letter was written in Philadelphia nearly two
years after the Flag was adopted in June, 1777, and
from a place within a few feet of the Hall of the
adoption. The sentence, "But it is not yet settled
what is the Standard of the United States," has stag-
gered more than one student of the history of the Flag.
One man does not attempt to explain it. Another
54
A FEW FLAG PROBLEMS 55
gasps and stares at it, and then stammers out something
about the vast ignorance of Peters.
There is much comfort in the words, "one the Stand-
ard of the United States which should be the same
throughout the Army." We do not accept the expla-
nation of men who are inclined to believe that the
Flag-Resolution of June 14, 1777, since it was one
with a group of four Resolutions all referring to the
American Navy, standing second in the five, aimed
at supplying a national ensign for the little American
fleet and not one for the Continental Army. That is
a pure dodging the problem. The Stars and Stripes
had been appropriated by the Continental Army as its
peculiar Flag, but there were sections of the territory
of war where the Colonial standards still waved un-
challenged in 1779; witness the flags of Savannah,
Pulaski's Banner, and the Eutaw Flag of Col. William
Washington's Horse. Richard Peters was right. There
was not, in 1779, a general recognition of the Stars
and Stripes as the only battle-flag for Americans from
New Hampshire to Georgia. But his letter in no mea-
sure disproves the statement that the heart of the Cause,
the little group of officers and men of the Continental
Army around George Washington, held allegiance to
but one standard, the Stars and Stripes.
Sergeant William Jasper and his flags of Fort Sul-
livan, afterwards Fort Moultrie, and Savannah, come
to mind as a good opening for a discussion of the con-
fusion that clouds the records of the several Colonial
and State battle-flags of the Revolution. This man
figured in two stirring scenes that had flags for their
motives. It was natural that in the first of the two.
56 THE DRAMATIC STORY OF OLD GLORY
that of Fort Moultrie on June 28, 1776, the Palmetto
Flag of the Carolinas should go through an experience
that caused it to go down in history as famous.
There is an interesting little side note to be brought
in here. The American people, willing to be fooled
in a good cause, recently accepted a calendar pub-
lished by a prominent Insurance Company, on which
Jasper appeared struggling up the redoubt at Moul-
trie with a Stars and Stripes in his arms. The artist
knew the facts and, in his original sketch, showed the
Palmetto Flag. "We must have Old Glory, no mat-
ter what the truth," said the officials of the Company;
thus following in the trail of John Trumbull.
Even the printed accounts of Jasper's heroism, given
in histories, clash in their conclusions. In the manu-
script, "Life of Brigadier General Peter Horry," oc-
curs this story of this man and his flag at Moultrie:
"Above my gun, on the rampart, was a large American
flag hung on a very high mast, formerly of a ship ; the
men-of-war directing their fire thereat, it was, from
their shot so wounded as to fall, with the colors, over
the fort. Sergeant Jasper of the Grenadiers leapt over
the rampart, and deliberately walked the whole length
of the fort, until he came to the colors on the extrem-
ity of the left, when he cut the same from the mast,
and called to me for a sponge staff, and with a thick
cord tied on the colors and stuck the staff on the ram-
part in the sand."
Jasper was offered "a lieutenant's commission, but
as he could neither read nor write, he modestly re-
fused to accept it, saying T am not fit to keep officers'
company, being only a Sergeant.' "
A FEW FLAG PROBLEMS 57
We now go on to Jasper's second and final act of
daring under a flag. In the assault on Savannah, Oct.
9, 1779, an attack as disastrous to the Americans and
the French as was Bunker Hill to the British, two silk
flags, one red and the other blue, made by the wife of
Major Bernard Elliot, and presented by her to Moul-
trie's Regiment, were carried into action beside the
Lilies of France. William Gilmore Simms tells us,
in his "The Life of Francis Marion," that one of them
"was borne by Lieutenant Bush, supported by Sergeant
Jasper; the other by Lieutenant Gray, supported by
Sergeant McDonald. Bush being slightly wounded
early in the action, delivered his standard to Jasper,
for better security. Jasper a second time, and now
fatally wounded, restored it to the former. But at the
moment of taking it, Bush received a mortal wound.
He fell into the ditch with his ensign under him, and
it remained in possession of the enemy."
After reading the above, written nearly eighty years
ago by a man who had the facts at first hand, how are
we to account for this circumstantial statement of a
modern historian, "Jasper, wounded and dying as he
was, seized the colors, and succeeded in saving them
from falling into the hands of the British. He was
carried to camp, and died soon after. Just before he
expired, he said to Major Elliot, Tell Mrs. Elliot I
lost my life supporting the colors she gave to our regi-
ment.' "
A Hessian ofRcer, writing of the surrender of Bur-
goyne's army at Saratoga, in 1777, said in his letter,
in speaking of the American Army drawn up in line,
"There were regular regiments, also, which for want
58 THE DRAMATIC STORY OF OLD GLORY
of time and cloth, were not yet equipped in uniform.
These had standards with various emblems and mot-
toes." The Hessian officer was right. There were
''standards with various emblems and mottoes."
Horry says the flag of Fort Moultrie was "a large
American flag," although we know it was a Palmetto
Flag, blue with a white crescent moon in the corner
where the canton usually appears and, as some au-
thorities assert, having the word "Liberty" upon it in
large letters. What were the flags of red and blue
of the assault on Savannah? Were certain of the
thirteen States in the habit of designating their own
special standards as "American"?
We believe that the Stars and Stripes was adopted
in 1777, as the standard of the Continental Army, and
that there were many minor banners carried into ac-
tion by troops that fought in areas removed from the
fields of campaign of that Continental Army under
Washington. Col. William Washington followed a
crimson damask flag made by the girl of his heart; and
this flag, still in existence, flew over the fields of the
Cowpens and Eutaw. It is now known as the Eutaw
Flag. Pulaski, who fell with Jasper on the slopes at
Savannah, had for his particular flag the famous Pu-
laski Banner, made for him by the Moravian nuns at
Bethlehem, Pa. Longfellow's poem, "Hymn of the
Moravian Nuns at the Consecration of Pulaski's
Banner," was inspired by this flag, which is still in-
tact. A flag taken by the Hessians at Long Island,
on Aug. 27, 1776, was deep red in color, with the
word "Liberty" upon it. An English print of the
action of Oct. 28, 1776, shows the Americans bearing
A FEW FLAG PROBLEMS 59
a flag with a white field, "In which is a crossed sword
and staff, the latter surmounted by a liberty cap ; above
the design is Patrick Henry's motto, 'Liberty or
Death.' " Jasper and his fellow color-bearers at Sa-
vannah carried red and blue silk flags. Truly it is a
case of "confusion worse confounded."
There were two men in the group of Washington's
generals who knew what flags meant, who must have
been not a little perplexed at the multiplicity of Amer-
ican banners. Steuben was one and Lafayette was the
other. Richard Peters, in his letter of May 10, 1779,
quoted at the opening of this chapter, referred to Steu-
ben's purpose to settle with Washington "some plan
as to the Colours." Lafayette was on the field at
Brandywine, very much so in fact, as he was wounded
during the battle. He must have been in the camp
of the Continental Army on the night before the ac-
tion. And now we have a ray of light. At twilight of
Sept. 10, 1777, a few hours before the Brandywine,
the Rev. Joab Trout preached a sermon "in the pres-
ence of the American soldiery. General Washington,
General Wayne, and the other officers." That sermon
was found a few years ago, in manuscript form, and
we quote from it: "It is a solemn moment, brethren.
Does not the solemn voice of nature seem to echo the
sympathies of the hour? The flag of our country
droops heavily from yonder staff."
Here is proof, final, conclusive, that an American
Flag flew over the camp of the Continental Army on
the evening before Brandywine. No man would say,
"The flag of our country," in September, 1777, and
have a Grand Union Flag, or a Pine Tree Flag, or a
6o THE DRAMATIC STORY OF OLD GLORY
Rattlesnake Flag, in full sight. And if the Flag was
displayed on a staff within a few hours of battle, we
may rest assured that it was not absent when its Army
received the shock of the attack of Cornwallis. The
boy Lafayette would have been one to see that Old
Glory went under fire.
Brandy wine was followed, in a few weeks, by the
overthrow of Burgoyne at Saratoga. George Canby,
in his 'The Evolution of the American Flag," says,
"There seems no doubt that the flag was used at the
surrender of Burgoyne, October 17, 1777, as Trum-
bull's painting of the surrender shows an American
Flag with the stars in a circle."
This turning to Trumbull for proof of the presence
of Old Glory at Princeton and Saratoga must be put
an end to, and summarily. John Trumbull went to
England in 1784 to study painting, and was a pupil
of Benjamin West. He fell under the influence of the
latter's method of work. His "Bunker Hill," painted in
West's studio, was modeled closely on West's "Death
of Wolfe." Now we will see what English historians
think of the "Death of Wolfe." Robert Wright, in
his "Life of Wolfe," informs us that "Monckton,
Barre, and other persons portrayed in the group around
Wolfe were not on the spot. Monckton had been shot
through the lung. Barre had been blinded, and Sur-
geon Adair, who is represented in attendance, was then
at Crown Point. West wished Gen. Murray to figure
in the picture, but the honest Scot refused, saying, 'No !
No! I was not by. I was leading the left.' West's
notions of artistic truth did not go beyond dress."
John Trumbull was completely under the spell of
A FEW FLAG PROBLEMS 61
Benjamin West's mode of composition. He ignored
all the facts of the battle of Bunker Hill, in his paint-
ing, and he knew very well what they were, in group-
ing over a dozen prominent Englishmen and Ameri-
cans in a small comer of the field, when they were in
reality scattered over the ground of action. And he
introduced the two flags to give a finishing touch. He
makes a damaging confession, in the catalogue of his
works in the Yale University Collection, when he says,
of his later painting, "The Declaration of Independ-
ence" : "The Artist also took the liberty of embellish-
ing the background by suspending upon the wall mili-
tary flags and trophies." We have good reason to
fear that he "took the liberty of embellishing" his
paintings, "The Battle of Princeton" and "The Sur-
render of the British to the American Forces at Sara-
toga," with the Stars and Stripes, although he knew
that the Flag was not present on the former occasion.
Of course, Trumbull's picture of Burgoyne's surren-
der is not to be accepted as a proof that Old Glory was
present at Saratoga.
Alexander Anderson, who made the original wood-
cuts for Weems' "General Washington," followed the
lead of Trumbull. He surely knew the early history
of the Stars and Stripes, for he was born in 1775, and
his name is identified with one incident recorded later
in this book. Yet Anderson, regarding the Flag as a
symbol of the spirit of the Revolution, deliberately
gave it a prominent place in his cut of the Battle of
Bunker Hill. We are compelled to reject practically
all paintings, sketches and wood-cuts that illustrate
the Revolution, made by men of the period, as true
62 THE DRAMATIC STORY OF OLD GLORY
presentations of the events portrayed. Their values
are in their curious disregard of the truth, their at-
tempts at symbolism, and their portraits of the leading
men of the age. It is strange that almost all his-
torians of the Flag go to Trumbull for their argument
for the presence of the Stars and Stripes at Saratoga,
and never consider his method of composition and his
statements of purpose as given in his autobiography.
The Stars and Stripes on the Sea
WE are now to come out of the fog which veils
so much of the story of Old Glory on land
during the Revolution, into the clear sunlight of its
life on the ocean. The story of our Navy of the Revo-
lution is precise in its references to the Stars and
Stripes. There were two events of the early months
of 1778 that bring the Flag out in bold relief: one the
capture of New Providence, and the other the fight
between the Randolph and the Yarmouth, American
privateers and small ships of war frequently swooped
down on the English possessions to the southeast of
Florida, and the Flag was not a stranger to the twist-
ing channels of the network of Carib islands. Here,
at last, we find dramatic evidence of the appearance
of Old Glory in the midst of a romantic scenery, pitted
against the Union Jack of Great Britain.
Under cover of darkness, on the night of January
27, 1778, Captain John P. Rathburne crept up to the
island of New Providence in his brig, quite appro-
priately named the Providence. This little vessel car-
ried but twelve four-pounders, but was already famous
as the first command of Paul Jones in 1776, the one
in which he won a reputation for daring seamanship.
When Rathburne had come close to the island, he an-
63
64 THE DRAMATIC STORY OF OLD GLORY
chored, left half his crew, twenty-five men, on board,
and then went ashore with the rest in boats. Events
followed in a rush. Thirty American prisoners,
aroused from their sleep, were set free, and the entire
force of but little over fifty men carried Fort Nassau
by storm.
At dawn the astonished inhabitants of the island, all
good Englishmen, were alarmed at the sight of a
strange Flag flying over Fort Nassau. To cap the cli-
max of this audacious flaunting of a hostile ensign,
Rathburne and his men appropriated all the ammuni-
tion they could lay hands on, together with three hun-
dred muskets, and then, in the broad daylight of the
morning of the 28th, captured an armed vessel of
sixteen guns, with five merchantmen, in the harbor.
The situation suddenly became hot for the Stars
and Stripes and its bold followers. On the 29th, at
three P. M., five hundred men with artillery marched
into sight. A messenger under a white flag called on
Rathburne and ordered him to surrender the fort or be
killed with all his men. Rathburne's reply was brief
and emphatic. He nailed the Stars and Stripes to the
flag-staff and told the messenger to report that he
would hold Fort Nassau until not one of his men was
left alive.
Of course it was impossible to stay, beleaguered and
cut off from all assistance. The guns of Fort Nassau
were spiked, and the whole American force embarked
and put to sea, carrying with them valuable munitions
of war. Two of the prizes were burned, and the re-
maining four were brought home in triumph to the
United States. Rathburne, outnumbered ten to one,
STARS AND STRIPES ON THE SEA 65
held an enemy's fort for two days, and kept the Stars
and Stripes flying over English soil for that period.
No chronology of the Flag's history can omit this brief
account of its floating at the top of a staff where for
years the red ensign of Great Britain had streamed
unchallenged.
On March 7, 1778, "Nick" Riddle of Philadelphia,
of whom it was said that "Liberty never had a more
intrepid defender," was off the Barbadoes in the thir-
ty-two-gun frigate Randolph^ accompanied by four
South Carolina cruisers. Late in the afternoon the
English sixty-four-gun ship-of-the-line Yarmouth came
in sight and bore down on the little fleet. Riddle,
knowing that his cruisers would be battered to pieces
by the guns of the Englishman, signaled them to make
all sail and escape. The Yarmouth overhauled the
Randolph and came up on the weather quarter.
Riddle, with his thirty-two guns, deliberately accepted
battle with a foeman of sixty-four guns.
Captain Nicholas Vincent was in command of the
Yarmouth, We have to go to his report, in the Rrit-
ish Records, for our account of the fight. The Yar-
mouth hoisted her colors and bade the Randolph show
her ensign. Riddle at once ran up the Stars and Stripes
and poured a broadside into the Yarmouth. For nearly
an hour the two ships sailed side by side, exchanging
volleys. Then, with a roar, the Randolph blew up.
Vincent says, "The two ships were so near each other
at the time that many fragments of the wreck struck
the Yarmouth, and among other things, an American
ensign, rolled up, was blown upon her forecastle. This
flag was not even singed."
66 THE DRAMATIC STORY OF OLD GLORY
"Nick" Biddle carried a Stars and Stripes ready to
run up to the masthead if the one already there was
shot away. Captain Vincent recognized the daring of
his adversary, and added this noble note to his report:
"The temerity of Captain Biddle in thus engaging a
ship so much superior to his own deserved a better
fate."
The Randolph went up in smoke and flame. It was
symbolic of the American spirit of the Revolution, that
her splendid Flag, Old Glory, should invade the deck
of the British Yarmouth as a warning that fire and
water can never destroy the soul of America.
XI
The Stars and Stripes and Paul Jones
ON a clear, cold morning late in December, 1775?
or early in January, 1776, Commodore Esek
Hopkins, with his Staff officers, was rowed in a barge
from the foot of Walnut Street, Philadelphia, to the
flag-ship Alfred^ lying in the Delaware. After certain
ceremonies, Lieut. John Paul Jones seized the end
of the halliards and raised to the masthead a yellow
silk flag with a rattlesnake, and possibly a pine-tree,
upon it, and bearing the words "Don't tread on me."
Paul Jones was also the first man to raise the Stars
and Stripes to the masthead of an American ship of
war. His record from 1777 to 1779 is the most drama-
tic one in the long list of naval heroes that have made
our Flag famous the world over; and the Flag seems
to be the inspiration of every chapter, well-nigh of
every page, of his remarkable story of daring and
adventure.
You will remember that on June 14, 1777, Congress
passed the following Resolution:
Resolved^ That the flag of the thirteen United States of
America be thirteen stripes, alternate red and white; that the
union be thirteen stars, white in a blue field, representing A
New Constellation.
67
68 THE DRAMATIC STORY OF OLD GLORY;
Within a few minutes after that Resolution was
passed, the following also went on record :
Resolved^ That Captain John Paul Jones be appointed to
command the ship Ranger*
When Paul Jones read those Resolutions, he is re- j
ported to have said tersely, "The Flag and I are twins." ^
He loved it, he fought like a demon under it, he im- ;
parted to his men a realization of its beauty and its \
meaning.
That Paul Jones unfurled Old Glory on the Ranger \
at Portsmouth, N. H., in July or August, 1777, is cer- I
tain. We find the proof in his own journal, given in ,
the third person: "Jones was appointed to com- j
mand the Ranger^ on board of which he hoisted the 1
national flag for the first time it was displayed on a ;
man of war." There has been some controversy over j
minor elements of the event as recorded in tradition,
and it is wise to be cautious in accepting the versions j
of a number of imaginative writers. The Ranger was
being finished and equipped at Portsmouth. A few \
of the young ladies of the town knew the design of the
new Flag and decided to make one for Paul Jones and
his ship. As legend has it, very prettily, "Slices of
their best silk gowns" went into the making of this \
Flag. When it was finished, Jones journeyed from
Boston to Portsmouth, to receive and display it on the 1
Ranger.
That this significant event occurred on July 4, 1777, j
exactly one year after the signing of the Declaration j
of Independence, as some writers assert, is doubtful. ;
STARS AND STRIPES— PAUL JONES 69
Three weeks was rather a short time, in those days,
to get the description of the Flag from Philadelphia to
Portsmouth and have the complete ensign ready for
unfurling on July 4.
It is enough for us to believe that on a summer day
in 1777, a group of young women of a town in New
Hampshire came down to the shore bearing a large
and beautiful Flag, their gift to Captain John Paul
Jones of the Ranger. A company of towns-people
and sailors, with the gallant Captain and the patriotic
girls in the center, gathered on the deck of the ship,
and Paul Jones with his own hands hoisted Old Glory
to the top of the mast.
That scene was the starting-point for a series of his-
toric episodes in the story of the American Flag. The
Stars and Stripes of Portsmouth town was destined
to set the pace, and a swift and glorious one at that,
for many other American naval ensigns to follow. It
was the first Old Glory on the sea, and it made for
itself a record that has never been surpassed and
probably never will be equaled.
It is not out of place here to give a fragment of the
story of the Ranger herself, the first battleship to
fly the Stars and Stripes, and to copy a few lines from
old records of her memorable voyage across the At-
lantic in the late months of 1777. She was American
from top-mast to keel. Even a number of her guns
were cast in this country. She was one of the first
American ships to be coppered, and she was longer
by six feet than any other ship of her class of the
day. She could "run like a hound" going free, but
was decidedly cranky in work to windward. Jones
70 THE DRAMATIC STORY OF OLD GLORY
realized that she was top-heavy, but defied sea and
storm by adding to her armament and raising her cen-
ter of weight.
That voyage across the Atlantic that commenced on
Nov. 1, 1777, was "terrific," according to Lieutenant
Hall, who said, more in detail, "I had never seen a ship
crowded as Captain Jones drove the Ranger. Imagine
the situation of the crew, with a top-heavy and crank
ship under their feet, and a commander who day
and night insisted on every rag she could stagger un-
der without laying clear down." Jones was carry-
ing to France the news of Saratoga, and weather was
not to hinder his ship.
Among the poems written during the Revolution
is one that authorities claim "shows internal evidence
that indicates it was composed by a member of the
Ranger's crew." There was a boy, Charley Hill, on
the ship, who amused himself and his comrades by
writing and reciting poems on patriotic subjects. One
of them, on the surrender of Burgoyne, was received
with especial delight. Young Hill may have been
the author of "The Yankee Man of War," of which
the following is the opening stanza:
" 'Tis of a gallant Yankee ship that flew the stripes and stars,
And the whistling wind from the west-nor-west blew through
the pitch-pine spars.
With her starboard tacks aboard, my boys, she hung upon
the gale;
On an autumn night we raised the light on the old head of
Kinsale."
That is a stirring picture of the Ranger with her
Flag of the girls of Portsmouth town snapping in the
STARS AND STRIPES— PAUL JONES 71
wind, crossing the very stretch of sea off Kinsale where,
years later, the Lusitania was to go down, and, in the
dying cries of her women and children, call on Old
Glory for justice.
Paul Jones carried the Stars and Stripes straight
across the stormy Atlantic to the shores of Europe.
If we Americans ever build a Hall of Flags in Wash-
ington, as has been suggested, to commemorate great
events in the history of Old Glory, he must have a
commanding niche in the shrine at the heart of that
Hall.
XII
The Flag and the Poets of the Revolution
THE poetry of the sea written by Americans dur-
ing the Revolution, quite frequently mentions
the Flag, and always in a manner, after 1777, that in-
dicates the Stars and Stripes as the ensign of the Navy.
As Paul Jones was the inspiration of more than one
line of verse, we introduce this brief chapter on the
Flag and the poets of the period, at this stage in our
book. There is reason to believe that the phrase
"stripes and stars," found in the first line of "The
Yankee Man of War" and quoted in the preceding
chapter, was the first use, in an inverted form, of the
now famous, popular title for the Flag, in history.
One of the earliest poems in which Paul Jones fig-
ured was written by an unknown writer. We give a
stanza in which much of the life of Jones is epit-
omized :
"In the first fleet that sailed in defence of our land,
Paul Jones forward stood to defend freedom's arbor;
He led the bold Alfred at Hopkins' command,
And drove the fierce foeman from Providence harbor.
'Twas his hand that raised
The first flag that blazed,
And his deeds *neath the Tine Tree' all ocean amazed."
72
THE FLAG AND THE POETS 73
It is our contention, although others differ with us,
that the phrase "The first flag that blazed" refers to
the Stars and Stripes; for it is a perfect figure for the
flaming red stripes of Old Glory. And it is correct
in its history, when we have in mind the raising of
the Portsmouth Flag over the Ranger,
Philip Freneau, one of the two really notable poets
of the period, mentions the Stars and Stripes in at
least four of his poems written during or immediately
after the war. We quote from these poems, in the
order of their appearance. In "On the New American
Frigate Alliance,'' probably written in 1778, are these
two lines :
"As nearer still the monarch drew,
Her starry flag displayed to view."
The Alliance was closely identified with Paul Jones.
The story of his escape in her from the Texel, Hol-
land, in December, 1779, when he eluded the British
fleet, makes good reading. In a letter to the French-
man, Dumas, written on Dec. 27, 1779, Jones said,
"I am here, my dear sir, with a good wind at east,
under my best American colors."
Freneau's "On the Memorable Victory," a poem
that commemorated Paul Jones' victory of the Bon
Homme Richard over the Serapis, appeared in print
August 8, 1781, but undoubtedly was written earlier.
It contains this stanza:
"Go on, great man, to scourge the foe,
And bid the haughty Britons know
They to our Thirteen Stars shall bend;
74 THE DRAMATIC STORY OF OLD GLORY
The Stars that, veiled in dark attire,
Long glimmered with a feeble fire,
But radiant now ascend."
Freneau's "veiled in dark attire" must mean the
years of despair that shadowed the American Cause
before the time of the alliance with France.
Two lines from Freneau's "An Ancient Prophecy,"
written after the surrender of Cornwallis, run in this
manner :
"O King, my dear King, you shall be very sore.
From the Stars and the Stripes you will mercy implore."
The second line appears in the following form in
another edition of the poem :
"The Stars and the Lily shall run you on shore."
The "Lily" is a tribute to the flag of France of
the period, which was white, with the golden lilies of
Louis upon it.
Freneau's poem "Barney's Invitation," written in
honor of Commodore Barney, gives us these four lines :
"See on her stern the waving stars,
Inured to blood, inured to wars.
Come enter quick, my jolly tars,
To scourge these warlike Britons."
"See on her stem the waving stars" is a word-
picture of the Stars and Stripes displayed on the en-
sign-gaff of the mizzen-mast, over the stern of Bar-
ney's ship.
THE FLAG AND THE POETS 75
Paul Jones, the Ranger, and the Stars and Stripes,
gave the keynote for a poetry of victory. There may
be some doubt as to exact dates and places connected
with the display of Old Glory on land during the
Revolutionary War. No one can question the rec-
ord of the Flag at sea during the same period of time.
Almost from the month of its adoption as the national
emblem, it went to the masthead and stayed there,
to be cheered by Americans, honored by Frenchmen,
and respected by Englishmen.
XIII
France Salutes the Stars and Stripes
WE return to the story of the Ranger. She ar-
rived at Nantes on December 2, 1777, when
Jones found, somewhat to his disappointment, that an-
other New England ship had reached France with the
news of Burgoyne's surrender, ahead of him. For a
number of weeks, he remained in French waters. On
February 13, 1778, he was off Quiberon Bay, and saw
that a French fleet was anchored in the roadstead.
Jones' early and brief account of the first salute to
the Stars and Stripes by a foreign Power, is found in
this passage from his journal: "Reached the Bay (Qui-
beron), Feb'y 13, 1778, and sent to demand of the
Admiral, if he would return his (Jones') salute; and
this compliment was immediately agreed to by that
brave officer, although neither he nor Jones knew at
the period that a treaty of alliance had been signed
between France and America, seven days before. This
was the first salute received by the American flag from
any power, and occasioned much debate in the English
Parliament."
Dr. Ezra Green, surgeon of the Ranger, wrote in his
diary for February 14, 1778, "Saluted the French Ad-
ip-iral, and received nine guns in return. This is the
very first salute ever paid the American flag."
76
FRANCE SALUTES OLD GLORY 77
This recognition of the Stars and Stripes by the
Fleur-de-lis of France requires a more detailed ac-
count, one that shows how insistent Paul Jones was in
requesting and obtaining a salute that should be be-
yond doubt a proper tribute to the United States and
to the Flag.
To be absolutely correct in this affair at Quiberon
Bay, there were two salutes given to Old Glory by
the French fleet under Admiral La Motte Piquet: one
on the evening of February 14, 1778, and the other
on the next morning. Jones' date, February 13, in
the passage above quoted, refers to the day of his ar-
rival at Quiberon. The delay in the exchanging of
salutes was caused by an interchange of notes be-
tween Jones and the Admiral. When the former made
his request for a formal recognition of the American
Flag, on February 13, the latter replied that he would
return four guns less than the number he received.
This ruling as to the number of guns fired was in ac-
cordance with La Motte Piquet's instructions, which
prescribed the firing of four guns less for a Republic
than a sister Kingdom.
Paul Jones was determined on receiving a salute
worthy the Stars and Stripes and the new Republic
it represented, and he sent this letter to William Car-
michael, the American agent at Quiberon, to be de-
livered to the French Admiral :
"Feb'y. 14, 1778.
"Dear Sir; I am extremely sorry to give you fresh trouble,
but I think the admiral's answer of yesterday requires an
explanation. The haughty English return gun for gun to
foreign officers of equal rank, and two less only to captains
78 THE DRAMATIC STORY OF OLD GLORY
by flag officers. It is true, my command at present is not
important, yet, as the senior American officer at present in
Europe, it is my duty to claim an equal return of respect to
the flag of the United States that would be shown to any
other flag whatever.
"I therefore take the liberty of inclosing an appointment,
perhaps as respectable as any which the French admiral can
produce ; besides which I have others in my possession.
"If, however, he persists in refusing to return an equal
salute, I will accept of two guns less, as I have not the rank
of admiral.
"It is my opinion that he would return four less to a pri-
vateer or a merchant ship ; therefore, as I have been honoured
oftener than once with a chief command of ships of war, I
can not in honour accept of the same terms of respect.
"You will singularly oblige me by waiting upon the ad-
miral ; and I ardently hope you will succeed in the applica-
tion, else I shall be under a necessity of departing without
coming into the bay.
"I have the honour to be, etc.
"N. B. — Though thirteen guns is your greatest salute in
America, yet if the French admiral should prefer a greater
number he has his choice on conditions."
Now that was a decidedly daring letter to send to
La Motte Piquet. There is reason to believe that
when Paul Jones thought it over, while awaiting a
reply, he realized that, after all, the real object to be
gained was the salute, a positive recognition of an
American ship under an American Flag, by a great
European Power. Therefore, when he was advised
that La Motte Piquet could not alter a custom of his
nation, Jones agreed to receive the nine guns in re-
sponse to his thirteen.
It was after sunset on the evening of the 14th of
FRANCE SALUTES OLD GLORY 79
February, 1778, when the Ranger got under way and
came beating into Quiberon Bay through a smoky sea.
The first stars were in sight when she was abreast of
the huge French flagship. Jones backed the Ranger's
main-topsail, and the six-pounders on the main-deck
banged out a salute of thirteen guns. La Motte Pi-
quet at once returned with nine great guns. The
Stars and Stripes had received its first salute from a
foreign Power.
But Paul Jones was not satisfied. He had with him
a brig, the Independence^ and, always having a fond-
ness for spectacular events, he sent word to La Motte
Piquet that on the morrow, the 15th of February, 1778,
he would sail the Independence through the French
fleet in broad daylight, and repeat the salute. The
Admiral graciously consented to reply. So the saucy
little Independence, with a Stars and Stripes at the
top of each mast, rode in triumph past the lines of
towering three-deckers, and gave and received salutes.
The history of the United States had been given dates
in the story of the Stars and Stripes that never will be
forgotten.
XIV
The Flag at Valley Forge
A FLAG smitten by the winter winds. A Flag
over headquarters in a camp of starved, frozen
and dying men. The Flag at bay at Valley Forge. As
a December sun sank into banks of snow clouds, the
ragged Continental Army tramped into this vale among
the Pennsylvania hills. A recorder of the finish of their
march tells us that a number of half-naked men were
crowded around a fire at a bivouac. Suddenly Wash-
ington appeared. "The officer commanding the de-
tachment, choosing the most favored ground, paraded
his men to pay the General the honor of a passing
salute. As Washington rode slowly up, he was ob-
served to be eyeing very earnestly something that at-
tracted his attention on the frozen surface of the road.
'How comes it, sir,' he inquired, *that I have tracked
the march of your troop by the blood-stains of their
feet^' Washington received this reply: 'Your Ex-
cellency, when shoes were issued, the different regi-
ments were served in turn. It was our misfortune to
be among the last to be served !' "
At no time in our history as a nation has the Flag
meant more than during the winter of 1777-1778 at
Valley Forge. As it rippled against the blue sky, clear
and beautiful, or was seen proudly defiant through
80
THE FLAG AT VALLEY FORGE 81
whirls of snow, Old Glory was the image of the heroic
regiments clustered beneath and around it. The
United States of America was in that camp, and not
in the hall of the weak Congress at York. Mere words
that we might write could never give any conception
of the fortitude of the Continental Army that found
itself as a Democracy at Valley Forge. Steuben, who
arrived in the camp on February 5, 1778, said, "No
European army could be kept together under such suf-
fering."
Among the mere boys with Washington during that
winter was one John Marshall, in years to come the
great Chief Justice and historian. He wrote, "More
than once they were absolutely without food. The
returns of the first of Feb'y, exhibit the astonishing
number of 3989 men in the camp unfit for duty for
want of clothes. Of this number scarcely a man had
a pair of shoes. Although the total of the army ex-
ceeded 17,000 men, the present effective rank and file
amounted to only 5012."
On February 16, 1778, soon after Steuben's arrival,
Washington wrote as follows to Governor Clinton:
"For some days past, there has been little less than a
famine in camp. A part of the army has been a week
without any kind of flesh, and the rest three or four
days. Naked and starved as they are, we cannot enough
admire the incomparable patience and fidelity of the
soldiery that they have not been ere this excited by
their sufferings to general mutiny and desertion."
Valley Forge was the nation's first crucible. In that
bowl in the hills, the sons of English Puritan Cava-
lier and Quaker, with Irishmen, Scotchmen, French-
82 THE DRAiMATIC STORY OF OLD GLORY
men, Germans, Swedes, Danes and Poles, were fused
by the alchemy of nature and their own heroism, into
an Army and a Nation. The Flag had become the sym-
bol of unity, of a real Democracy.
The presence of the Flag at Valley Forge is a
matter of inference on the part of the historian. There
is no reference to it in any history of the Continental
Army in the camp, and a search through orderly books
gives no clew. Yet it must have been there. The near-
est we can get to evidence that a flag was hoisted in
the camp, is in a living testimonial. Miss Frances B.
Lovell, a descendant of Betty Lewis, the only sister
of Greorge Washington, loaned to the Valley Forge
Museum of American History the flag which floated
over Washington's headquarters.
This headquarters' flag is a jack of light blue silk
with thirteen stars. The blue is faded and the stars
are yellow with age. The flag is thirty-six inches long
and twenty-eight inches wide. The stars are six-
pointed, double stitched, and the silk back of them
has been cut out to show the stars on both sides. These
stars are not arranged in a circle, but on lines that
follow the crosses of the British flag.
It is a bit of poetic license to substitute Washing-
ton's headquarters' flag for the Stars and Stripes. That
flag, in its thirteen stars, was expressive of unity and
a proof in itself that the standard carried by the Con-
tinental Army in 1777-1778, was a real Old Glory.
Its size, indicating that it was merely the jack taken
from a much larger Flag, tells the story.
The placing of the stars in this jack, in a form
copied from the crosses in the British ensign, suggests
THE FLAG AT VALLEY FORGE 83
a new line of research. Possibly the statement quoted
in chapter nine, that there was not in 1779 a standard
form for the Flag of the United States, was inspired
by a confusion as to the grouping of the stars in the
Revolutionary Old Glory. Trumbull, although he
went astray in some particulars, knew what he was do-
ing when he gave us a Stars and Stripes in at least
three of his paintings. He always showed the stars
arranged in a circle. This mode of placing them is
especially prominent in the splendid American Flag
shown in his "Surrender of Cornwallis." What was
the rule as to the stars in the days of the Continental
Army? Was there such a rule?
But we have digressed. On May 6, 1778, the Con-
tinental Army was drawn up by brigades at Valley
Forge to receive official announcement of the treaty
of alliance with France. To the stripling Lafayette,
commanding a division as the regiments fell into line
and presented arms beneath the Stars and Stripes, that
morning must have been an hour of triumph. There
was a roar of muskets and thirteen cannon, followed by
the cry, ''Long live the King of France." Then came
another roar of guns and the cry, ''Long live the friend-
ly European Powers !" And then, lastly, a crash, with
a tremendous shout that ran along the lines, "The
American States!"
The stripes of red and white were of the blood and
the snow of Valley Forge beneath the blue of Heaven,
where heroic men were to establish the stars of George
Washington's headquarters forever.
XV
Old Glory Crosses the Alleghanies
MORGAN'S riflemen were on the march from the
Shenandoah Valley to Boston, in 1775. They
were men of the frontier, each wearing a hunting shirt
with "Liberty or Death" on the breast in white let-
ters. While on their way, Washington came riding
along the lines, met them, and received Morgan's
salute. There was a look of query in Washington's
eyes, and Morgan said, simply, "From the right bank
of the Potomac, General!" Washington at once dis-
mounted and, with his eyes brimming with tears, walked
along the ranks, shaking hands with the men in turn.
It was a body of men of this type, in many ways
the finest troop of its size then on the globe, that car-
ried Old Glory across the Alleghanies on its pioneer
journey of western conquest, with George Rogers
Clark, in 1778. So much of our history of the Revolu-
tion is concerned with the conduct of the war in the
thirteen Colonies that the magnitude and significance
of Clark's great enterprise is almost hidden from sight.
George Rogers Clark was only twenty-five years old
when he came before Patrick Henry, Thomas Jeffer-
son, George Mason and George Wythe with his au-
dacious plan of striking at the British in their huge
territory that stretched from the Alleghanies on the
84
OLD GLORY CROSSES ALLEGHANIES 85
east and the Ohio on the south, to the Mississippi River
on the west. The old French posts of Detroit, Kas-
kaskia and Vincennes were the supply-centers of this
hostile country, from which the Indians were sent out
to fall on the long, weakly defended rear of the thir-
teen States. Clark studied his plan from all angles
and was positive that he could supplant the Union Jack
of Great Britain with the Stars and Stripes, over the
posts that were the hot-beds of plot and active hos-
tility.
Clark gathered his little army of one hundred and
fifty men on Corn Island, near the present city of
Louisville, and, after drilling them carefully, set out
on his really tremendous task on June 24, 1778. On
the Fourth of July, at sunset, the company came in
sight of Kaskaskia, crossed the river and marched to
the fort. We are told that a dance was in progress,
that Clark, like an apparition, suddenly appeared at
a door of the room, that an Indian recognized him as
an enemy and gave a wild war-whoop. Clark told the
Englishmen to go on with their dance, but bade them
remember that they were to continue it in honor of the
United States and not of Great Britain. At daybreak
the Stars and Stripes floated for the first time over a
fort in the vast area then known as the Northwest
Territory.
From Kaskaskia, Clark sent a priest. Father Gib-
ault, to Vincennes, to invite the French residents to
join hands with the Amicrican States. Father Gibault
won his people over to the new allegiance, and the
French themselves raised Old Glory over Fort Sack-
ville, the post at Vincennes.
86 THE DRAMATIC STORY OF OLD GLORY
The Flag was not to fly unchallenged over the forts
so easily taken. Down from Detroit came Henry
Hamilton, with troops at his heels, and Vincennes was
again in British hands. Clark heard that with the ap-
proach of winter, Hamilton had dismissed his Indian
allies and held Sackville with eighty men. He also
learned that Hamilton expected heavy reenforcements
in the spring and intended to drive the Stars and
Stripes beyond the mountains, forever.
A great issue in the history of North America was
at stake. Clark knew it, realized that England, with
that magnificent hinterland in her grip, would be a
menace to the United States, even after the close of
the war. He struck at once. With barely one hun-
dred men, he set out on February 4, 1779, to cross
a land half quagmire. On February 15, the heroic
little band came to the forks of the Little Wabash.
From that day on, for ten days, they struggled toward
Vincennes, through ice, water and mud, at times so
submerged that they were forced to hold their guns
and powder-horns above their heads to keep them dry.
To make this chapter short, Fort Sackville, or Vin-
cennes, surrendered to those iron men. The British
marched out and gave up their arms. The Americans
marched in and hoisted Old Glory. A salute of thir-
teen guns was then fired from the captured British
cannon.
The country won for the Flag by George Rogers
Clark became in time the imperial States of Ohio,
Indiana, Illinois, Michigan and Wisconsin. Into that
Empire, after the Revolution was over, trailed the
OLD GLORY CROSSES ALLEGHANIES 87
first emigrants from Northeastern States, following the
tides of rivers and skirting the southern shores of the
Great Lakes. The Stars and Stripes had beguri its
journey toward the Pacific.
XVI
The Flag Sinks Into the Sea Unconquered
WE return to the records of Paul Jones and his
Flag. You will remember that in February,
1778, France honored the Stars and Stripes, displayed
on the Ranger and the Independence^ with national
salutes in Quiberon Bay. Two months later, on April
24, 1778, Paul Jones, then in the Irish Channel with
the Ranger^ learned from fishermen that the Drake,
the British guard-ship at Carrickfergus, was about to
run out in search of him. Late in the afternoon, near
sunset, the Drake drew near and flung out the English
colors. The Ranger hoisted the Stars and Stripes.
When hailed with "What ship is that*?" Jones replied,
"The American Continental ship Ranger, Come on!
We are waiting for you."
That fight in sight of three Kingdoms was dramatic.
It was the first challenge of a new Flag to an old one
under the hills of the latter's home. Paul Jones won
through the superior gun-fire of his crew, who caught
the period of the Drake's roll and fired as the muzzles
of the Ranger's cannon fell and those of the Drake
rose. The British ship would have been sunk then
and there if Jones had not commanded his gunners
to change tactics, fire on a rising sea, and disable the
rigging of the Drake, He desired, above all things,
88
THE FLAG SINKS UNCONQUERED 89
to sail into a French port with the Union Jack low-
ered on a prize taken in hand-to-hand battle, with the
Stars and Stripes a victor beyond dispute. France
required a sign. He would give it, in a sloop-of-war
taken by one of inferior armament. Jones' anxiety
to get the shattered Drake to the coast of France is
revealed in his letter of May 7, 1778, to Lieutenant
Elijah Hall, whom he had placed in command of the
Drake: *'The honor of our flag is much concerned in
the preservation of this prize."
On the evening of May 8, 1778, Paul Jones neared
the outer road of Brest and saw the moving lights of
the patrolling guard-frigates of the French Grand
Fleet at anchor in the roadstead. Imagine his feel-
ings as he glanced up and saw his Flag, a rippling
shadow against the stars, and then turned to watch
the looming shapes of two French frigates bearing
down within hail. Over the water came a call, "Who
are you and what is your prize?" Paul Jones an-
swered, over the taifrail of the Ranger: *'The Ameri-
can Continental ship Ranger^ of eighteen guns. Cap-
tain Paul Jones, and the man-of-war prize is his
Britannic Majesty's late ship the Drake, of twenty
guns."
The path followed by the Ranger's Flag, from the
day when it left Portsmouth to the hour when it came
up over the sea-rim off France, a victor over the "me-
teor flag of England," was a definite hint of the roads
of high adventure to be traversed by Yankee sea-
fighters in years to come, under Old Glory. Paul
Jones took the Ranger right into waterways patrolled
by British men-of-war vastly superior in metal, straight
go THE DRAMATIC STORY OF OLD GLORY
up the Irish sea, out through its north channel, and
round Ireland by the west, back to France. During
the latter part of his historic cruise, he had the battered
Drake in convoy.
We go on over nearly a year and a half, to the
month of the appearance of Paul Jones and his Flag
in one of the most widely known events in the history
of the United States. It is proper to precede the ac-
count of the sea-fight off Flamborough Head with a
reference to a letter written by Jones late in 1775,
which reveals the unconquerable spirit of the man.
This letter, written to the Marine Committee of Con-
gress, sets forth his views as to the personnel of the
navy. It has been called by an English writer, "The
moral and intellectual charter of Annapolis." In it
we find this glowing passage: "A commander may
challenge the devotion of his followers to sink with
him alongside the more powerful foe, and all go down
together with the unstricken flag of their country still
waving defiantly over them in their ocean sepulcher."
On a moonlit night in September, 1779, off the east
coast of England, Paul Jones himself answered the
clarion call to heroism of that sentence. Englishmen
have vied with Americans in describing that terrific
fight between Jones, in a rotten hulk of a ship, the
Bon Homme Richard, and Pearson, in the Serapis^
termed by Disraeli "one of the finest frigates of his
Majesty's Navy."
For hours, in a light off-shore wind, the two frigates
exchanged broadsides. The superior weight of metal
of the Serapis smashed through the decayed hull of the
Richard^ wrecked guns, killed and wounded a great
THE FLAG SINKS UNCONQUERED 91
part of the crew. Jones feared that his ship would
be blown out of the water and, having the windward
position, deliberately closed, grappled, and lashed the
Richard to the Serapis with his own hands.
Then came the moment when Pearson, thinking he
saw the Stars and Stripes coming down, called across
to Jones, "Have you struck your colors'?" This im-
mortal reply was hurled back, "No! I have but this
instant commenced to fight." Over the rail and the
hammock netting went a boarding party led by the
Virginian, Richard Dale, the Huguenot Carolinian,
John Mayrant, and the Nantucket Indian boy, Jerry
Evans. The fight was won. Pearson grasped the hal-
liards and struck his colors to Old Glory.
Paul Jones fought his great fight with a crew of
which less than one-fifth were Americans, a crew held
together and dominated by his unbending determina-
tion to conquer or sink to the bottom of the sea uncon-
quered. Mackenzie, one of the early biographers of
Jones, wrote, "Had Pearson been equally indomita-
ble, the Richard, if not boarded from below, would
at last have gone down with all her colors flying in
proud defiance."
Paul Jones took the Serapis and lost the Bon
Homme Richard, For a day and a half, with her dead
aboard her, the splintered remnant of the Richard
rolled on the surface of the sea. Jones watched her
from the deck of the Serapis. At length, on the morn-
ing of September 25, 1779, she sank, bow first. Her
tattered Stars and Stripes floated for a brief moment
on a sweeping wave, and then trailed down beneath
the blue that mingled with its field of stars.
92 THE DRAMATIC STORY OF OLD GLORY
The Stars and Stripes that the girls of Portsmouth
made, that crossed the ocean on the Ranger, that re-
ceived La Motte Piquet's salute, that compelled the
colors of the Drake to come down, was and is the
only flag in history to go beneath the waves on a vic-
torious ship sinking beside the enemy she had captured.
Paul Jones had said, "The flag and I are twins I"
What thoughts were in his mind as he wrote, "The
very last vestige mortal eyes ever saw of the Bon
Homme Richard was the defiant waving of her un-
conquered and unstricken flag as she went down. And,
as I had given them the good old ship for their sepul-
cher, I now bequeathed to my immortal dead the flag
they had so desperately defended, for their winding
sheet."
Quarter-gunner John Kilby's picture is superb. In
his "Narrative," he wrote, "She went down head fore-
most with all sails set — studding sails, top-gallant
sails, royals, sky-scrapers, and every sail that could be
put on a ship, — ^jack, pennant, and that beautiful en-
sign that she so gallantly wore in action and when we
conquered. A most glorious sight."
XVII
Stars and Stripes, Union Jack and Fleur-de-lis
ONE of Canada's ablest historians, A. G. Bradley,
in a chapter on the close of the American Revo-
lution, has the following picturesque passage: "A mad
world enough it would have seemed to any man,
French or English, but thirty years dead, could he
have risen from his grave by the James, the Hudson
or the St. Lawrence, and roamed it again. A British
flag flying on the citadel of Quebec, and a strange de-
vice fluttering on every public building from Boston
to Charleston, with the lilies of France hoisted in
amity beside it."
Bradley covered much history in that paragraph.
He touched on the French and Indian War, with its
close in 1759 when the English flag took the place of
the French standard at Quebec. And he then moved
on to 1781 or 1783, when the Stars and Stripes, "a
strange device," waved in company with the Fleur-
de-lis of France over all the length of the thirteen
States. On the date this page is being written, Decem-
ber 13, 1918, a President of the United States is at
Brest, France, where, as here in America, the three flags
are intertwined after the close of a war. Surely his-
tory effects strange but beautiful mutations.
It is quite in order to make this chapter, when we
93
94 THE DRAMATIC STORY OF OLD GLORY
consider the date on which it is written, both a logical
step forward in the advance of our history and a leap
to the present time. For there are elements of old
and contemporary history here concerned, that fasci-
nate and hold us, that appear to have eluded our edi-
tors and recorders of to-day. We tell, briefly, the
story of Yorktown, and throw one or two flashlights
of reminiscence on the French coast at Quiberon Bay
and Brest, localities that have been tinged with the
colors of the flags of France, Great Britain and the
United States.
In October, 1781, Cornwallis surrendered at York-
town, after being hemmed in by sea and shore, by the
American and French forces. The allied flags had met
on shipboard when Washington conferred with de
Grasse, and, side by side, they had stormed the British
lines, led on by Lafayette, Alexander Hamilton, Baron
de Viomenil and John Laurens. The hour had come
for the final picture, the actual culmination of the
American Revolution, although two full years were to
elapse ere the English troops left New York and the
United States.
Down the lane between the two lines, Americans of
the Continental Army on the one hand and the French
on the other, tramped the British and Hessians, not
altogether happy, and with colors cased, a penalty
exacted for similar treatment accorded General Lin-
coln at Charleston. When the twenty-four standards
were collected, they were found to be eighteen Hes-
sian and six English. John Trumbull's painting, in
this case, is most satisfactory. He shows on one side
the white banner of France with its golden Fleur-de-
THE K'EV/ YORK ■
PUBLIC LIBRARY
ASTOR, LEN#X
TILDEN FOUNBATIONS
THREE GREAT FLAGS 95
lis, and on the other our resplendent Old Glory, with
the thirteen stars in a circle.
Now for a flight across the Atlantic. The great
French harbor on that Breton thrust of land into the
sea to the northwest, at the time of which we have
been writing, was Brest. It owed its existence to the
foresight of Richelieu. To link past with present, it
has figured in French history from the years of the
eighteenth century down to the period of the recent
war when it served as a port of entry and exit in
marine warfare. A few miles from Brest, to the south-
east, is Quiberon Bay. The narrow strip of land on
which Yorktown lies, and the tongue of rocky soil
that reaches out into the sea at Quiberon, are similar,
and they give us peculiar resemblances and contrasts
in history.
At Yorktown in 1781, the troops of an English
King surrendered to the forces of the young Republic
of the United States, aided by soldiers from the King-
dom of France. At Quiberon in 1795, that remark-
able body of men, the loyalist Chouans, fought their
last fight under the Fleur-de-lis against the French
Republicans marching under the Tricolor and led by
Hoche and Rouget de Lisle, the latter of whom wrote
the Marseillaise. In each case, at Yorktown and at
Quiberon, British ships, at hand or approaching, were
useless.
A novelist of 1918, in one of the best historical nov-
els of the year, has a fine sentence on the cutting down
of the Fleur-de-lis at Quiberon: "The golden lilies
were in the dust, and all was vain — ardor and sacri-
fice and devotion — as vain as the fury and despair that
96 THE DRAMATIC STORY OF OLD GLORY
saw them wither, watered though they were with the
best blcx)d of France."
Quiberon Bay has another interest for us. There, in
1759, the year when Quebec fell to Wolfe, the red-
ensigned ships of British Admiral Howe smashed the
lily-bannered ships of Conflans, after nightfall, in a
howling storm and on a lee shore one of the most
treacherous and dangerous in the world. And there,
in Quiberon Bay, in February, 1778, another French
admiral, La Motte Piquet, saluted two little adven-
turous ships from a weak Republic across the Atlantic,
commanded by one Paul Jones who displayed a defiant
Flag of Stars and Stripes, under which he was to give
Englishmen lessons in fighting that Frenchmen never
could administer. How the three flags of England,
France and the United States, shift in historic combi-
nations !
The French flag at Yorktown, fluttering in triumph,
was the same flag that was trailed in the dust at Qui-
beron, in its last stand. The flag that opposed it was
the Tricolor, suggested by the Stars and Stripes and
then but a year old. This Tricolor, later in that very
year, 1 795, found a young officer of artillery in Paris,
by name Napoleon Bonaparte, who took it and car-
ried it over all Europe, and literally wrote upon it in
letters of blood the words "Marengo," "Austerlitz,"
"Waterloo."
We go up the French coast to Brest, through whose
narrow portal on May 8, 1778, sailed Paul Jones in
the Ranger^ bringing in the Drake, the first British
ship-of-war ever trailed into a French port as the result
of a single-ship action, to the amazement and delight
THREE GREAT FLAGS 97 j
of Frenchmen. Today, a President of the United
States enters the harbor of Brest, with guns roaring
and flags streaming from roofs, windows and staffs.
In 1778, Paul Jones brought in with him, at Brest,
the Union Jack displaced by the Stars and Stripes, and
received the salute of cannon that blazed beneath the
Fleur-de-lis. Woodrow Wilson comes to the road-
stead of Brest, to find it aglow with the Red, White
and Blue of the three mighty Tricolors, the Stars and
Stripes, the Union Jack and the Tricolor of France.
While we are speaking of Tricolors, we will settle
one or two little points of flag-history. Bradley's
"strange device," the Stars and Stripes of 1781, now
marches with the flags of Great Britain and France,
and, strangely enough, is in reality the oldest flag of
the three. Down to the year 1801, the flag of Great
Britain had but two crosses in the Union, those of St.
George and St. Andrew. In that year the cross of St.
Patrick was added, giving us the present English
standard. The Lilies of Louis disappeared forever in
the flame of the French Revolution, to be replaced
by the Tricolor in 1794.
In view of the present alliance of three great na-
tions that at times have been hostile in varying politi-
cal conditions of war, it is well to relate briefly two
minor but significant incidents in the histories of their
three flags; the first salute granted to Old Glory by
the Union Jack, and the first greeting to our Flag by
the Tricolor on French soil.
On May 2, 1791, the English ship Alligator, Cap-
tain Isaac Coffin, while entering Boston from Halifax,
saluted the Stars and Stripes floating on the Castle,
98 THE DRAMATIC STORY OF OLD GLORY
and the fort at once returned with her guns. This was
undoubtedly the first salute to Old Glory by any rep-
resentative of Great Britain.
During the deliberations of the National Conven-
tion, Paris, August 15, 1794, James Monroe, the Min-
ister Plenipotentiary of the United States, arrived and
was introduced. After the reading of credentials, it
was decreed, on the motion of Mons. Bayle, "that the
colors of both nations should be suspended at the vault
of the hall, as a sign of perpetual alliance and union."
In delivering the Stars and Stripes, Captain Joshua
Barney said, in closing a short address, "Henceforth,
suspended on the side of that of the French Republic,
it will become the symbol of the union which subsists
between the two nations, and last, I hope, as long as
the freedom which they have so bravely acquired and
so wisely consolidated." Prophetic words, that found
a brave echo in Pershing's "Lafayette, we are here I"
XVIII
Flag-Episodes of 1781-1783
THE two years from October, 1781, to November,
1783, were trying ones for Americans and Eng-
lishmen. They formed what was practically a period
of armistice, for the Treaty of Peace and the evacua-
tion of New York by the British were not on the pages
of history until November, 1783. In our search
through the interesting records of these two years, we
find three episodes in which the Stars and Stripes fig-
ured as the sole center of interest and discussion. There
is a touch of romance in the story of each one of these
episodes, and not a little humor.
In December, 1782, King George the Third formally
recognized the independence of the United States. The
sea was open to American merchantmen, and the ports
of the thirteen States at once sent out ships to all
quarters of the world in quest of markets. A member
of this fleet was the Bedford^ Captain Moores, of
Massachusetts, and she pointed straight across the At-
lantic for London Town. Her cargo was whale-oil.
The Bedford passed Gravesend on February 4,
1783, and was reported at the Custom House, London,
on the 6th of the month. As the Treaty of Peace be-
tween Great Britain and the United States was not
signed until September of that year, there was still
99
loo THE DRAMATIC STORY OF OLD GLORY
some tension between the two countries. London was
about as ready to salute George Washington walking
down the Strand as to view with pleasure an American
ship flying the Stars and Stripes on the Thames.
If we open the pages of the Political Magazine^
London, for the year 1783, we find articles that tell
very plainly how astonished the old city was on seeing
a Yankee ship, showing Old Glory, lying "a little be-
low the tower" where more than one American had
languished during the years of the Revolution. We
quote, for we cannot improve on the Political Maga-
zine's account:
"She is American built, manned wholly by American sea-
men, wears the rebel colors, and belongs to the island of Nan-
tucket in Massachusetts. This is the first vessel which has
displayed the thirteen rebellious stripes of America in any
British port."
The Political Magazine^ in a summary of debates
in Parliament, said:
"The Thirteen Stripes in the River. Mr. Hammet begged
leave to inform the House of a very recent and extraordinary
event. There was, he said, at the time he was speaking, an
American ship in the Thames with the thirteen stripes flying
on board. This ship had offered to enter at the custom house,
but the officers were at a loss how to behave."
Mr. Hammet continued in an appeal for "free in-
tercourse between this country and America." Evi-
dently, the Bedford had brought in with her a cargo
of political and merchant-marine problems not so eas-
ily made fluid as whale-oil, for, as the Political Mag-
FLAG-EPISODES OF 1781-1783 101
azine tells us, "The Ministers remained silent." It
would seem that the members of the British Ministry
of 1783 were stupefied at the apparition of the thir-
teen stripes of Old Glory fluttering boldly on the royal
Thames, and peace yet to be signed.
One paper, the London Chronicle^ in its issue for
February 7, 1783, waxed ponderously humorous:
"There is a vessel in the harbor with a very strange flag.
Thirteen is a number pecuHar to the rebels. A party of naval
prisoners lately returned from Jersey say that the rations
among the rebels are thirteen dried clams a day. Sachem
Schuyler has a topknot of thirteen stiff hairs which erect them-
selves on the crown of his head when he gets mad. It takes
thirteen Congress paper dollars to equal one shilling sterling.
Polly Wayne was just thirteen hours in subduing Stony
Point, and thirteen seconds in leaving it. Every well-organ-
ised rebel household has thirteen children, all of whom expect
to be major generals or members of the high and mighty
Congress of the thirteen United States when they attain the
age of thirteen years. Mr. Washington has thirteen teeth
in each jaw, and thirteen toes on each foot, the extra ones
having grown since that wonderful declaration of independ-
ence, and Mrs. Washington has a tomcat with thirteen yellow
rings around his tail. His flaunting it suggested to the Con-
gress the same number of stripes for the rebel flag."
It is safe to surmise that many Londoners went to
the Thames in February, 1783, to see "the rebellious
stripes of America." John Wilkes, that thorn in the
side of Tory England, had a sister, then the widow of
a George Hayley who "did much business with New
England." It is on record that she visited the Bedford
and saw the Stars and Stripes displayed.
The Bedford was for England the herald of the
102 THE DRAMATIC STORY OF OLD GLORY
splendid fleet of American merchantmen and whalers
that were soon to make Old Glory the rival of any
flag afloat upon the high seas.
We come back to the soil of the United States for
our last two little stories of the Stars and Stripes of
the days of the Revolution. On the 3rd of September,
1783, the Treaty of Peace between Great Britain and
the United States was signed at Paris. The Revolu-
tion was over. In October, Sir Guy Carleton was or-
dered to evacuate New York, the only city of the
United States then held by British troops. After some
delay, caused by waiting for ships, the 25th of No-
vember was agreed upon as the date for the evacua-
tion.
It chanced that on Murray Street, near the Hudson
River, there was at that time a boarding-house kept by
a Mr. Day, whose wife was a large, muscular woman,
and a zealously loyal American. In front of the house
was a pole, and she, true to her colors, ran up the Stars
and Stripes at dawn of that eventful 25th of Novem-
ber, in sturdy defiance of the British claim that New
York was to be in England's hands until noon. We
can imagine her running to a window at intervals, to
see if her beloved flag was "still there."
^ Across the street, sitting on his father's stoop, a
young boy, Alexander Anderson,* later to be famous as
America's pioneer wood-engraver, watched the Flag
rippling and tugging at its halliards. Presently, to
the little fellow's dismay, down the street came Wil-
* This was the Alexander Anderson referred to in Chapter
IX as the engraver who put the Stars and Stripes in his cut of
the battle of Bunker Hill.
FLAG-EPISODES OF 1781-1783 103
liam Cunningham, provost marshal of the English
army, known in history as a stern oppressor of loyal
Americans. He saw the Flag and Mrs. Day sweeping
in front of her door. With a display of bluster and
loud words, Cunningham ordered her to haul down her
Flag. Mrs. Day, with her broom clutched resolutely
in her good right hand, refused to lower it one inch.
Then came the last pitched battle of the Revolution.
Cunningham seized the halliards and started to pull
down the Stars and Stripes. Without a moment of
hesitation, Mrs. Day fell upon him like a thunderbolt.
Bang, and again and again, bang went her broom upon
his head. His wig was twisted; the powder flew in
all directions; he raised an arm to parry the stout
whacks of the determined woman. The result of the
conflict was a sad piece of ignominy for a high-and-
mighty officer in His Britannic Majesty's Service. Baf-
fled by the unceasing shower of blows and a tangle of
the halliards, Cunningham was forced to give up the
attempt to lower the Flag, and to retreat in disorder.
The Flag, a woman and her broom, had won "a sweep-
ing victory."
At almost the very hour of that 25th of November,
1783, when Mrs. Day routed William Cunningham,
George Washington and his Staff approached New
York City from the north. By one o'clock, the British
had collected, preliminary to the evacuation, at the
water's edge at the lower end of the city. Fort George,
at the extremity of Broadway, was their last foothold,
and, before leaving it and the United States forever,
they nailed an English flag to the staff at the fort,
104 THE DRAMATIC STORY OF OLD GLORY
removed the halliards, smeared the pole with grease
and knocked off the cleats.
Down Broadway came General Knox and a body of
troops from West Point, to take possession of Fort
George. After they had entered, they looked up at
the British flag fluttering derisively over them. There
was but one move to make; get it down as quickly
as possible. In the group of Americans gathered in
and around Fort George, was John Van Arsdale, an
agile sixteen-year-old boy. He searched the neigh-
borhood for cleats, returned with a number of them
which he nailed to the staff as he climbed, and so
reached the Union Jack. Then he ripped it from the
pole and tossed it to Knox's men below. Tradition
says that it was seized and torn to fragments. Young
Van Arsdale completed his work by nailing the Stars
and Stripes to the top of the staff.
The writer of this history watched columns of Boy
Scouts march down Fifth Avenue on April 19, 1917.
It would be a chivalrous tribute to a nobly patriotic
body of young Americans, to turn over the privilege
of raising Old Glory to the top of the staff at the Bat-
tery, on each November 25, to regiments of Boy Scouts
of New York City, in memory of the boy John Van
Arsdale.
XIX
The Stars and Stripes Goes Around the World
IN the years of the eighteenth century that im-
mediately followed the Revolution, our Flag
began to appear on the sea on an ever increasing num-
ber of ships. The dawn of the American merchant
marine was at hand. Typical of the buoyant youth
of the young Republic, many a commander was a mere
boy. Nathaniel Silsbee was master of the Benjamin^
of Salem, Mass., at the age of twenty. His first mate,
Charles Derby, was nineteen, and his second mate,
Richard J. Cleveland, was but eighteen. One histor-
ian of the period says beautifully, "The picture of one
of those boyish sea-captains flinging out the Stars and
Stripes to the breeze on the far side of the earth por-
trays, better than anything ever said, written or done,
the spirit of America."
In 1787, a little company of Boston merchants, in-
spired by the ardor of one of their number, Joseph
Barrel 1, determined to send ships around the Horn to
reach the fur territories of the great Northwest. New
York merchants aided them, and the valuable service
of John Darby, or Derby, a Salem shipmaster, was
secured in fitting out the expedition. The little syn-
dicate purchased the Columbia^ a stout, seaworthy
three-master with a Revolutionary record, and also the
105
io6 THE DRAMATIC STORY OF OLD GLORY
sloop Lady Washington, to aid in carrying the furs
to be bought of the Indians.
A medal struck in the year 1787 shows the two
ships under full sail, with the Stars and Stripes spread
to the wind over the stern of the Columbia, The re-
verse of this medal gives the names of J. Barrell, S.
Brown, C. Bulfinch, J. Darby, C. Hatch and J. M.
Pintard, as the members of the group of backers of
the plan. Bulfinch later became famous in another
way, as the architect of the Boston State House.
On Monday, October 1, 1787, the Columbia and
the Lady Washington, commanded by John Kendrick
of Wareham, Mass., and Robert Gray of Tiverton,
R. I., sailed from Nantasket Roads, near Boston Har-
bor, loaded with knives, iron bars, copper pans,
blankets and other material for barter with the Indians
of the Pacific coast. All went well with the two ves-
sels on their voyage until they were in the South At-
lantic when a violent hurricane separated them. The
Lady Washington was ahead when they were well on
their way up the Pacific coast of South America, and
she reached Nootka Sound on September 16, 1788.
The Columbia joined her there on September 22nd
or 23rd.
All through the winter, the two vessels lay at an-
chor in the Sound. On July 30, 1789, Captain Gray,
now in the Columbia, set sail to cross the Pacific, with
Old Glory fluttering in the wind. On December 6 he
reached Canton, China. Then, with the bow of the
Columbia pointing south, he skirted the East African
coast and rounded the Cape of Good Hope. His track,
from that day on, was north to Boston, where he
FLAG GOES ROUND THE WORLD 107
dropped anchor on August 10, 1780. The Stars aad
Stripes had gone around the world for the first time
in history.
But Robert Gray was to be the dominant figure in
a cruise of far greater importance to the United States
and the Flag, than the carrying of Old Glory around
the globe. The call of the Northwest drew Gray to
sea again, after a few weeks ashore. On September 28,
1790, he left Boston in the Columbia^ sailed south,
doubled the Horn, turned north, and at length found
himself again off the coast where Vancouver Island
now lies on the map.
And now for a fragment of history in which ap-
pear the flags of Great Britain and the United States,
with the banner of Spain dim in the background. For
years, ever since the Spaniards groped along the great
barrier of the west coast of North America, seeking
a passage through to the Atlantic, charts had shown
such a waterway or hinted at one in vague pencilings.
Two Englishmen, Meares and Vancouver, were off
that coast with Gray, and the three men frequently
compared notes. All three suspected that a river
emptied into the sea at some point within the range
of their cruisings.
Meares was deceived by the old Spanish charts,
which showed a river under the name of St. Roque.
He gave permanent record of his failure to find it in
the Straits of Juan de Fuca, when he placed these
names on a chart of the region. Cape Disappointment
and Deception Bay. Vancouver actually sailed past
the mouth of the Columbia River, which was practically
io8 THE DRAMATIC STORY OF OLD GLORY
hidden by a barrier of shoals. In his journal he wrote
that *'the surf has been constantly seen from the mast-
head to break on the shores." Vancouver mistook the
breakers on the bars at the mouth of the Columbia for
coastal surf.
Meares, Vancouver and Gray did not know that
an Empire thirty-two times the size of Massachusetts
was at stake, that it was but a question of a few days
when the Yankee was to give the Stars and Stripes
the right of way to the vast Oregon country. Van-
couver's entry in his log-book or journal, in which he
speaks of the "surf constantly seen from the mast-
head,'' bears the date April 29, 1792. On the after-
noon of that day. Gray and Vancouver met and com-
pared notes. Then they parted, the Englishman and
his Union Jack sailing north, and the American and
his Old Glory sailing south.
On May 11, 1792, Gray was off the mouth of the
mysterious river. With splendid courage, he ran in
under full sail between the churning, surging breakers,
the Red, White and Blue of his pennant snapping over
the white-green waters. Ten miles up the river he
anchored. A few days later he went fifteen miles fur-
ther inland with his ship. At the end of nine days,
he sailed out into the Pacific, leaving the name of his
ship, Columbia, forever associated with the great river
of his discovery.
Captain Robert Gray opened a new and glorious
chapter in the history of his country and the Stars
and Stripes, when he gave the United States a basis
for claim to the Oregon country. Lewis and Clark,
FLAG GOES ROUND THE WORLD 109
carrying Flags with them, in 1805 completed the ar-
gument for possession. Their great adventure will
give us the theme for another episode in the Story of
Old Glory.
XX
The Flag Supplants the Tricolor Over
Louisiana
THE years from 1792 to 1803 are almost barren
of events that give prominence to our Flag. In
1795, Vermont and Kentucky were admitted to the
Union as States, and Old Glory became a Flag of fif-
teen stripes and fifteen stars. Throughout the vitally :
critical period that ranged from 1795 to 1818, the
fifteen-striped Flag flashed through the storms of three ,
wars, appeared on the horizons of remote seas, crossed :
prairies and braved the winds of mountain crests on ■
the first march of the pioneer to the Pacific. It was ;
the Flag of New Orleans, of Lewis and Clark, of
Eaton's "Army of Northern Africa," of the Chesa-
peake^ of Perry's victory on Lake Erie, of Fort Mc- ;
Henry, and of the Essex and the Constitution. \
The scene now shifts from the surf-smitten coast j
where the Columbia enters the Pacific, to New Orleans I
where the Mississippi glides by to the Gulf of Mexico, j
Yet the two localities are linked inseparably in the
Story of Old Glory. The appearance of the Flag on i
tide-waters of the Columbia was followed in history
by its unfurling in New Orleans, in evidence that the '
United States had assumed control of the huge terri- -
no
FLAG SUPPLANTS TRICOLOR in
tory that was eventually to sweep, without an alien
flag within its confines, from the Mississippi to the
Pacific.
The raising of the Stars and Stripes in New Orleans,
in 1803, was an incident in a dramatic story of many
incidents. Four nations were concerned in the series
of events: Spain, France and the United States, ac-
tively, and Great Britain as an interested onlooker
and friend of our country, ready to block with her
fleet and her guns any sinister move by France. For
Napoleon had been plotting to set the Tricolor over
the tremendous region between the great river and
the Rockies, and give France a subject-dominion in
America that should balance England's India in Asia.
Strangely enough, the story of the three dominant
flags in this bit of history comes to a climax in the
space of a few days, even hours, in a single square in
New Orleans. On the 30th of November, 1803, the
Spanish authorities transferred their colony to Laus-
sat, the resident French agent. An appropriate cere-
mony was planned, the arrival of Napoleon's repre-
sentative. General Victor, was expected, and every one,
as we are told in an old chronicle, had his cockade of
tricolor ready to stick in his hat as soon as the flag
of Spain was lowered and the Tricolor of France was
raised.
Then came in the fine hand of the power we term
Destiny. Old Glory was to spoil the tableau for the
Tricolor. Thomas Jefferson, acting through his agents,
Livingston and Monroe, in Paris, had purchased on
April 30, 1803, not alone New Orleans but one mil-
lion square miles in the very heart of the continent.
112 THE DRAMATIC STORY OF OLD GLORY
And the price was fifteen million dollars; fifteen round
silver coins for each square mile. The fact of this
amazing sale was not known, or announced, until late
in the year; but Laussat knew that the ceremony of
November 30 was empty of all real meaning. He had
big plans for Louisiana, and the news that General
Wilkinson and Governor Claiborne, of Mississippi,
were on their way to take from him the keys to an
Empire, must have been a sad piece of information.
On that historic December 30, 1803, the open space
in New Orleans, "then a parade ground for an army,"
had at its center a tall, imposing flagstaff. During the
morning, the Tricolor fluttered from the top of this
staff. The French military officers and soldiers were
grouped about it, and around them was a curiously
variegated crowd, as one writer describes it, "human
faces, eagerly looking up in the bright December sun,
a motley of color and expression, white, yellow, red.
Frenchman, Spaniard, African, mulatto, Indian, and,
most visible of all by his height and boisterous triumph
on the occasion, the tall, lanky Westerner, in coon-
skin cap and leathern hunting shirt."
When the commissioners appeared, the Tricolor be-
gan to flutter gently down, and the great new Flag,
the Stars and Stripes, to mount the staff. As the two
flags passed each other, they paused for a moment. A
cannon was fired, and all the guns in New Orleans, on
fort, battery and ships, answered in salute. As the
last faint echo died away, Old Glory was streaming
from the top of the staff. An old record tells us that
"a group of Americans, who stood at the comer of the
square, waved their hats in token of respect for their
FLAG SUPPLANTS TRICOLOR 113
country's flag, and a few of them greeted it with their
voices."
We have given this raising of the Stars and Stripes
at New Orleans in December, 1803, considerable
space, and for two reasons. It marked a definite, tre-
mendous step in our history as a People, and it was
most rich in the color of romance. So we present a
last final scene, in tribute to our great friend of to-day,
France. When the Tricolor was sent to the tip of the
staff at New Orleans, on November 30, 1903, a little
group of French veterans formed themselves into a
guard of honor, to act as a sort of death-watch for their
beloved standard. On December 30 they stood at the
base of the staff, and took the Tricolor in their arms
as it came down to them. Then they marched away
in silence, led by their sergeant bearing the flag. Every
one uncovered as it went past, and the United States
troops presented arms.
XXI
Old Glory Goes Overland to the Pacific
THERE was at Washington, in 1803, in the Pres-
ident's chair, a man who, like his great predeces-
sor, George Washington, had an eye to the West. Both
men were far-visioned, and saw that the roads of the
Future for their country lay toward the setting sun.
But Thomas Jefferson's vision, stimulated by the Lou-
isiana Purchase, swept to the ranges of the Rockies,
questioning, wondering what lay between the Mis-
sissippi and that mighty barrier, and even what was
to be found on the slopes beyond, that fell to the
Pacific. He was instant in his purpose. He decided
to equip and send out an exploring expedition to cross
the "Stony Mountains," as the Rockies were then
called, and to go down the "nearest river" to the west-
ern sea. With all his imaginative reach of thought,
Jefferson little dreamed what a conquest he had in
store for the Stars and Stripes.
When Congress appropriated the money required
to finance Jefferson's project, he at once chose his
private secretary, Meriwether Lewis, to lead the party
of explorers. Lewis asked Captain William Clark of
the United States Army to go with him as second in
command. When all was ready, the expedition was
made up of the two leaders and twenty-six men. Nine
114
OLD GLORY GOES OVERLAND 115
of the party, from Kentucky, were accustomed to fron-
tier life among the Indians. Add to them fourteen
soldiers from the Army, who volunteered, two French
voyageurs or watermen, one of whom could act as in-
terpreter among the Indians, and one negro, and you
have the complete roster of Lewis and Clark's little
band.
We cannot give space to an exhaustive statement of
their purposes. They were to get Old Glory through
to the Pacific, through a wilderness and over moun-
tains never before crossed by Americans. They were
to observe the natives and record their customs while
on the way, and they were to note the flora, fauna and
geological structure of the country traversed. Among
the articles carried as gifts to the Indians, were gilt
braid, red trousers, medals and United States Flags.
As their journey, in its first stages, was to be up the
Missouri River, they were given three boats, the largest
being a fifty-five foot keel-boat.
Now open your geography and see where California
borders on Oregon. Jefferson could not send Lewis
and Clark to the Pacific by the most direct route, by
way of the Platte River, through the South Pass of
the Rocky Mountains, by great Salt Lake and down
the valley of the Humboldt, crossing the Sierra Neva-
das at some point that led into the valley of the Sac-
ramento; for that road led straight into California
then under the golden banner of Spain. What he had
in mind was the Columbia River which, by right of
Gray's discovery in 1 792, gave the United States claim
to the territory it drained. If his twenty-eight men
could go up the Missouri to its headwaters, and then
ii6 THE DRAMATIC STORY OF OLD GLORY
strike directly west, through a mountain pass or over
a crest, they might reach the sources of the Columbia
and follow the river down to the coast. They could
carry Old Glory thousands of miles, always in the
territory of the United States; and they could bring
home, if they ever returned, some few pages of re-
liable information from a big book of American Nature
never before unfolded.
Jefferson feared that Lewis and Clark, and their
party, might be marooned on the Pacific coast or so
shattered by exposure and struggles with the Indians
that they could not hope to retrace their steps. He
gave these significant instructions: "Our Consuls,
Thomas Hewes at Batavia in Java, William Buchanan
in the Isles of France and Bourbon, and John Emslie
at the Cape of Good Hope, will be able to supply your
necessities by drafts on us." In other words, if a tat-
tered Old Glory and a camp of ragged United States
explorers on a strip of the shores of the Pacific, were
sighted by men under the Union Jack or some other
flag, they could be transferred by sea to some Asiatic
or African port where they could find aid from Eng-
lishmen or Frenchmen.
On Monday, May 21, 1804, the party set out from
a point opposite St. Louis to go up the Missouri to
its source. We must neglect any account of the many
instances of heroism shown and the really dramatic
situations met by Lewis and Clark and their com-
rades. We are interested wholly with the part the
American Flag played in their journey. They had a
keen sense of their duty in leaving the impress of the
Flag on all the land crossed. It was appropriate that
OLD GLORY GOES OVERLAND 117
on July 4, 1804, the Missouri River heard for the first
time the firing of guns celebrating an anniversary of
the Declaration of Independence, and incidentally giv-
ing tribute to Thomas Jefferson, who wrote the great
document and was the originator of the plan of their
expedition.
The journal of Lewis and Clark is punctuated with
brief flag-episodes. On August 3, 1804, chiefs of the
Ottoes, Missouris and Pawnees came in to camp for
conference: "The great chief of the nation not being
of the party, we sent him a flag," says the record of
the expedition. This gift of a Stars and Stripes to an
Indian chief occurred at the place where Council Bluffs
stands to-day.
If we go on up the Missouri to Yankton, South
Dakota, we are at the spot where the Sioux and the
white men met for a grand council under an oak tree,
from the top of which streamed an Old Glory. Sep-
tember 25th found the expedition at the junction of
the Teton and the Missouri Rivers where, as the jour-
nal says, "we raised a flagstaff. After this we went
through the ceremony of acknowledging the chiefs, by
giving to the grand chief a medal, a flag of the United
States, a laced uniform coat, a cocked hat and feather."
On October 10, when Lewis and Clark were in what
is now the famous Deadwood mining district of the
Black Hills, South Dakota, and three days' journey
south from Spring River, they held another meeting
with the Indians. Again we quote from the journal:
"We then acknowledged three chiefs, one for each of
the three villages ; giving to each a flag, a medal, a red
coat, a cocked hat and feather," It is a pity that no
ii8 THE DRAMATIC STORY OF OLD GLORY
modem motion-picture man could have been with
Lewis and Clark. Those Indians, togged out in their
new finery, would have made a rare picture.
Winter was coming down on the little band as they
were in the region of modern North Dakota. Before
selecting the place for winter quarters, Lewis and Clark
summoned to council^ the chiefs of the neighboring
tribes, the Mandans, the Annahaways and the Minne-
tarees. Once more the Flag figured. *'One chief of
each town," says the faithful journal, "was acknowl-
edged by a gift of a flag, a medal with a likeness of
the President of the United States, a uniform coat,
hat and feather." The camp of the expedition for
the winter of 1804-5 was in modern McLean County,
North Dakota, sixteen hundred miles up the Missouri
from St. Louis. On Christmas day, "the American
flag was hoisted on the fort and saluted with a volley
of musketry."
The winter was a breathing-spell for a plunge into
the unknown. The country previously covered by
Lewis and Clark was not wholly a terra incognita, as
trappers and hunters had come down stream with re-
ports that gave some idea of its nature. But the land
to be explored was to see in the Stars and Stripes the
first bit of bunting of any nation ever unfurled in its
deeps. We hurry on in our story, though tempted to
give more of this historic, epochal trailmaking the full
recounting it deserves. We come to the date May 26,
1805. On that day, Captain Lewis climbed a high
hill on the north side of the Missouri, and saw the
sunlight gleaming on the snowy summits of the Rocky
Mountains fully fifty miles away. The sight fired
OLD GLORY GOES OVERLAND 119
him and his little party. It gave them renewed strength
in pulling and tugging their boats up rapids and over
shoals.
We are now at a point in their journey that gives
us a picturesque scene. It was the middle of July,
1805. Lewis and Clark were going through that great
gap in the hills where, as they wrote, "for five and
three-quarter miles these rocks rise perpendicularly
from the water's edge to the height of nearly twelve
hundred feet." They called this portal the "Gates of
the Rocky Mountains." Picture, if you can, the little
band moving into those stupendous gates with the
Stars and Stripes showing its Red, White and Blue
against "the black granite near the base." In the last
days of July, the party was at the foot of the narrow
rampart that divides Idaho from Montana on our
maps of to-day. Just beyond them, over this range,
were the springs that give the streams that flow into
the Columbia River.
An American Flag was given to the Shoshones on
August 13, 1805, not far from the place where the
boats were abandoned and canoes substituted as means
of transportation. In a few days, the expedition
crossed the divide, and Old Glory was at a point
where, as one writer says, "one can imagine a tiny
drop of water falling from the clouds and being di-
vided by the upturned edge of a leaf, the one half
finding its way to the Atlantic Ocean by way of the
Missouri, the Mississippi and the Gulf of Mexico,
the other flowing into the Pacific by way of the Co-
lumbia River." To state this feat of nature in terms
of this our history, one half of that drop of water
120 THE DRAMATIC STORY OF OLD GLORY
might go on to New Orleans, where the Stars and
Stripes supplanted the Tricolor, and the other half
to the raging surf of the Pacific, where the Stars and
Stripes dared destruction to find a river that was to
be forever one of its great waterways.
Eventually Lewis and Clark got to the upper
reaches of the Columbia, and in canoes went down it
to the Pacific. Under the date, November 8, 1805,
we have this triumphant bit of record: "Great joy
in camp. We are in view of the Ocean, this great
Pacific Ocean which we have been so anxious to see,
and the roaring or noise made by the waves breaking
on the rocky shores may be heard distinctly."
On December 3, 1805, Clark carved on the trunk
of a great pine tree this inscription:
Wm Clark December 3D 1805
By Land from the U. States
IN 1804 & 5.
The Stars and Stripes had gone overland to the Pa-
cific, through country that was to be carved into the
magnificent States of Missouri, Iowa, Kansas, Ne-
braska, South Dakota, North Dakota, Montana,
Idaho, Oregon and Washington.
XXII
The Flag Floats Over an African Fortress
IT is a long flight from the Pacific shore at the
mouth of the Columbia River to the Mediter-
ranean coast of Northern Africa. At the very time
Lewis and Clark were carrying the Flag through our
western country, Old Glory was settling a number of
scores with the pirates of Tripoli, and the story of
this squaring of accounts is spiced with spectacular
incidents. During the closing years of the eighteenth
century, the Algerians preyed upon our commerce. We
were practically without a navy, and the only way
to obtain immunity was to pay good gold to the rob-
bers. In 1798, as a part of the tribute to Algiers,
and in way of penalty for delay in making the pay-
ment, the United States sent as a present to the Dey
the frigate Crescent and gifts to the value of three
hundred thousand dollars.
This concession to the Algerians awoke jealousy in
the small minds of their neighbors, the Tripolitans,
who complained because "the Sahib-Tuppa at
Tunis had received more than forty thousand dollars
from the United States in cash besides presents." As
the reply from Washington was slow in reaching him,
the Bashaw of Tripoli deposed the American consul
and cut down the consulate flag. If ever the United
121
122 THE DRAMATIC STORY OF OLD GLORY
States needed a man on the ground when the Stars
and Stripes was an object of insult, it was then and
there, at some spot within the borders of the pirate
States.
In July, 1797, General William Eaton was ap-
pointed "consul to the city and kingdom of Tunis."
He was instructed to alter the existent United States
treaty with Tunis. We quote from Eaton's auto-
biography: "Objection was also made by the Senate
to some other parts of the treaty; especially the pro-
vision that a barrel of gunpowder should be paid the
Tunisian government for the firing of every gun of
a Tunisian fort saluting American armed vessels enter-
ing their harbors ; the number of guns for a salute be-
ing left to the pleasure of those saluting." This pro-
vision meant that, every time an armed ship of the
United States entered a harbor of Tunis with the
Stars and Stripes displayed at the maintruck, those
crafty rascals could fire just as many guns in way of
salute as they saw fit, and claim from Uncle Sam a
fine big barrel of gunpowder in return for each gun
discharged.
Now that business of the gunpowder, together with
sundry other acts of pure plunder, was highly in ac-
cord with the character and the conduct of the men
of Northern Africa. It was not in harmony with
the ideas of William Eaton, Connecticut Yankee,
graduate of Dartmouth College and soldier of for-
tune. Eaton had in him qualities that make a suc-
cessful line-plunging half-back, and his story, told in
his own words, is full of what we modern Americans
call "pep." There was much trouble for Northern
OVER AN AFRICAN FORTRESS 123
Africa on the ship Sophia that sailed from the
United States with General William Eaton on board
as consul to Tunis.
In relating the story of the Stars and Stripes, Eaton
and the Tunisians and Tripolitans, we can do no bet-
ter than to cling pretty closely to his narrative, as
found in his autobiography. Immediately after his
arrival in Africa, there began a series of adroit fenc-
ing matches in diplomacy. On March 15, 1799,
Eaton met the Bey of Tunis. "After taking coffee,"
Eaton tells us, "he began to interrogate me."
"Is your vessel a vessel of war*?"
"Yes."
"Why was not I duly informed of it, that you
might have been saluted, as is customary?"
"We were unacquainted with the customs."
Now note this little sidenote in the autobiography,
which illustrates this whole incident in the passage of
wits: "True cause, we did not choose to demand a
salute which would cost the United States eight hun-
dred dollars."
William Eaton saw at once that the Stars and
Stripes was receiving a double insult. There was the
intention of browbeating the United States, and there
was a demand for a salute that was sheer extortion
in dollars and cents and not a decent, honorable rec-
ognition of one nation by another through an inter-
change of salutes to their flags. So we read, with
growing interest, this brief account of a later meeting,
which opened with much haggling. After an hour
or more of empty talk, "I was introduced to his (the
Bey's) apartment," says Eaton. "A few words
]24 THE DRAMATIC STORY OF OLD GLORY
passed between us. He got into a passion, arose and
left the hall, but turned, going out, and said, 'Consult
your government. I give them six months to give me
an answer, and to send the presents. If they come
in that time, well; if not, take down your flag and
go home I' "
Eaton's temper came right up to the top. Old
Glory had been sneered at, ridiculed by a cheap little
beggar on a strip of African sand. He wrote to Wash-
ington at once. In his letter he said, among other
plainly spoken words, "Too many concessions have
been made. There is but one language which can be
held to these people, and this is terror." The letter
closes with, "The United States have no messenger
whom I would greet with so much cordiality with an
answer as Commodore Barry." William Eaton de-
sired greatly to see the Stars and Stripes waving over
the black muzzles of a row of cannon on an American
frigate, with those guns pointed at the pirate's palace.
Picture this Connecticut Yankee counting on his
fingers the names of the American ships that carried
Old Glory past Gibraltar in the spring of 1799.
Eighty of them I And every one of them was in dan^
ger of being taken and having its Old Glory destroyed
or thrown into the sea. He looks down from the wall
where he is sitting, upon the Mediterranean, and sees
the harmless little ship, the Sophia^ that had brought
him from the United States, riding at anchor. He
speaks of her that day in his journal, as "the little
Sophia disguised in men's clothes." He wants a fight,
and lacks weapons with which to fight.
At last there came a day when Eaton set down in
OVER AN AFRICAN FORTRESS 125
a letter to Washington some plain facts as to condi-
tions in the Mediterranean as they concerned the Stars
and Stripes:
"France has no commerce exposed. Spain can defend her-
self by assistance of auxiliaries drawn from her mines.
Portugal, tho' a lady, speaks with a manly tone to these
pirates ; she dictates to them under their own batteries. Den-
mark and Sweden have frigates in these seas; Holland has
no commerce here. Tunis is robbed of her prey, and is as
restless as a bear. Plunder must be had. Where is it to be
found? America presents it. But Tunis is at peace with
America. Necessity has no law. A pretext is found for a
declaration of war in our delinquency ; or delay in sending out
the stipulated regalia (present of jewels). The commerce in
this sea will fall the victim to these starving robbers."
But Jefferson and Congress did not move then. Ea-
ton, single-handed, "acted with so much boldness and
tact that he secured for his country the freedom of its
commerce from attacks by the Tunisian cruisers," as
an historian tells us. In 1803, he returned to the
United States and was appointed naval agent for the
Barbary States. He accompanied the American fleet
sent to the Mediterranean in 1804, with Decatur,
Hull and other young officers soon to become house-
hold names in the United States. All schoolboys who
have read the history of this country know the records
of our little fleet at Tripoli. The burning of the Phil-
adelphia has furnished a classic incident for our text-
books. Yet, for all the heroism shown, three years'
experience proved that a blockade merely protected
in part our commerce. Blackmail was still a condi-
126 THE DRAMATIC STORY OF OLD GLORY
tion of peace. And you cannot besmirch the American
Flag with blackmail.
Now steps on the stage a new commander in the
United States fleet in the Mediterranean, Samuel Bar-
ron, with our friend William Eaton. The latter's
supreme adventure of 1805, as Henry Adams assures
us, was so "daring, so romantic and even Quixotic,
that for at least half a century every boy in America
listened to the story with the same delight with which
he read the Arabian Nights." This story gives us one
of Old Glory's greatest exploits.
William Eaton, to tell the truth, had no real au-
thority to act in a military capacity when he arrived
in the Mediterranean; so, when he abruptly left Bar-
ron and sailed to Malta, where he arrived on September
5, 1804, he was off on a vagabond crusade on his own
hook. But he had a big idea. He intended to play
Hamet Caramelli, the exiled rightful Bey of Tripoli,
against Yusuf the usurper. He planned to raise an
army under the Stars and Stripes and march with Ha-
met to besiege Dema, the eastern capital of Tripoli.
A plan for joint operations was made with Commander
Barron, and the hour to strike had come.
On March 3, 1805, at a place called the Arab's
Tower, about forty miles southwest of Alexandria,
Egypt, the Stars and Stripes fluttered over the most
"strangely assorted force that ever marched and fought
under its shadow." General William Eaton must have
smiled as he reviewed his "Army of Northern Africa."
The cream of this army was a little group of seven
United States marines, led by Lieutenant O'Bannon.
The remainder were Greeks, Tripoli tans and Arab
OVER AN AFRICAN FORTRESS 127
camel-drivers ; in all, about four hundred men. Hamet
was set on a camel and told to come along.
For days this polyglot band of real fighters mixed
with booty-seekers, toiled across the Desert of Barca,
with the sun at 120 F. for hours at a time. Henry
Adams, in his admirable history, affirms that "without
discipline, cohesion, or sources of supply, even with-
out water for days, their march was a sort of miracle."
Where is the artist to give us a picture of Old Glory
at the head of this ragamuffin regiment*?
On April 14, the "Araiy of Northern Africa"
reached Bomba, where ships from the American fleet
were to meet them. To Eaton's consternation, no
ships were in sight. We cannot improve on his auto-
biography at this crisis: "I went off with my Chris-
tians, and kept up fires upon a high mountain in our
rear all night. At eight the next morning, at the in-
stant when our camp was about breaking up, the
Pasha's casnadar, Zaid, who had ascended the moun-
tain for a last look-out, discovered a sail! It was the
Argus. Captain Hull had seen our smokes, and stood
in. Language is too poor to paint the joy and exulta-
tion which this messenger of life excited in every
breast."
Supplies were furnished from the Argus and, on
April 25, 1805, the "Army of Northern Africa," with
General William Eaton and Old Glory at its head,
moved on Derna. The town was held by a garrison
of eight hundred men, who had made earthworks and
cut loopholes through the terraces and walls for mus-
ket-^re. On April 27, Eaton sent in a flag of truce.
It came back with the message, "My head, or yours."
128 THE DRAMATIC STORY OF OLD GLORY
Preparations for an assault, were at once made. Three
United States vessels, the Hornet, the Nautilus and
the Argus, each flying Old Glory, anchored off the
town, the first within pistol-shot of the Tripolitan bat-
teries. All three opened fire.
Late in the afternoon, Eaton ordered his marines
under Lieutenant O'Bannon, now reen forced by ma-
rines from the three ships, to storm the fortifications.
He, in person, led one body of his little army on one
side of Derna, while the marines came in from the
shore. They were met by a murderous fire. Eaton
was badly wounded. But the man who had sworn to
avenge the insults to his Flag, and had marched with
it across five hundred miles of desert, was not daunted.
He placed himself at the very front and charged across
a plain swept by musket-fire.
During this struggle, O'Bannon and his marines
had stormed the fort and, in a perfect whirlwind of
bullets, had turned the cannon on the Tripolitans and
hoisted the Stars and Stripes over a bastion where the
pirate banner had streamed. For the first time in his-
tory, the Stars and Stripes had been raised over a
fortress of the Old World.
And so, during the month when two American ex-
plorers were carrying Old Glory to the base of the
eastern wall of a western mountain range in North
America, an impetuous little body of United States
marines, with a self-made Yankee commander, were
storming the front of a fortification in North Africa,
to plant the Stars and Stripes upon it as a warning
that no man or nation can attempt with impunity to
impose upon the United States and her Flag.
XXIII
The Stars and Stripes Seeks the Source of
THE Mississippi
ON August 9, 1805, a little over a year after the
day when Lewis and Clark set out from St.
Louis to go up the Missouri, a young officer in the
United States Army, Lieut. Zebulon M. Pike, started
from the same city, then a straggling town, to go up
the Mississippi and seek its source. Pike was about
twenty-five years old when he captained this adven-
ture of the Stars and Stripes, and, to judge from his
journal, was in many ways better equipped mentally
for an exploring expedition into wild and unknown
country than was Lewis or Clark. His journal re-
veals some ability to write interesting and grammati-
cal prose. A quaint touch of color appears in the leaves
of his record as he tells us of hours passed in study
and in reading. Here are a few entries: "Refreshed
my memory as to French grammar;" "Read and la-
bored at our works;" "Read Pope's Essays." One day's
entry is compressed into a single word, "Studying."
While in the dead of winter near the source of the
Mississippi, Pike read, a part of it probably by candle
light, Volney's "Egypt." The fields of ice and snow
around him must have thrown a strange background
against the tropic splendor of the Nile that took shape
in his imagination.
129
130 THE DRAMATIC STORY OF OLD GLORY
On August 20, 1805, the little party of twenty-one
men in their seventy-foot boat "arrived at the rapids
of De Moyen" (Des Moines). "We had passed,"
says Pike, "the first and most difficult shoals, when
we were met by Mr. Wm. Ewing with a French in-
terpreter, four chiefs and fifteen men of the Sac nation,
in their canoes, bearing the flag of the United States."
On the following day, August 21, 1805, Pike ad-
dressed the Sac nation. We give a part of his little
speech, the portion in which he defines one phase of
Jefferson's purpose in sending out Lewis and Clark and
himself. He told the Indians that "their great father,
the president of the United States, wishing to be more
intimately acquainted with the situation, wants, etc.,
of the different nations of the red people in our newly
acquired territory of Louisiana, ordered the general to
send a number of his young warriors in different di-
rections, to take them by the hand." Pike made con-
stant use of the Stars and Stripes in his dealings with
the Indians. With him, as with Lewis and Clark, it
carried a message of brotherly friendship, and they
had little cause to fear injury at the hands of the
Indians during all the days of their explorations. As
Henry Whiting, one of Pike's biographers, says, "The
flag is an emblem that carries with it some moral au-
thority, even among Indians. He (Pike) made it re-
spected, and made it exclusive, while he was in the
Indian country." By "exclusive" Whiting means the
shutting out of all other national flags from the coun-
try gained for the Stars and Stripes through the Louisi-
ana Purchase.
When Pike and his men were a few miles below the
FLAG AT SOURCE OF MISSISSIPPI 131
falls of St. Anthony, a very pretty little drama oc-
curred, with Old Glory as the principal actor. The
journal for September 24, 1805, was in great part de-
voted to the first picture in this playlet. We quote:
"In the morning I discovered my flag was missing
from my boat. Being in doubt whether it had been
stolen by the Indians, or had fallen overboard and
floated away, I sent for my friend, the Original Love,
and sufficiently evinced to him, by the vehemence of
my action, by the immediate punishment of my guard
(having inflicted on one of them corporeal punish-
ment) and by sending down the shore three miles in
search of it, how much I was displeased that such a
thing should have occurred."
Later in the day, as a sort of interlude in our little
play. Pike "sent a flag to the Sioux at the head of the
St. Peters," undoubtedly following instructions from
Washington that copied orders to Lewis and Clark,
directing each body of explorers to see to it that the
Indians received and were requested to respect the
Stars and Stripes.
The curtain rose on September 25, 1805, on the
second scene in the flag-drama that opened on the
previous day, that of the lost Old Glory. Pike con-
tinues, in his journal, as follows, "I was awakened out
of my bed by Le Petit Corbeau, head chief, who came
up from the village to see if we were all killed, or
if any accident had happened to us; this was in con-
sequence of their having found my flag floating three
miles below their village (fifteen miles hence), from
which they concluded some affray had taken place,
and that it had been thrown overboard. Although I
132 THE DRAMATIC STORY OF OLD GLORY
considered this an unfortunate accident for me, I was
exceedingly happy at its effect; for it was the occasion
of preventing much bloodshed among the savages."
"A chief called the Outard Blanche had his lip
cut off, and had come to Petit Corbeau and told him
that 'his face was his looking glass, that it was spoiled,
that he was determined on revenge.' The parties were
charging their guns and preparing for action, when lo,
the flag appeared, like a messenger of peace sent to
prevent their bloody purposes. They were all aston-
ished to see it: the staff was broke. Then the Petit
Corbeau arose and spoke to this effect: 'That a thing
so sacred had not been taken from my boat without
violence; that it would be proper for them to hush all
private animosities until they had revenged the cause
of their eldest brother; that he would immediately go
up to St. Peters to know what dogs had done that
thing, in order to take steps to get satisfaction of those
who had done the mischief.' They all listened to this
reasoning and he immediately had the flag put out to
dry and embarked for my camp."
Third scene, little drama of the lost Old Glory of
September, 1805. Entry in Pike's journal for the 27th
of the month: "Two young Indians brought my flag
across by land, who arrived yesterday, just as we came
in sight of the falls. I made them a present for their
punctuality and expedition, and the danger they were
exposed to from the journey."
That is a perfectly splendid scene, the moment of
the arrival of the Flag floating on the Mississippi. We
invite some painter to give us the angry Indians about
to open fire with their muskets, and one of them catch-
FLAG AT SOURCE OF MISSISSIPPI 133
ing sight of the "messenger of peace," the Stars and
Stripes rippling by on the surface of the current, and
swimming out into the river to rescue it.
In the middle of October, Pike was well up in the
heart of modern Minnesota, and began the construc-
tion of his block-house. He was two hundred and
thirty-three miles above the falls of St. Anthony.
From there as a base, he made trips of exploration over
the snow, on sledges and snow-shoes. On New Year's
Day, 1806, he was in the land of the Chipeways; "My
interpreter came to me in a great hurry, conjuring me
not to go so far ahead, and assured me that the Chipe-
ways, encountering me, without an interpreter, party
or flag, would certainly kill me."
Pike's entry for the next day reveals a friendly and
not a hostile spirit on the side of the Indians: "Fine
warm day. Discovered fresh signs of Indians. Just
as we were incamping at night, my sentinel informed
me that some Indians were coming at full speed upon
our trail or track. I ordered my men to stand to their
guns carefully. They were immediately at my camp,
and saluted the flag by a discharge of three pieces;
when four Chipeways, one Englishman and a French-
man of the North West Company, presented them-
selves. They had heard of us and revered our flag."
It is a pleasure to give, in this book, permanent rec-
ord in a history of our Flag of a kindly reception of it
and its bearers by a British subject, over one hundred
years ago. On January 3, 1806, Pike wrote, "My
party marched early, but I returned with Mr. Grant
to his establishment on the Red Cedar Lake, having
one corporal with me. When we came in sight of the
134 THE DRAMATIC STORY OF OLD GLORY
house, I observed the flag of Great Britain flying. I
felt indignant and cannot say what my feelings would
have excited me to, had he not informed me that it
belonged to the Indians. This was not much more
agreeable to me."
Now open the journal to the page with the entry for
February l. Pike had reached "an establishment of
the North West Company" and "was received with
marked attention and hospitality by Mr. Hugh M'Gil-
lis. Had a good dish of coffee, biscuit, butter and
cheese for supper."
This man M'Gillis warms our hearts. He was of
the same breed that gave North America the intrepid,
honest Mackenzie, forerunner of the true men of the
British Northwest of to-day. The Stars and Stripes
has nothing to fear from such neighbors under the
Union Jack. "On Feb. 6," adds Pike, "my men ar-
rived at the fort about four o'clock. Mr. M'Gillis
asked if I had any objection to his hoisting their flag
in compliment to ours. I made none, as I had not yet
expressed to him my ideas." Pike's "ideas" were, of
course, that Old Glory miist fly supreme over that
region.
On February 9, 1806, Pike traveled over the snow to
the station of a Mr. Dickson, on Leech Lake. Here
is the succinct account of the event that happened:
"Hoisted the American flag in the fort. The English
yacht (jack) still flying at the top of the flagstaff, I
directed the Indians and my riflemen to shoot at it,
who soon broke the iron pin to which it was fastened
and brought it to the ground."
February 12, 1806, reveals Pike's assurance that he
FLAG AT SOURCE OF MISSISSIPPI 135
was at the source of the Mississippi. He says, "This
may be called the upper source of the Mississippi." He
was not at the true source. Other men, coming later,
were to fix the springs of the great river at another
point.
Another flag-episode comes into his records on Feb-
ruary 16, 1806: "Held a council with the chiefs and
wardors at this place. . . . They generally delivered
up their flags (British) with a good grace, except the
Flat Mouth, who said he had left both at his camp,
three days' march, and promised to deliver them up to
Mr. M'Gillis to be forwarded." The true-hearted
Briton knew what was right, though it must have hurt
him to act as an intermediary in a visible transfer of au-
thority. He goes out of our book at this stage. Pike,
his American supplanter, was to die a brigadier gen-
eral, within a few years, while fighting under the Stars
and Stripes against his Union Jack. In his last mo-
ments, a captured British flag was placed under his
head as a pillow.
Here is a significant foot-note from Pike's journal:
"17th. Feb. The chief of the land brought in his flag
and delivered it up." If England had possessed men
like you, M'Gillis, in London in that year 1806, the
insane war of 1812, which was precipitated by insults
to Old Glory, might never have appeared in history.
Pike and his party returned in safety to St. Louis,
but he was not to remain idle. On July 15, 1806, he
set out again, this time to go up the Missouri, cross
by land to the Arkansas River, and go up the latter
stream exploring and meeting the Indians as he ad-
vanced. With him went two lieutenants, one surgeon.
136 THE DRAMATIC STORY OF OLD GLORY
one sergeant, two corporals and sixteen privates.
There is but one event of this journey that fits into
this book. Before we embody it in this chapter, we
give a picture of Pike's mode of approach to a village.
He says that the party advanced with "Lieutenant
Wilkinson and myself in front; my sergeant, on a
white horse, next with the colors." This passage tells
us very definitely that the Stars and Stripes was to be
displayed continually. The fact that the Flag that
floated down the Mississippi in 1805 was on a broken
staff, proves that it must have been planted either in
the bow or the stern of the seventy-foot boat.
In Republican County, modern Kansas, on Septem-
ber 29, 1806, Pike and his followers "held our grand
council with the Pawnees, at which were present not less
than four hundred warriors, the circumstances of which
were extremely interesting. . . . The Spaniards had
left several of their flags in their village, one of which
was unfurled at the chiefs door the day of the grand
council. Amongst various demands and charges I gave
them, was that the said flag should be delivered to me
and one of the United States flags be received and
hoisted in its place. This probably was carrying the
pride of nations a little too far, as there had so lately
been a large force of Spanish cavalry at the village,
which had made a great impression on the minds of
the young men, as to their power, consequence, etc.,
which my appearance with the 2oth infantry was by
no means calculated to remove."
The journal continues as follows: "After the chiefs
had replied to various parts of my discourse, but were
silent as to the flag, I again reiterated the demand for
FLAG AT SOURCE OF MISSISSIPPI 137
the flag, adding that it was impossible for the nation
to have two fathers ; that they must either be the chil-
dren of the Spaniards or acknowledge their 'American
father.' After a silence of some time, an old man rose,
went to the door and took down the Spanish flag, and
brought it and laid it at my feet, and then received the
American flag and elevated it on the staff which had
lately borne the standard of his Catholic majesty.
Perceiving that every face was clouded with sorrow,
as if some great national calamity was about to befal
them, I took up the contested colors and told them
that it was the wish of the Americans that their red
brethren should remain peacefully around their own
fires." It is to Pike's credit that he succeeded in
handling a difficult problem with rare tact.
This event undoubtedly marked the first raising of
Old Glory within the borders of what is now the State
of Kansas. On July 4, 1901, the corner-stone of a
shaft of granite, twenty-seven feet high, was laid at
the site of the Pawnee village. The shaft bears this
inscription :
Erected by the State of Kansas,
1901,
To Mark the Site of the Pawnee Republic,
Where
Lieut. Zebulon M. Pike
Caused the Spanish Flag to be Lowered
And the Flag of the United States to be Raised,
September 29, 1806.
138 THE DRAMATIC STORY OF OLD GLORY
Zebulon M. Pike left his name on the map of his
country. On November 15, 1806, he wrote of "a moun-
tain on our right, which appeared like a small blue
cloud. . . . Their appearance can easily be imagined
by those who have crossed the Alleghany, but their sides
were whiter as if covered with snow." That mountain
on the horizon, "a small blue cloud," is now known as
"Pike's Peak."
XXIV
Discord Among the Three Tricolors
IN this year 1919, the Stars and Stripes is seen in
thousands of homes in the United States, flanked
by the flags of Great Britain and France. A little
more than a hundred years ago, it was between the
same two standards, but in the unhappy position of an
innocent party in danger of being singed in the flames
that threatened to burn its fellow tricolors. For Eng-
land and France were at grips, and their struggle con-
vulsed the commercial world. London tried to shut
ships flying Old Glory from all French harbors, and
Paris, through Napoleon's Berlin and Milan Decrees,
aimed to prevent our Flag on our ships from enter-
ing British ports.
How greatly this country was confused by the shift-
ing shuttles of European politics and entangled Amer-
ican sympathies, is shown in the attitude of her citi-
zens. This attitude, or want of concerted purpose, is
well expressed by Henry Adams: "President Madison
submitted to Napoleon in order to resist England ; the
New England Federalists preferred submitting to Eng-
land in order to resist Napoleon; but not one American
expected the United States to uphold their national
rights against the world."
Few if any historians have realized that our Flag,
139
J40 THE DRAMATIC STORY OF OLD GLORY
as a symbol of nationality, came to its own in the
early years of the last century, and on the sea. All
ships of all Powers display their colors; for these col-
ors are the only means of positive identification dis-
tinctly visible over distances where waters intervene.
The contest between Napoleon and Great Britain
spread out to the high seas, became a cut-throat strug-
gle in commercial blockades. It developed into a prob-
lem of shutting out even neutrals. The United States
was a sadly perplexed neutral, and her Flag was to
suffer exclusion and ignominy in the angry give-and-
take of the times. For the Flag, being the nation's
supreme indubitable symbol on the ocean, was the
watched-for mark of the United States at trade. Im-
mediately, even as early as 1807, the Stars and Stripes
became a figure of speech frequent in impassioned ad-
dresses and in the daily press.
The affair of the Chesapeake and the Leopard off
the Virginia coast in 1807, was like a sudden swing-
ing of a vane turned by a breeze from the sea, indi-
cating to those inland that there was trouble brewing
seaward. English sailors had been deserting to Amer-
ican ships. Admiral George C. Berkeley, of his Britan-
nic Majesty's fleet in the North Atlantic, said in orders
to that fleet, in 1807, "Subjects of his Britannic Maj-
esty, and serving in his ships, deserted — and openly
paraded in the streets of Norfolk under the American
flag." This marching of erstwhile English seamen un-
der Old Glory was considered a rank insult to the
Union Jack. On July 29, 1807, Captain Douglas, of
his Majesty's Service, wrote a letter to the Mayor of
Norfolk, in which he said, "You must be perfectly
DISCORD AMONG TRICOLORS 141
aware that the British flag never has been, nor will be,
insulted with impunity."
The guns of the Leopard opening fire on the Ches-
apeake while practically defenseless, awoke the United
States to the realization that England meant a busi-
ness of a sinister nature. The right of search on the
high seas, even in neutral waters, following a com-
mand to stand to, was a violation of international law.
Jefferson, and Madison, his Secretary of State, wrote
to Monroe in Europe on July 16, 1807, ''As a security
for the future, an entire abolition of impressments from
vessels under the flag of the United States, if not al-
ready arranged, is also to make an indispensable part
of the satisfaction." They had the Chesapeake affair
in mind.
England saw in 1807 that trouble between her and
the United States might arise from the double incite-
ment of the search of the Chesapeake for deserters,
after a broadside, and the stifling of American trade
with European countries through decrees closing ports.
Yet the general feeling of the day in England was
expressed in the London Morning Post, in a reference
of October 23, 1807, to the United States as an ''in-
significant Power" and, in the same paper of a previous
issue, January 27, 1807, when, with a glance to the
sea, it uttered the scornful words, "It will never be
permitted to be said that the Royal Sovereign has
struck her flag to a Yankee cockboat."
If England was baiting the United States with
words and actions, France, under Napoleon, was also
playing a part of tantalizing mystery and deeds equiv-
alent to slaps of the American face. Josiah Quincy,
142 THE DRAMATIC STORY OF OLD GLORY
of Massachusetts, said in 1808, that "Nature gave the
ocean to New England." See how Napoleon, in his
utterances, catered to the Federalists of the northern
States of the United States. On May 18, 1809, he
dictated the following: "The seas belong to all nations.
Every vessel under the flag of any nation whatever,
recognised and avowed by it, ought to be on the ocean
as if it were in its own ports. The flag flying from
the mast of a merchantman ought to be respected as
though it were on the top of a village steeple. To in-
sult a merchant-vessel carrying the flag of any Power
is to make an incursion into a village or a colony be-
longing to that Power."
Napoleon may have had France in mind as he dic-
tated those words, for he knew well how to fling out
the Tricolor and make it the very living symbol of
France, but he had New England in the background
of his thought; for he was preparing a letter to General
Armstrong, the representative of the United States in
Paris, and his "village steeple" was a shrewd casting
of a fly for the New England fish. He had blocked
England's scheme, if she ever had one, for an Empire
in the Mississippi Valley, when he closed the Louisiana
Purchase, and he was maneuvering, in the years that
immediately preceded the War of 1812, to get Old
Glory again into a tussle with the Union Jack. On
December 13, 1811, he wrote, "You will give the as-
surance that if the American government is decided to
maintain the independence of its flag, it will find every
kind of aid and privilege in this country." Napoleon
often made a flag the symbol of a nation's individual-
ity. In his address to deputies of the Hanseatic League,
DISCORD AMONG TRICOLORS 143
March 17, 181 1, he spoke of "nations that defend their
sovereignty and maintain the religion of their flag."
That month of March, 1811, marked Napoleon's
most direct hint to the United States. In a speech at
the Tuileries, on the 24th of the month, he said, *T
consider the flag of a nation as a part of herself. That
nation must be able to carry it everywhere, or she is
not free. That nation which does not make her flag
respected is not a nation in my eyes. The Americans,
we are going to see what they will do." One report of
this speech gave this passage : "As for neutral naviga-
tion, I regard the flag as an extension of territory. The
Power which lets it be violated cannot be considered
neutral. The lot of American commerce will soon be
decided."
In the closing weeks of 1811, spurred on by that
young and audacious body of Southern Congressmen
led by Clay and Calhoun, who were of a generation
after Madison and Monroe, the United States walked
up to the brink of war with England. Opposition to
a declaration of war was bitter in the extreme northern
group of States. Again we quote Henry Adams, for
we can find no better authority: "As a force in the
affairs of Europe, the United States had become an ap-
pendage to England. The Americans consumed little
but English manufactures, allowed British ships to
blockade New York and Chesapeake Bay, permitted
the British government to keep by force in its naval
service numbers of persons who were claimed as Amer-
ican subjects, and to take from American merchant-
vessels, at its free will, any man who seemed likely
to be useful." But New England's trade with Eng-
144 THE DRAMATIC STORY OF OLD GLORY
land was at stake, and she would not move toward war.
Yet New England could meet the cards played by
the South, with her own trumps. War with Great
Britain was declared on June 18, 1812. On the very
next day came news of still more "American vessels
burned by French frigates." A French commodore de-
clared that "he had orders to burn all American ves-
sels sailing to or from an enemy's port." As a matter
of simple fact, the United States had fully as much
cause to fight France in 1812 as she had to go to war
with Great Britain. She had even more cause for
defying Napoleon, for England was rapidly coming to
a ground of fair and open dealing with this country
in that year.
So, in 1812, the three Tricolors fell out. Napoleon
chuckled in his sleeve when he heard that one more
Power was arrayed against England. Great Britain
"felt that Madison had been a tool of Bonaparte, had
stabbed her in the back." To get a view of the Amer-
ican attitude, as it concerned the Stars and Stripes, we
turn once more to Henry Adams: Clay, Calhoun, and
their associates in Congress, "bent on war with Eng-
land, were willing to face debt and probable bank-
ruptcy on the chance of creating a nation, of conquer-
ing Canada, and carrying the American flag to Mobile
and Key West," then in foreign hands.
XXV
The Stars and Stripes Raised Over a Log
schoolhouse
EARLY in May, 1812, Massachusetts chose a legis-
lature more strongly Federalist, or supposedly
pro-British, than any one dared to predict. The old
Bay State, a military backbone of the French and In-
dian wars and the Revolution, was in the distressing
position of a province at odds with the nation. Were
it not for her splendid record on the Canadian frontier,
shown in the heroism of her enlisted men, and her
connection with the frigates Constitution and Essex and
many privateers, she would have stood shamed when
the War of 1812 came to its close.
Yet Massachusetts gave the United States, in 1812,
one remarkable, spontaneous proof of fealty. The in-
cident we are about to relate was one of those unher-
alded but natural evidences of fine patriotism that
often come from the hearts of a people acting inde-
pendently, without the counsel of their rulers and wise
men. In May, 1812, Old Glory went to the top of
"a pine staff" over a log schoolhouse on Catamount
Hill, Colrain, in the heart of Massachusetts. It is
generally believed that this home-made Flag was the
first Stars and Stripes to float over a schoolhouse in
the United States.
145
146 THE DRAMATIC STORY OF OLD GLORY
The women of Colrain, forerunners of the women
of the North who, in countless cities, towns and vil-
lages, sewed stripes and squares and stars, of red,
white and blue into Flags in 1861, were the inspiring
figures at the center of this event. Mrs. Rhoda Shippee
gave the cloth for the stars and the white stripes. Mrs.
Lois Shippee contributed the blue cloth for the Union.
But tradition hesitates between Mrs. Alden Willis and
Mrs. Stephen Hale, as the donor of the cloth for the
red stripes. And those loyal women wove the fabric
for the Old Glory of Colrain on their looms in their
homes.
A man comes into the story in the person of Amasa
Shippee who "marked out the stars with compass and
square," and went "down to the Pine Swamp" to cut
a staff from good old New England growth. Within
a few months, he was to be one of the five men from
Catamount Hill who marched away to fight for the
Stars and Stripes, who were true blue when so much
of Massachusetts was tinged with British red.
The whole story is American in its atmosphere.
The final picture of that Flag of the hearthfires going
to the top of its pine staff over a rough log school-
house, with the waving pines in the background, and
with a little group of men, their wives, and their boys
and girls barefooted and in homespun, is one that de-
serves perpetuation in a painting by an American art-
ist.
On June 3, 1903, the Catamount Hill Association
erected a monument in honor of the event of May,
1812, on the spot where the little log schoolhouse stood
one hundred years ago.
XXVI
The Flag on the Sea in the War of 1812
ONE of our most reliable historians divides the
years of our history from 1776 to 1812, into
periods of twelve years' duration. The first ended in
1788, with the adoption of the Constitution. The
Flag had won a compact of federation for its original
States of the thirteen stripes and stars. The second
closed with the year 1800, which date marked low
tide, a recession of the current of national purpose,
with the Flag struggling for firm ground on a rock-
bed of clean-cut nationality. The third period saw
a declaration of war with England, and Madison
throwing "forward the flag of the country, sure that
the people would press onward and defend it," al-
though the nation was split into opposing camps.
As the War of 1812 was forced by repressions of
American commerce and infringements of American
rights of the individual on the sea, it at once assumed
the form of a struggle to maintain inviolate the free-
dom of the Stars and Stripes on the ocean. A full
month before war was declared, an American frigate
had answered England's insult to the ensign of the
Chesapeake^ of 1807, in a decisive manner. On the
evening of May 16, 1812, Captain Rodgers, in the
President, while off Cape Charles, sighted a ship which
147
148 THE DRAMATIC STORY OF OLD GLORY
he took to be the British Guerriere^ on which was sup-
posed to be an American seaman recently impressed
by the English. He made sail in pursuit, and, just
after dusk, came near enough to hail. At 8.30, the
President rounded to within pistol-shot. Each ship
ran out "every gun in the broadside."
Rodgers' hail, "What ship is that?" was answered
by a flash and a ball that hit the mainmast of the
President. What happened then is best told in a
statement made by Rodgers after the action — note how
he makes the Flag the keynote — "Equally determined
not to be the aggressor or suffer the flag of my country
to be insulted with impunity, I gave a general order
to fire." A shattering volley smote the Englishman.
The action was brief, and the President^ s opponent
soon lay helpless, in distress. She was the English
corvette the Little Belt.
There was much controversy between the United
States and Great Britain over this affair, and we find
Old Glory figuring in the report of Captain Bingham
of the Little Belt, when he says, "At 6.30, finding he
gained so considerably on us as not to be able to elude
him during the night, being within gun-shot, and clear-
ly discerning the stars in his broad pennant, I imagined
the most prudent method was to bring to and hoist
the colors, that no mistake might arise."
We have given this little account of a very minor
incident in way of prelude to the real story of the Flag
on the sea during the War of 1812, as revealed in a
few dramatic scenes. That Great Britain made light
of the defeat of the Little Belt, and regarded this
country, in the summer of 1812, as an "insignificant
FLAG ON THE SEA IN 1812 149
Power" is clearly shown in a sentence that appeared
in the London Evening Star in July of that year.
That paper sneered at "a piece of striped bunting fly-
ing at the mastheads of a few iir-built frigates manned
by outlaws."
But England was to receive a shock that shook the
whole structure of her naval traditions. Bear in mind
that no European country had ever beaten her in a
single-ship action; that Trafalgar was, in 1812, a
memory of a tremendous victory less than seven years
past. During that month of July, when that refer-
ence to "striped bunting flying at the mastheads of a
few fir-built frigates" came to print in London, the
Constitution, Captain Isaac Hull, made her remarkable
escape from under the guns of a British fleet, through
superior seamanship. Within a month, to be precise,
on August 19, 1812, the same Constitution smashed
the Guerriere, a pride of the British navy, to flinders
off the New England coast. Hull sailed up Boston
harbor to the old Federalist town, and, his ship being
of Massachusetts make, there was no holding back the
true American soul from uttering itself in wild cries
of joy and in streets beflagged with Old Glory. A song
of the times, one of the many poems of jubilation,
gives us a stanza that introduces the London Evening
Star's "striped bunting" with real effect:
'Too long our tars have borne in peace
With British domineering;
But now they've sworn the trade should cease-
For venereance thev are steerin,^.
150 THE DRAMATIC STORY OF OLD GLORY
First gallant Hull, he was the lad
Who sailed a tyrant-hunting,
And swaggering Dacres soon was glad
To strike to 'striped hunting F "
There was a neat little incident on the smashed deck
of the Guerriere. Hull sent Lieut. Geo. C. Read in
a boat to receive the surrender of the British frigate.
When Read stepped up to Dacres, the British captain,
he said, "Commodore Hull's compliments, and wishes
to know if you have struck your flag." Dacres looked
up and down his ship, and then coolly and dryly re-
plied, "Well, I don't know. Our mizzen-mast is gone.
Our mainmast is gone. Upon the whole, you may say
we have struck our flag."
But behind unfortunate Dacres, across the wide
Atlantic, stood the English nation awaiting word of
victory. Imagine, if you can, the dismay when tid-
ings came of the Stars and Stripes waving above a
beaten Union Jack. The London Times^ then as now
the great paper of the city, lamented "the striking of
an English flag on the high seas to anything like an
equal force. . . . Never before in the history of the
world did an English frigate strike to an American."
Some one should have stood right up in meeting and
called up the shades of the Serapis and Paul Jones. It
was most sad, as the Guerriere was one of the select
frigates picked to drive "the insolent striped bunting
from the seas."
October i8, l8i2, witnessed the defeat of the Frolic
by the Wasp. The Britisher was so shattered, and lost
so many men, that an American had to board her
and haul down her flag. She fought magnificently,
FLAG ON THE SEA IN 1812 151
but was beaten decisively in a raging sea that hurled
spray over the muzzles of the guns.
On October 25, 1812, a week later, the United
States defeated the Macedonian and brought her home
in triumph. And, on December 29, the Constitution^
then under Bainbridge, whipped the Java, In six
months, England had lost the frigates Guerriere, Ma-
cedonian and Java^ and three hundred merchantmen.
This universal success of Old Glory on the sea went
far to compensate for the poor luck of the American
forces on land during the opening months of the war.
Even recent English writers do not neglect to pay a
just tribute to the achievements of the Stars and Stripes
on the ocean in 1812. Shane Leslie, in an article in
the Dublin Review, said in 1917, that "Naval honors
went to America. The Anglo-Saxon, after littering
the sea with Spanish, Dutch and French wreckage,
was whipped at sea by his own whelps."
Those sea-battles were contested bitterly, and were
won for Old Glory through the superior seamanship
of officers and the superb gunfire of crews. When it
came to the question of courage, of the ability to hold
on to the grim end, there was little choice between
American and Briton. And there was much noble
chivalry displayed under the two flags in that war on
the sea of 1812, a chivalry that should be recalled in
these later days of approaching understanding be-
tween Great Britain and the United States. Decatur,
who commanded the United States, and Garden, who
captained the Macedonian, had met in Norfolk just
before war was declared. This bit of dialogue is worth
preservation, especially for its flag-motif:
152 THE DRAMATIC STORY OF OLD GLORY
Garden : * 'We now meet as friends. God grant we
may never meet as enemies. But we are subject to the
orders of our governments, and must obey them."
Decatur: "I heartily reciprocate the sentiment."
Garden : ''But what, sir, would be the consequence to
yourself and the force you command, if we should meet
as enemies^"
Decatur: "Why, sir, if we meet with forces that
might be fairly called equal, the conflict would be se-
vere, but the flag of my country on the ship I command
shall never leave the staff on which it waves as long as
there is a hull to support it."
Epilogue: On October 25, 1812, Garden stepped on
board the United States to hand over his sword to De-
catur. "No, sir," said the latter, doffing his cocked
hat, "I cannot receive the sword of a man who has so
bravely defended his ship, but I will receive your
hand." Then Decatur conducted Garden to his cabin
where, as an old account tells us, "refreshments were
set out and partaken of in a friendly spirit by the two
commanders."
The defeats of the Guerriere, the Macedonian and
the Java, in rapid succession, stunned England. There
were no more references to the Constitution as "a bun-
dle of pine-boards." George Ganning, speaking in open
Parliament in February, 1813, asserted that the loss
of the Guerriere and the Macedonian produced a sen-
sation in the country scarcely to be equaled by the
most violent convulsion of nature. He added, "It
cannot be too deeply felt that the sacred spell of the
invincibility of the British fleet was broken by those
FLAG ON THE SEA IN 1812 153
unfortunate captures." The London Times confessed
that ''a very short time before the capture of the Guer^
riere, an American frigate was an object of ridicule
to our honest tars." And the Filot^ the chief naval
authority of England, seeing Old Glory like an ap-
parition in the west, fairly wailed. The following
must have made good reading for the men who stood
on decks under the Stars and Stripes: "Any one who
had predicted such a result of an American war this
time last year would have been treated as a madman
or a traitor. He would have been told, if his opponents
had condescended to argue with him, that long ere
seven months had elapsed the American flag would
be swept from the seas, the contemptible navy of the
United States annihilated, and their maritime arse-
nals rendered a heap of ruins. Yet down to this mo-
ment not a single American frigate has struck her
flag."
To the United States these victories were clarion
calls to Old Glory, summoning it to appear on roof
and steeple and in banquet hall. After Decatur had
taken the Macedonian^ he sent Midshipman Hamilton,
who had served under him in the action, to Washing-
ton with the captured flag of the British frigate, to
deliver it to Paul Hamilton, the Secretary of the Navy
and the father of the young midshipman. Hamilton
arrived on the evening of December 8, 1812, and at
once went to a ball that was in progress with his father
in attendance. Into the groups of dancers came the
young fellow with the Macedonian's flag draped
around his shoulders. We open an old letter written
in Washington on December 14, for the rest of the in-
154 THE DRAMATIC STORY OF OLD GLORY
cident : "He was borne into the room by many officers.
Good little Mrs. Hamilton, his mother, stood by me,
and was so much agitated at the sight of her son that
she must have fallen had I not stepped forward and
offered her my arm. The young man sprang into her
arms, his sisters threw their arms around him. The
colors were then held up by several gentlemen over
the heads of Hull, Morris and Stewart, and 'Hail
Columbia' played; and there were huzzas until my
head swayed."
The picture of those sea-fighters, Hull and Stewart,
under the captured British ensign, with the flags of
the Guerriere and another English ship of war on a
wall near them, and with flashes of Old Glory giving
colors of victory, is one to be added to our gallery
of scenes in the story of the Stars and Stripes.
XXVII
The Flag Finds Victory in Defeat
BY the middle of the year 1813, England had suc-
ceeded in smothering the navy of the United
States under an overwhelming power. The Stars and
Stripes, in the matter of frigates free for service at
sea, was bankrupt or in danger of bankruptcy. The
Constellation was held a prisoner at Norfolk; the
United States and the Macedonian were gripped by a
stern blockade ; the Congress had become unseaworthy ;
and the Essex was in the Pacific, where she soon was
captured after a desperate fight against heavy odds.
Only three frigates were left in a condition that gave
them freedom to go out and fight. They were the
President^ the Constitution and the Chesapeake. The
latter two were, in May, 1813, at the Charlestown
navy yard, Boston, and Englishman Broke, on the
Shannon^ could see their masts as he came in toward
Nahant.
The battle of June 1, 1813, between the Chesapeake
and the Shannon, off Boston harbor, although a defeat
for Old Glory, gave our navy its signal of victory for
many contests that followed. Lawrence was beaten
by Broke in a better ship. As he lay mortally wounded,
he repeatedly exclaimed, "Don't give up the ship!"
and, as one account states, added, "The flag shall wave
15S
156 THE DRAMATIC STORY OF OLD GLORY
while I live." When the news of the defeat and cap-
ture of his frigate traveled through the United States,
it was received with incredulity and great anxiety.
Richard Rush wrote, years afterward, "I remember
the public gloom; funeral orations and badges of
mourning bespoke it. 'Don't give up the ship,' the
dying words of Lawrence, were on every tongue."
One episode, slight but full of meaning, occurred
near Newark, N. J., on July 4, 1813. On that day
a group of men rode on horses from Newark to a place
then called Orange Four-Corners. They entered a
tavern and drank a number of toasts, two of which
were as follows;
"Hull, Jones, Decatur and Bainbridge, their courage
and success have encircled them with laurels unfading
as time, imperishable as immortality."
"James Lawrence, the brave, the true, the good. May
his last words be the signal of victory to the United
States commanders, 'Do not give up the ship !' "
Those were indeed dark days for Old Glory, bright-
ened in part by the thought of the heroism of Law-
rence, and by certain memories of his chivalry at sea
and generous appreciation by his foemen. Broke was
severely injured in the head during the fight of the
Chesapeake and the Shannon^ yet for hours, between
moments of delirium, he spoke of the "gallant and
masterly style" shown by Lawrence in bringing the
Chesapeake out to meet his ship, under full sail, and
with four great flags flying; Stars and Stripes on the
mlzzen-royal masthead, on the peak, in the starboard
FLAG FINDS VICTORY IN DEFEAT 157
main rigging, and, at the fore, a broad white flag with
the words "Free Trade and Sailors' Rights."
The Shannon took the Chesapeake to Halifax, with
the dead Lawrence, wrapped in his Stars and Stripes,
on the quarter-deck. The good people of Halifax,
loyal to the core to their Union Jack, knew what man-
ner of man lay within the folds of Old Glory on the
deck of his lost frigate. Less than three months had
elapsed since Lawrence, in the Hornet^ had defeated
Peake, in the Peacock. Two acts of the American
must have thrilled true Englishmen with a feeling that
James Lawrence was a man through and through. He
had taken into his own family the son of one of the
slain hands of the Peacock^ and he had paid a glo-
rious tribute to the Union Jack. His opponent. Cap-
tain William Peake, was killed by the last broadside
from the Hornet. Lawrence had his body carried to
his cabin, and tenderly covered it with the Union Jack.
So Captain William Peake went down in his ship,
in five and a half fathoms of water, honored with "a
shroud and a sepulcher worthy so brave a sailor."
Halifax knew of Lawrence's tribute to his dead foe.
So, when the Chesapeake slowly came into the harbor,
with her captain lying still and cold on the deck, and
wrapped in Old Glory, she determined to honor his
memory as a fellow man and a chivalrous enemy. We
must not overlook this event in the story of our Flag,
for it shows us clearly that the souls beneath the
standards of the English-speaking peoples are one in
noble impulses.
Halifax chose the oldest resident naval officer as
chief pall-bearer at the funeral, and she buried Law-
158 THE DRAMATIC STORY OF OLD GLORY
rence in his Old Glory. One beautiful line of the
day comes to mind: * 'Victory, reluctant, dropt a star
upon the grave." We quote from a poem written in
the Nova Scotian city during the week of the funeral :
"At dawn of day was seen afar
The flag that bore the stripe and star,
And high Old England's ensign flew
To cheer the Shannon's hardy crew.
"His midnight watch the seaman keeps
Where wrapt in death the hero sleeps,
Where, in his country's colours, bleeds
Brave Lawrence."
After the body of Lawrence was returned to the
United States, in September, 1813, the Hon. Joseph
Story delivered an address at Salem. We select from
this address one fine sentence: "The stars and stripes,
which distinguish our flag, are not more our own than
that profuse and generous gallantry which sees an
enemy no longer than a hostile banner waves for his
protection." That was a salute to Halifax.
We also copy two extremely interesting fragments
from the mass of printed matter on the loss of the
Chesapeake. One, in reference to the slain officers of
the frigate, said, in way of reply to Napoleon's utter-
ance of March 17, 1811, "Lawrence, Ludlow, Ballard,
Broome, White, you died in the defense of the 'religion
of your flag.' " The Boston Palladium for June 15,
1813, glorified both Lawrence and his Stars and
Stripes, in these words: "His flag he could not suffer
should wave under a shadow of suspicion, or be ex-
posed to the least breath of reproach."
FLAG FINDS VICTORY IN DEFEAT 159
Old Glory snatched victory from the jaws of defeat
on Lake Erie on September 10, 1813. The story of
Perry's victory on Lake Erie is one of the high lights
in the record of the War of 1812. But our schoolbooks
almost invariably give a wrong impression of the flag-
episode at the very heart of that important battle.
They support the belief, and practically all illustra-
tions of the event strengthen the view, that Perry
transferred the Stars and Stripes from the Lawrence
to the Niagara^ at the critical moment of the struggle.
The facts follow. Perry, taking the words of the
dying Lawrence, "Don't give up the ship," as his bat-
tle-cry, his motto for his signal, had a large blue flag
made at Erie, with those words upon it in white muslin.
When his flagship, the Lawrence^ named after the
commander of the Chesapeake^ was shattered and in
danger of falling into the hands of the British, he took
this flag, left the Lawrence in the command of her
captain, with a Stars and Stripes at her masthead, and
was rowed in a boat to the Niagara. Then he pro-
ceeded to win his fight, with the Niagara as his flag-
ship.
Now the typical picture of the act of transfer of
the blue flag shows Perry standing upright in a small
boat amid a hail of shot churning the water around
him, and with a thirteen-stripe Stars and Stripes either
in his arms or flying at the bow of his little skiff. He
carried the blue flag, with the last words of Lawrence
upon it. If he had carried an Old Glory, it would
have been the orthodox Flag of the period, with fif-
teen stars and fifteen stripes.
The big dramatic moment of that critical fight on
i6o THE DRAMATIC STORY OF OLD GLORY
Lake Erie was the hour when Perry, on the Niagara^
broke through the British line and saw the Lawrence
with her Flag lowered, about to surrender. Through
the murk came the Niagara pouring broadsides into
the English ships. Now for the Lawrence, and her
men who could stand amid her dead and dying. "When
the smoke cleared, with a feeble shout the remnant of
the crew flung out their flag at masthead." So wrote
an historian years ago, and, with that stirring picture
of victory snatched from defeat for Old Glory,
through the inspiration of the call of Lawrence that
still thrills American fighters at sea, we close the rec-
ord of Old Glory on the water in the War of 1812.
XXVIII
The Flag on Land in the War of 1812
AFTER discouraging campaigns during the early
months of the War of 1812, the Flag found it-
self with defenders gathering close around it in vic-
tory. There are but three events of the whole war on
land that give us stirring scenes with Old Glory a
dominant actor. They occurred at Lundy's Lane,
Canada; Stonington, Conn., and Fort McHenry, Mary-
land.
Strangely enough, the Stars and Stripes owed its
glory at Lundy's Lane mainly to regiments from New
England, although New England had been a back-
slider in supporting the central government at Wash-
ington in active prosecution of the war. The men
of Vermont, Massachusetts and Connecticut, who
fought with Scott and Ripley under Old Glory at
Lundy's Lane, were of the stock that stood at Bunker
Hill and swarmed over the Berkshires and the Green
Mountains to fall upon and overwhelm Burgoyne.
No amount of Federalist talk could argue them out
of their conviction of the demands of loyalty to their
country's Flag.
The battle of Lundy's Lane, on July 25, 1814, was
mostly fought after sunset, during a close, sultry dark-
ness, with a pale moon shining, and with the roar
161
i62 THE DRAMATIC STORY OF OLD GLORY
of Niagara Falls thundering through the volleys of
cannon and muskets. As the American force marched
to the field, a rainbow arched the head of their column,
the colors of its curve enclosing the red, white and blue
of the flags that fluttered within it. This column, we
give the make-up of the little American army as a
whole, was composed of two regiments from Massa-
chusetts, one from Vermont, one from Connecticut, one
from New York, one from Pennsylvania, and a mixed
body of militia mainly from Pennsylvania. The reg-
ulars had been trained to a fine finish by Scott and
Ripley, and formed one of the best fighting bodies the
United States ever sent to a battlefield.
The British force at Lundy's Lane included the fa-
mous Royal Scots and other regiments whose standards
had been seen on many fields. The fight that ensued
when the two little armies met, was one long series of
bayonet charges, with interludes of musketry fire in
volleys so close that the flashes from the muzzles of the
muskets frequently crossed in sheets of flame vivid in
the night.
Major Jesup, with the 25th Regiment (Conn.), at-
tacked on the left, while Scott's other three regiments
in his brigade fell upon the front of the English line.
Jesup broke through the Royal Scots. His Stars and
Stripes "was riddled with balls, and as a sergeant
waved it amid a storm of bullets, the staff was sev-
ered in three places in his hand. Turning to his com-
mander, the sergeant exclaimed as he took up the frag-
ments, 'Look, Colonel, how they have cut us!' The
next minute a ball passed through his body, but he
Still kept his feet, and still waved his mutilated stand-
THE FLAG ON LAND IN 1812 163
ard until, faint with loss of blood, he sank on the
field."
The above quotation is from a history that appeared
in 1852. We use this book again, in telling of the
attack by Major Leavenworth's Ninth Regiment
(Mass.), which advanced on the British center and
"appeared in the darkness to be engulfed in fire."
Scott, coming up on the gallop, "pointed to the flag
that still waved in the dim moonlight" and urged
the regiment to hold fast. Soon Colonel Miller arrived
with the 25th Regiment (Mass.), and received orders
to storm the British battery on the hill. Major Mc-
Farland, with the 23rd Regiment (N. Y.), went in
to support him. "The struggle," as the old book we
have at our elbow says, "became at once close and
fierce ; bayonet crossed bayonet, weapon clashed against
weapon." The guns were taken, but the British came
back in a wave of desperate men, and again, in the
moonlight, around the American regimental flags, the
struggle was renewed.
Canadians and Englishmen claim that Lund/s
Lane was a victory for their side or a drawn battle.
Americans make similar claims. One fact we know.
Old Glory never waved over better troops than those
regiments that fought for it in the darkness of the
night of July 25, 1814. In Scott's brigade, at the
close of the action, all the regimental officers were
killed or wounded, and "only one out of every four
soldiers stood up unhurt."
Here are two sharply defined pictures of two regi-
ments, taken word for word from the book we have
i64 THE DRAMATIC STORY OF OLD GLORY
been following. They give the lie to the statement
that New England had little part in the War of 1812 :
"Around the tattered colors of the Eleventh Regi-
ment (Vermont), that shattered fragment of the first
brigade was rallied."
"The Twenty-fifth (Connecticut), under Jesup,
with their regimental banner pierced with scores of
bullet-holes received at Chippewa and in this engage-
ment, reposed after victory on the river side of the
Oueenstown Road."
Add to those pictures that of the Old Glory of
the Ninth Regiment (Massachusetts), "that still waved
in the dim moonlight" over its men "engulfed in fire,"
and you have material for bronze tablets in State
Capitols of three New England states.
During the month after Lundy's Lane, in August,
1814, the British bombarded Stonington, Conn., from
the sea. Lossing, in his "Field Book of the War of
1812," tells this story: "A timid citizen in the battery
proposed lowering the colors. 'No! No!' shouted ven-
erable Captain Jeremiah Holmes. 'That flag shall
never come down while I am alive !' When the wind
died away, he held it out on the point of a bayonet,
and several shots went through it. To prevent its
being struck by some coward. Holmes held a com-
panion, J. Dean Gallup, on his shoulders while he
nailed it to the staff. It was completely riddled by
British shot." Lossing saw this flag in Stonington, in
i860, and counted the bullet-holes.
The history of the Stars and Stripes on land dur-
THE FLAG ON LAND IN 1812 165
ing the War of 1812 very properly closes with the
"Star-Spangled Banner" of Fort McHenry. Francis
Scott Key, who wrote the poem that so soon became
famous when sung to the music of an English song,
"Anacreon in Heaven," was a temporary prisoner on
a British ship during the bombardment of Fort Mc-
Henry at Baltimore. He had gone to this ship to
obtain the release of his friend. Dr. William Beanes,
and was held by the British until after the attack was
over.
Key had taken with him, in his effort to secure the
release of Dr. Beanes, another friend, John S. Skin-
ner, and the two men were transferred from Admiral
Cochrane's ship, the Royal Oak, to the frigate Sur-
prise, and from the latter to their own little boat,
where they were held under guard. This boat was so
placed that it gave Key a clear view of Old Glory
streaming over Fort McHenry. The poem, which was
hastily scribbled, part of it while on the deck of his
boat while watching the "rockets' red glare" and "the
bombs bursting in air," and the rest in lines jotted
down on the back of a letter as he was returning to
Baltimore, is a record in verse of what Key actually
saw on September 13, 1814.
On September 21, 1814, the poem, or song, ap-
peared in the Baltimore American under the title "De-
fense of Fort McHenry," set to the music of "Anac-
reon in Heaven." It was at once received with en-
thusiasm. To-day, as "The Star-Spangled Banner,"
it holds premier place among the patriotic songs of
the United States. It was fitting that our Flag should
have been the inspiration of our most popular national
i66 THE DRAMATIC STORY OF OLD GLORY
hymn, for "The Star-Spangled Banner" was a per-
fectly natural outburst of feeling in a period when Old
Glory was making a dramatic fight for recognition
among the great standards of the world.
The Flag that inspired Key was made by order of
Brig. Gen. John Strieker, who commanded the Third
Brigade, made up mainly of men from Baltimore. It
was sewed together by Mrs. Mary Young Pickersgill,
wife of Col. Henry S. Pickersgill of Baltimore. It
was made in sections, was originally forty feet long,
with fifteen stripes, each nearly two feet wide, and with
fifteen stars, each two feet from point to point. The
stars are arranged in five parallel lines, three stars
to a line. "The Star-Spangled Banner" now rests in
the National Museum at Washington.
XXIX
The Flag Assumes Permanent Form
ON September 26, 1814, the American privateer,
General Armstrong^ dropped anchor in the har-
bor of Fayal, a port protected by the neutral flag of
Portugal. She was one of the fleet whose audacious
exploits, as a prominent Englishman said in Glasgow
but three weeks before, had "proved injurious to our
commerce, and discreditable to the directors of the
naval power of the British nation, whose flag till late
waved over every sea and triumphed over every rival."
At sunset of that September 26, three ships showing
the British flag entered the roads leading to the harbor
of Fayal. We can give no space to the fight that fol-
lowed, one of the most desperate sea-fights ever fought.
It opened with "one of the bloodiest defeats suffered
by the British navy in the war of 1812," and closed,
later, with Captain S. C. Reid sinking the General
Armstrong to prevent her being taken.
Early in 1817, Captain Reid was in Washington,
and was asked to prepare a design for the Stars and
Stripes that should represent the increase in the num-
ber of States, "without destroying its distinctive char-
acter, as the committee were about to increase the stars
and stripes to the whole number of States." As there
were at the time twenty States in the Union, there
167
i68 THE DRAMATIC STORY OF OLD GLORY
was a possibility of arriving at an Old Glory of twenty
stripes, with a strong probability of indefinite addi-
tion of stripes. As one Congressman facetiously re-
marked, the Flag would in time require a ship's mast
or a tree to hold it aloft.
It was a gracious act to give Reid the task of design-
ing a form for Old Glory that would endure, as his
fight at Fayal was practically the last sea-fight of a
war waged in defense of the integrity and the reputa-
tion of the Stars and Stripes. Congressman Peter H.
Wendover, of New York City, a leader in the move-
ment toward securing a permanent form for Old Glory,
was a close friend of Reid, and it is reasonable to as-
sume that the two men had talked over the future of
the Flag, that they saw in the vast expanse of the
Louisiana Territory the areas of many new States to
come, each demanding representation in fhe nation's
Flag.
To go back a few years, on July 13, 1794, George
Washington gave his name to the first bill that re-
ceived his signature as President at that session of
Congress. The bill read :
"An Act making alterations in the flag of the United
States :
"Be it enacted, etc., That from and after the first of May,
1795, the flag of the United States be fifteen stripes, alter-
nate red and white, and that the union be fifteen stars, white
in a blue field."
Vermont and Kentucky had come in to the sister-
hood of States, to make the fifteen represented in the
Old Glory of 1794. But, since 1795, Tennessee, Ohio,
FLAG ASSUMES PERMANENT FORM 169
Louisiana, Indiana and Mississippi, had been added,
and it was realized that it would be ridiculous to con-
tinue adding stripes to the Flag, to keep pace with the
incoming States. Captain Reid found a reasonable
solution of the problem. "He recommended that the
stripes be reduced to the original number of thirteen
States, and to form the number of stars representing
the whole number of States into one great star in the
Union, adding one star for every new State, thus giv-
ing the significant meaning to the flag, symbolically
expressed, of 'E Pluribus Unum.' "
Congressman Wendover wrote a number of letters
to Captain Reid while the latter was in New York.
In that of March 25, 1818, he included this sentence:
"If the bill passes the Senate soon, it is probable I
shall request the captain of the late General Armstrong
to have a flag made for Congress Hall under his di-
rection." The bill referred to was the one of April
4, 1818, which we shall quote later in this chapter.
Another letter, that of April 6, 1818, also from Wash-
ington to New York, opens with a clever allusion to
England's slurring phrase, "striped bunting flying at
the mastheads of a few fir-built frigates," and does
not overlook Reid's heroic defense of his ship at Fayal.
We give the first two sentences: "Your favor of the
3d. instant is this moment received. I learn with
pleasure that the 'Star-Spangled Banner' has fallen in-
to good hands, and doubt not Captain Lloyd of the
Flantagenet once thought it was in good hands as the
nature of the case would admit, and hope the 'striped'
or 'ragged bunting' will ever find equal support as
at Fayal." Lloyd was the commander of the huge
170 THE DRAMATIC STORY OF OLD GLORY
ship-of-the-line Plantagenet, seventy-four guns, one of
the three that cornered Reid's privateer at Fayal, to
their sorrow.
Captain S. C. Reid, with the aid of his good wife,
in old Cherry Street, New York, made the Old Glory
of the new design, and sent it by mail to Washington,
where it arrived on April 13, 1818. James Schouler,
in his "History of the United States of America,"
comes close to the true significance of this Flag of
1818. He says, "April 13, 1818: The new flag of the
United States, hoisted for the first time over the cham-
ber of assembled representatives at Washington, with
its twenty stars so disposed as to form one great star
in the center of the azure field, while the long red
and white stripes danced in the breeze, supplied a
parable. That spangled host, soon to be increased in
number, spoke of a Union to be progressive and per-
petual, while the thirteen stripes recalled founders
whose memory must ever be cherished."
The Act of Congress signed by President Monroe
on April 4, 1818, read:
"An Act to Establish the Flag of the United States :
"Section 1. Be it enacted, etc., That from and after the
fourth day of July next, the flag of the United States be thir-
teen horizontal stripes, alternate red and white ; that the union
have twenty stars, white in a blue field.
"Section 2. Be it further enacted, That on the admission
of every new State into the Union, one star be added to the
union of the flag; and that such addition shall take effect on
the fourth of July next succeeding such admission."
Old Glory, even in that rather precise Act, had not
reached a definite design. No one seemed to know
FLAG ASSUMES PERMANENT FORM 171
how to arrange the stars. As late as July 4, 1857,
flags were displayed in New York City with stars
grouped in at least nine different ways; in circles, dia-
monds, anchors, etc. It was not until March 18, 1896,
that Daniel S. Lamont, then the Secretary of War,
issued the following order relative to army flags :
"The field or union of the National flag in use in the army
will, on and after July 4, 1896, consist of forty-five stars,
in six rows, the first, third and fifth rows to have eight stars,
and the second, fourth and six rows seven stars each, in a blue
field."
That order fixed the arrangement of the stars in
the Union in parallel lines, and apparently gave per-
manence to the design of the Stars and Stripes.
XXX
"Old Glory''
THE brig Charles D^^^^//, Captain William Driver,
was about to sail from Salem, Mass., in 1831.
A young man, a friend of Caj; tain Driver, came on
deck at the head of a party from the town, and pre-
sented the Captain with "a large and beautifully made
American flag." It was done up in stops and, when
sent to the masthead and broken out to the wind. Cap-
tain Driver christened it "Old Glory." This Flag is
now preserved in the Essex Institute at Salem.
The original Old Glory very appropriately had a
romantic history. It came up over the sea-rim of the
South Pacific, when Driver and his brig sailed to the
rescue of the mutineers of the English ship Bounty,
Then its story shifts back to the United States, after
a gap of thirty years.
Captain William Driver was living in Nashville,
Tenn., at the outbreak of the Civil War. Fearing that
Confederate sympathizers would seize and destroy his
Flag, he sewed it into the coverlet of his bed, that it
might be hidden by day and be near him at night.
In February, 1862, Nashville fell into Federal hands.
A correspondent of the Philadelphia Press gave this
paragraph as a portion of his story: "A corporal's
guard was sent to the old man's house, where they
172
'OLD GLORY'' 173
ripped from the coverlet of his bed an immense flag
containing a hundred and ten yards of bunting, and
he brought it himself to the Capitol and unfurled it
from the flagstaff. Then, with tears in his eyes, he
said: 'There, those Texas Rangers have been hunting
for that these six months, without finding it, and they
knew I had it. I have always said if I could see it
float over that Capitol, I should have lived long
enough. Now 'Old Glory' is up there, gentlemen, and
I am ready to die."
Curiously, Captain William Driver, in naming the
American Flag "Old Glory," unwittingly echoed
another sailor, John Kilby, a quarter-gunner under
Paul Jones on the Bon Homme Richard^ who, in his
memoirs, spoke of the Flag as "the glory of America."
XXXI
Two Women, the Flag and the Book
IN the early years of the nineteenth century two
nations traveled in nearly parallel lines from the
Atlantic to the Pacific, across the middle belt of North
America. England, with the Hudson Bay Company
as a type of her advance guard under the Union Jack,
went with the steel trap of the hunter, seeking only
for the gain that would accrue from hunting and trad-
ing in the skins of wild animals. She cared little for
any enterprise that aimed to establish fixed colonies
or tended to uplift the native Indian tribes.
The story of the travel of the men of the United
States to the shores of the West, along their lines
of occidental progress, is best typified in the history
of two men and two women, Marcus Whitman, M.D.,
the Rev. H. H. Spalding, and their wives. There is
a background to their episode in our story of Old
Glory. General William Clark, he of our chapter on
the Flag's trip overland to the Pacific, was living in
St. Louis in 1832, as Indian Superintendent. To him
came two Indians of the Flat Heads, who had traveled
hundreds of miles in an unusual quest. They wanted
the white man's Book and his religion for their people
in the fastnesses of the remote mountains and on the
slope of the land beyond.
174
TWO WOMEN, FLAG AND BOOK 175
William Barrows, in his admirable history, "Ore-
gon; The Struggle for Possession," gives a version of
the address of one of these Indians, delivered to Clark
in council at St. Louis, of which we copy a part: *'I
came to you over a trail of many moons, from the
setting sun. You were the friend of my fathers who
have all gone the long way. I came with one eye
partly opened, for more light for my people, who sit
in darkness. I made my way to you with strong arms,
through many enemies and strange lands, that I might
carry back much to them. . . . My people sent me to
get the white man's Book of Heaven." Clark did not
give the Indians what they wanted, and they departed
over the trail "of many moons" with heavy hearts. But
a young clerk, who was in the room with Clark when
they presented their petition, overheard the talk, and
what he treasured in memory became "a divine pivot"
in the history of the Oregon country. He sent the
story of the appeal of the two Flat Heads to friends
in Pittsburg, who transferred it to George Catlin, the
Indian historian; and Catlin gave it, in 1836, to the
Rev. H. H. Spalding and his wife, who were on their
way from the East to Oregon as missionaries.
On July 4, 1836, Spalding, with the to-be-famous
Whitman, and their wives, came through the South
Pass between the Rockies and the Wind River Moun-
tains, in a wagon, the first to make the long trek, on
their path to Oregon. With them were a Stars and
Stripes and a Bible. Rarrows says, "It is a little
amusing to trace through this pass the routes of dis-
tinguished explorers, as 'Fremont, 1842,' 'Fremont,
1843,' 'Stanbury, 1849.' It may give information
176 THE DRAMATIC STORY OF OLD GLORY
and also divide honors to add, 'Mesdames Whitman
and Spalding, 1836.' A United States corps of engi-
neers discovering a pass in the Rocky Mountains six
years after two women had gone through I"
On the morning of the Fourth of July, 1836, Mrs.
Spalding was ill, fainted, "and thought she was near
the end of her life." By nightfall she was stronger.
As Barrows puts it, poetically, "Was it because they
gave her to drink of the brook trickling by, whose
waters were to run through her great parish to the
Pacific*?" They were, on that Fourth of July, on the
high plateau where the head springs of the South Platte,
the Yellowstone and the Columbia, gleam in their sil-
ver threads. They little knew, those four men and
women, that, because their wagon carried Old Glory
and the Book, together with wheat seed and farming
utensils, they were to give, through righteous coloniza-
tion, the one indubitable claim of the United States to
the Oregon country in years to come.
When once on the Pacific slope, twenty-five hun-
dred miles from their homes, the little party halted.
"Then, spreading their blankets and lifting the Amer-
ican flag, they all kneeled around the Book, and, with
prayer and praise, took possession of the western side
of the continent for Christ and the Church." They had
traversed the weary road to give the land a Christian
civilization under the Stars and Stripes. With them,
as they knelt, were two Nez Perce boys, who stood by
with eyes on Old Glory and the Bible.
William Barrows, in his work on Oregon, gave us
one of the most adequate and fascinating of all the
biographies of our forty-eight Commonwealths. In
TWO WOMEN, FLAG AND BOOK 177
tribute to him as an historian, and in memory of the
heroism of the two women who were "ready to die on
the Rocky Mountains" in the service to which they
were called, we give his word-picture of one of the most
significant scenes in the whole history of the Stars and
Stripes: "In compass of background and foreground;
the two halves of the continent; the parting rivers for
two oceans; the moral exigency suggested by the two
Indian figures; the rounding out of the Republic on
the sunset side, as it came in the consequences; the
kneeling men and women around the Book, with the
American flag floating over them, — the scene is worthy
any panel in the Rotunda at Washington."
XXXII
Old Glory Seeks the Ends of the World
BY an Act of Congress of May 18, 1836, an expe-
dition to the Antarctic regions was authorized,
for the purpose of aiding, through a better knowledge
of the fishing grounds, "our commerce embarked in
the whale fisheries," and increasing the nation's fund
of information of the world. Charles Wilkes, of the
United States Navy, was placed in command, and his
little fleet included the sloops-of-war Peacock and
Vincennes^ the brig Forpoise, the storeship Reliefs and
the tenders Sea-Gull and Flying Fish,
Wilkes and his ships left Chesapeake Bay on Au-
gust 18, 1838, sailed across the Atlantic to Funchal,
and then turned south and skirted the east coast of
South America. After rounding the Horn, they car-
ried their Flags over the South Pacific to Australia,
and then headed straight for the Antarctic ice. It
was a bold feat of seamanship to front the ice-pack
in those small sailing ships, not one of them equipped
with the engines of motor power of a later day. Yet
Wilkes ran along the edge of the gigantic barrier,
proved that there was an Antarctic continent, and
wrote, in 1840, "I feel it due to the honor of our flag
to make a proper assertion of the priority of the claim
of the American Expedition, and of the greater extent
178
OLD GLORY AT ENDS OF WORLD 179
of its discoveries and researches. That land does ex-
ist within the Antarctic Circle is now confirmed."
Wilkes and his fleet left the regions of the South
Pacific, and made north for the sea-track of Robert
Gray in the Columbia^ of whom we told in our chap-
ter on the Flag's journey around the world. On April
28, 1841, the Vincennes^ Wilkes' sloop, was off the
mouth of the Columbia River. The entry in his journal
for the day corroborates all that Vancouver, Meares
and Gray had said in 1792; for Wilkes wrote, "I stood
for the bar of the Columbia River, after making
every preparation to cross it, but I found breakers ex-
tending from Cape Disappointment to Point Adams in
one unbroken line. Mere description can give little
idea of the terrors of the bar of the Columbia. All
who have seen it have spoken of the wildness of the
scene, the incessant war of the waters, representing it
as one of the most fearful sights that can possibly meet
the eye of the sailor."
Wilkes went up the Columbia River. And now
come the unexpected elements of this chapter. We
set out to go through the five ponderous volumes that
contain the records of the Wilkes Expedition, in
search of Flag-incidents for this history. We read
chapter after chapter, and page after page, without
a glimpse of Old Glory. Then, and we are sure you
will be as surprised as we were, events of the very
nature we hoped to find came in a group, in Oregon.
In a peculiarly alluring way, the arrival of the Wilkes
party at the mouth of the Columbia, in 1841, ties to-
gether three threads of Flag-stories that have already
appeared in this book, and, in a truly dramatic man-
i8o THE DRAMATIC STORY OF OLD GLORY
ner, gives a verification of the salient episodes in each.
Wilkes, in a part of his long voyage, went over
the track of Robert Gray. He carried the Stars and
Stripes to the bars of the Columbia, and then inland,
as Gray had done before him. Then he met Marcus
Whitman, of whom we have just written, and con-
versed with him. When the two men clasped hands
at Wallawalla, Oregon, a great circuit of American
heroic endeavor was in current: for Wilkes had car-
ried Old Glory around the Horn, along the mysterious
Antarctic headlands of ice, and then up the Pacific, to
meet another Old Glory that had gone from the At-
lantic to the Missouri, and then by wagon over the
Rockies and down to the Pacific at the Columbia
River.
But the really beautiful episode of that July, 1841,
comes in here to make the trilogy complete. We give
Wilkes' own words: "Mr. Drayton (who was with
Wilkes) met with an old Indian at Waiilaptu, who
was pointed out as the man who took the first flag that
was ever seen in this country to the Grande Ronde
(a meeting place) as the emblem of peace. Lewis
and Clark, when in this country, presented an Amer-
ican flag to the Cayuse tribe, calling it a flag of peace ;
this tribe, in alliance with the Wallawallas, had up
to that time been always at war with the Shoshones
and the Snakes. After it became known to the Snakes
that such a flag existed, a party of Cayuse and Walla-
wallas took the flag and planted it at the Grande
Ronde, the old man above spoken of being the bearer.
The result has been that these two tribes have ever
OLD GLORY AT ENDS OF WORLD 181
since been at peace with the Snakes, and all three have
met annually in that place to trade."
Wilkes wrote, in 1844, in closing his narrative, "I
have reason to rejoice that I have been enabled to
carry the moral influence of our country to every
quarter of the globe where our flag has waved." Did
he also hold in memory the "moral influence" of the
Stars and Stripes and the Bible in that then remote
land of Oregon?
There was a sequel to Wilkes' narrative, one that
he could not have foretold in 1844. On July 18,
1841, the Peacock^ Captain Hudson, one of the two
sloops-of-war in his fleet, was wrecked in the surging
billows while trying to sail through the break in the
bar at the mouth of the Columbia. The sea rolled
over her, plundering her of her rigging and her frame-
work. In boats, a part of the crew reached shore.
Captain Hudson, when he saw that the sea was rising
rapidly, "ordered the ensign to be hoisted on the stump
of the mizzen-mast, as a signal for the boats to return
to the land; which was obeyed by them, although with
the feeling that they were abandoning their commander
and those with him to their fate."
But Hudson, and his plucky crew that stood by him,
were saved, and they brought ashore with them the
Old Glory that had fluttered "on the stump of the
mizzen-mast." This Flag went with Wilkes across the
Pacific, through the Indian Ocean, around the Cape
of Good Hope, over the Atlantic, back to the United
States. It must have had in its threads something of
the restless spirit of daring of the American people,
of the men v/ho in the middle years of the last ceu-
i82 THE DRAMATIC STORY OF OLD GLORY
tury were striking north, south, east and west, carry-
ing Old Glory on their mastheads into all corners of
the world. For this ensign of the Peacock known
now as the ''Peacock Flag," did not rest after its re-
turn to the United States in 1842. Its romantic story
was then but beginning.
In 1850, President Taylor recommended to Con-
gress an appropriation to defray the expense of an ex-
pedition to seek for Sir John Franklin, lost, with his
men under the Union Jack, in the Arctic regions.
Lieut. Edwin J. DeHaven, who had been with Wilkes,
received the command of this expedition, and he car-
ried the ''Peacock Flag" with him on the Advance,
The search proved in vain, although conducted in co-
operation with an expedition from England.
Now it chanced that Henry Grinnell had come into
possession of the "Peacock Flag," probably through
DeHaven, and had been largely instrumental in back-
ing the Franklin expedition. When DeHaven re-
turned with no word of Franklin, Grinnell at once
planned a second expedition to assail the white North,
and he gave Dr. Elisha Kent Kane the command.
Kane had gone with DeHaven in the Advance^ and had
developed original plans for attacking the northern
barriers of ice. With him again went the Old Glory
of the Peacock^ as the party sailed on May 30, 1853.
Kane reached the farthest point North ever at-
tained by man up to the time of his expedition. This
word-picture, taken from the journal of William
Morton, one of Kane's "gallant and trustworthy men,"
and transcribed by Kane, tells its own story; "Morton
tried to pass round the cape. It was in vain; there
" 2^
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S ^
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OLD GLORY AT ENDS OF WORLD 183
was no ice-foot, and, after trying his best to ascend
the cliffs, he could get up but a few hundred feet.
Here he fastened to his walking-pole the Grinnell flag
of the Antarctic, a well-cherished little relic, which had
now followed me on two Polar voyages. This flag
had been saved from the wreck of the United States
sloop-of-war Peacock^ when she stranded off the
Columbia River; it had accompanied Commodore
Wilkes in his far-southern discovery of an Antarctic
continent. It was now its strange destiny to float
over the highest northern land, not only of America
but of the globe."
Still the Stars and Stripes of the Peacock could not
rest. It went with Hayes to the North in i860, and
was again spread to the wind by Captain Charles
Francis Hall, on the Polaris in 1870. Hall had it
with him, and unfurled it, when he took possession
of land at 82° 60' north latitude "in the name of God
and the United States." There is no question that
this famous Stars and Stripes traveled farther north
and south than any other flag in the world, of any
nation. It was in good condition in 1878, and was de-
scribed then as being "of ordinary bunting about eight
by three feet, and with twenty-four stars of white
muslin sewed in the Union."
So we have for our Story of Old Glory the dra-
matic record of a Stars and Stripes that rippled in
the wind against the silver- white ice of the Antarctic;
that came through the gates of destruction on the bars
of the Columbia; that time and time again dared
the desolate Mystery of the frozen North; that, flut-
tering from the topmast of tl Polaris^ had the proud
i84 THE DRAMATIC STORY OF OLD GLORY
honor of being, at the time, at the highest point north
ever attained by any flag on any vessel. We leave
it, with its Red, White and Blue vivid on the margin
of the Polar Sea.
XXXIII
The Flag Flies Over the Halls of Montezuma
THE annals of the Army of the United States in
Mexico in 1847, reveal few instances of dramatic
action with the Stars and Stripes as a participant. Gen-
eral Taylor's campaign, which covered ground to the
North in Mexico, is practically devoid of any mention
of the Flag in action. Scott's spectacular drive on
Mexico city from Vera Cruz, at the South, gives a
scant half-dozen scenes that naturally fall within the
scope of this history. There was romance enough in
the mere fact that Scott's small American army of
invasion fought on plains and ridges that were wet
three centuries before with blood of Mexican and
Spaniard. Scott's line of march traversed the fields,
hills and rivers crossed by Cortez, and Old Glory
waved in triumph where once the yellow standard of
Spain had been flaunted in victory.
In March, 1847, General Scott was at Vera Cruz.
On the 9th of the month, he decided to land a force
to assault the city. A line of boats filled with men
and fluttering with standards, started from the ships
for the shore, and passed through lines of war vessels
with the British, French, Spanish, German, and other
national colors streaming above masts and yard-arms
heavy with masses of men gathered to watch the land-
185
i86 THE DRAMATIC STORY OF OLD GLORY
ing. When the boats struck the sand, there was a rush
of soldiers and marines to the sand-hills, and Old
Glory was planted on a high crest without the firing
of a gun.
On the 6th of March, Vera Cruz fell and "the Flag
of the American Republic floated from the top of
San Juan D'UUoa. The first great blow to the Mex-
ican power had fallen." It is interesting to note that
in Scott's "little cabinet" of officers at Vera Cruz,
was an engineer. Captain Robert E. Lee. The roll-
call of the commissioned officers of Scott's army of
invasion was rich in the names of other men who, in
two decades, were to win world-fame under the Stars
and Stripes and the Confederate flag.
Vera Cruz was followed by Cerro Gordo, a weird
battle fought in a region of gorges and cliffs, that
ended with every height crowned with the Stars and
Stripes. The battle of Contreras grants us a brief
glimpse of Old Glory flaming from the ridges of for-
tified heights. Cherubusco yields a florid passage
from Headley's "Life of Winfield Scott," which we
give; "The sun's rising beams flashed on the crimson
summit of Contreras; his noonday splendor failed to
pierce the war cloud that shrouded the tens of thou-
sands struggling in mortal combat around Cherubusco;
and now his departing rays, as they stooped behind
the Cordilleras, fell on a mournful field of slaughter.
But they kissed in their farewell the American stand-
ard fluttering from every summit and tower, where
in the morning the Mexican cross greeted his coming."
In September, 1847, Scott stood at the base of
Chapul tepee, with seven thousand men, determined on
FLAG OVER HALLS OF MONTEZUMA 187
carrying it by storm and then falling upon Mexico
city. Chapultepec was carried, and, as the waves of
the American army swept over the crest, "flag after
flag was flung out from the upper walls." Scott looked
up and saw, as Headley tells us in graphic prose,
''walls and ramparts which a few hours before bristled
with the enemy's cannon, now black with men, and
fluttering with the colors of his own regiments."
When Mexico city came into American hands. Gen-
eral Quitman's division first approached the square,
and his troops, "rushing with shouts upon it, hoisted
their flag on the walls of the National Palace." A
little company of forty United States marines, under
Lieut. A. S. Nicholson, won the honor of carrying Old
Glory into the heart of Mexico and standing beneath
it as it went above the Palace. If you recall Lieut.
O'Bannon, who planted the Stars and Stripes on the
walls of Derna, Tripoli, at the time of General Wil-
liam Eaton's assault in 1805, you will understand the
meaning of the opening words of "The Marines'
Hymn:"
From the Halls of Montezuma
To the shores of Tripoli
We fight our country's battles
On the land as on the sea.
The feature of this series of sharp, decisive vic-
tories for Old Glory that interests us the most, is the
appearance of certain names, then associated with
the Stars and Stripes, but now prominent in our coun-
try's history as representing men who served under
another flag. Lieut. George D. Pickett, at Chapulte-
i88 THE DRAMATIC STORY OF OLD GLORY
pec, "took charge of the colors of the 8th Infantry,
had them borne to the top of the palace, lowered the
enemy's standard, and replaced it with that of the
8th Infantry and the national flag." Almost at his
side, Lieut. James Longstreet "was disabled by a se-
vere wound." Lieut. Lewis Armistead, 6th Infantry,
was "the first to leap into the ditch under the artillery
and musketry fire and hand-grenades of the enemy."
Not far away, Lieut. T. J. Jackson "had eight of his
artillery horses killed at one shot."
Let us go on over the years to July 3, 1863. On
that day "Stonewall" Jackson was no more. A bullet
at Chancellorsville had dropped him, "Bobby" Lee's
good "right arm," lifeless. In the afternoon of that
July 3, at Gettysburg, Major General George D.
Pickett led the pride of Virginia's regiments against
the Union center. At the head of the column went
Brigadier General Lewis A. Armistead, to fall dying
among the Union guns.
The Mexican war was not one of enduring glory
for the Stars and Stripes. Its chief interest for us is
the schooling it gave to young West Pointers who
were to step over the threshold of the sixties and find
themselves arrayed in hostile camps on the soil of the
United States. Some of them were true to Old Glory ;
but there were others in their number who were for
a time as "strangers in a strange land."
XXXIV
The Flag Goes Down the River Jordan to the
Dead Sea
THE Mexican war gave up one restless spirit to
another and a nobler work when, on May 8,
1847, W. F. Lynch, of the United States Navy, "the
town and castle of Vera Cruz having some time before
surrendered, and there being nothing left for the Navy
to perform," applied to the Hon. John Y. Mason,
then Secretary of the Navy, "for permission to cir-
cumnavigate and thoroughly explore the Dead Sea."
That was certainly a peculiar request for a man to
make immediately on the heels of participation in a
war that had little sanction in righteousness. Lynch,
who was of a decidedly religious bent of mind, must
have found a welcome allurement in his plans to ex-
plore the very heart of the Holy Land. His request
was granted on July 31, 1847.
Lynch made preparations for his expedition with
rare foresight. He had two metallic boats made, in
sections, and engaged a mechanic to go with him, a
man "whose skill would be necessary in taking apart
and putting together the boats," which he named
Fanny Mason and Fanny Skinner, the first undoubt-
edly in honor of a member of Secretary Mason's fam-
189
190 THE DRAMATIC STORY OF OLD GLORY
ily. He also saw to it that he was well supplied with
arms, ammunition, tents, American Flags, etc.
On Friday, Nov. 26, 1847, in command of the
United States storeship Supply, Lynch weighed anchor
at 10.15, and stood down New York bay. Students
of the curious in literature find the log of this young
Naval officer interesting reading. He was admirably
posted in the world's history, and his entries fre-
quently reflect the reactions of historic spots on the
naive mood of his thought. We give one, as his Old
Glory gleamed in the sun off Cape Trafalgar on Dec.
19. "Made Cape Trafalgar, and sailed over the scene
of the great conflict between the fleet of England and
the combined fleets of France and Spain. Here, the
great Collingwood broke the opposing line. There the
noble Nelson, the terror of his foes and the pride of
his country, nobly, but prematurely fell, his last pulsa-
tion an exultant throb, as the shout of victory rang in
his ears. Had he lived, his noble nature would have
freed itself from the thraldom of a syren."
On went Lynch, with his Stars and Stripes thread-
ing a way through the Mediterranean, to the Bos-
phorus, Constantinople, and then down to Sidon and
Tyre. On March 28, 1848, he anchored under Mount
Carmel, before the walled village of Haifa. On
March 31, he sent to Acre for horses, "and hoisted out
the two Fannies and loaded them with our own efi
fects." Then he set up a staff and "for the first time,
without the consular precincts, the American flag was
raised in Palestine."
On April 1, the Supply weighed anchor and stood
close inshore to land provisions. The two small metal
FLAG GOES DOWN THE JORDAN 191
boats also arrived and were hauled up to "a green
spot beside Belus, and a short distance from the sea."
An illustration of the camp at this spot, given in
Lynch's "Narrative of the United States' Expedition
to the River Jordan and the Dead Sea," from which
we derive our story for this chapter, shows Old Glory
at the top of a staff near two tents, the little boats,
hauled up, near by, and the Supply distant on the
horizon.
On April 3, 1848, after much vexatious haggling
with native officials, the two Fannies were mounted
on trucks drawn by camels, and, with Old Glory fly-
ing over them, the little party set out for the Sea of
Galilee. On April 4, they crossed the plain of Acre.
The next day found them passing through "the nar-
rowest tract on the coast of Syria which was never
subdued by the Israelites, and through the narrowest
part of the land of the tribe of Ashur into that of
Zebulon." Lynch gives us a word-sketch of his little
expedition at this point. It is worth repeating here:
"The metal boats, with the flags flying, mounted on
carriages drawn by huge camels, ourselves, the mounted
sailors in single file, the loaded camels, the sherif and
the sheik with their tufted spears and followers, pre-
sented a glorious sight."
Then came trouble for the two Fannies and their
Flags. Lynch had reached "a broken and rocky coun-
try'' where he "encountered much difficulty with the
boats." The road was rugged, had never been crossed
by wheel-carriages before, and was cut by ridges and
hollows. In two days the little boats had been dragged
up fifteen hundred feet from the plain of Acre. From
192 THE DRAMATIC STORY OF OLD GLORY
that elevation, Lynch had his first view of the Sea of
Galilee and, while profoundly moved by the sight,
wrote in a practical Yankee vein, "How in the world
are the boats ever to be got down this rocky and pre-
cipitous path, when we are compelled to alight and
lead our horses? From hence is a sheer descent."
Nightfall of April 7, 1848, saw the Fannies on the
"brink of the high and steep range which overlooked
the lake to the west." Old Glory was unfurled in
sight of Galilee. The following day. Lynch proudly
wrote, "Took all hands up the mountain to bring the
boats down. Many times we thought that they would
rush into the sea. Every one did his best, and at length
success crowned our efforts. With their flags flying,
we carried them triumphantly beyond the walls unin-
jured, and, amid a crowd of spectators, launched them
upon the blue waters of the Sea of Galilee. Buoyantly
floated the two Fannies^ bearing the Stars and Stripes,
the noblest flag of freedom now waving in the world.
Since the time of Josephus and the Romans, no vessel
of any size has sailed upon this sea, and for many,
many years, but a solitary vessel has furrowed its
surface."
So it happened that on a bright day in April, 1848,
the Fanny Mason led the way, followed by the
Fanny Skinner, steering directly for the outlet of the
river Jordan, "with awnings spread and colours fly-
ing." After a number of exciting adventures in shoot-
ing the rapids of the river, the two boats, with Flags
at their stems, entered the Dead Sea at 3:25 P. M.,
April 18, 1848.
Lynch circumnavigated the Dead Sea, and finished
^/^
THe'keW YORK
PUBLIC LIBRARY
FLAG GOES DOWN THE JORDAN 193
his work early in May. On the morning of the 8th
of the month, he constructed "a float with a flagstaff
fitted to it." The next morning, he rowed out in the
Fanny Skinner and moored this float, with Old Glory
fluttering above it, in eighty fathoms of water. In the
afternoon the boats were taken apart and were started
on the road overland to the Mediterranean, where
Lynch joined thegi later.
One incident of this adventurous expedition is well
worth preservation in this book. On April 28, 1848,
Lynch received word of the death of ex-President John
Quincy Adams. The next day, he went out upon the
surface of the Dead Sea, in the Fanny Mason^ with the
Stars and Stripes displayed and with a heavy gun
mounted in the bow of the boat. "Twenty-one minute-
guns were fired, the reports reverberating loudly and
strangely amid the cavernous recesses of the lofty and
barren mountains."
XXXV
Stars and Stripes at Fort Sumter
THE first page of the greatest chapter in our coun-
try's history of Old Glory was written when
Confederate batteries opened fire on the Stars and
Stripes that flew over Fort Sumter in April, 1861. The
Civil War was a struggle for the salvation of the Flag.
The North saw in its thirty-four stars a family of States
that must not be broken. Horace Greeley's "erring
sisters" were not to go out over the national threshold
and take their stars with them. The South strove to
destroy the integrity of the Constellation that had been
so many years in coming from misty nebula to gleam-
ing reality. She would split North America with a line
from the Atlantic to the Pacific, shut out the lower
Mississippi from northern trade, unless controlled as
she dictated, and force the North to reshape the Stars
and Stripes, mournfully removing a group of stars that
had been splendid in history.
At that time no man on earth knew that the unity
of the United States of America is figured in the Heav-
ens in an eternal sign. As Beauregard's guns fired their
first shells at Sumter, a mighty constellation, Cygnus,
the Swan, was approaching the zenith. Near it trav-
eled Lyra, the group of stars that, as some men hold,
gave our fathers the thought of the constellation in our
194
STARS AND STRIPES AT SUMTER 195
Flag. In the middle ages, Cygnus, since it resembled
a gigantic cross, was called "The Cross of Calvary."
Years after the Civil War had closed, an astronomer
pointed his telescope at the heart of this Cross and, to
his astonishment, saw the faint glimmer of a universe
in the making. This film of silver against the night
took shape in the field of his vision, became a North
America of a myriad stars. It is known to-day as the
* 'North America Nebula." The batteries of Moultrie
and Morris Island could not destroy the stars of Old
Glory, for above those stars, in the silent night, was
hung the United States within the Cross.
Yet the South loved the Flag, even through the bit-
ter years from 1861 to 1865. She tried to imitate it
in her own standards, under which and for which she
fought so magnificently. There were instances when
Old Glory was insulted, torn, even buried in the
ground, south of Mason and Dixon's Line. But there
ran a current of memory through Southern hearts, a
thrill that was alive with thoughts of the Old Glory
of Washington, Greene, Morgan, Marion, Sumter,
Pickens, Harry Lee and Andrew Jackson. We have
one little story, out of many, to prove what we are
saying, and will give it later, in another chapter.
We return to Sumter. During the afternoon of
April 13, 1861, the Stars and Stripes that had waved
in defiance over the fort, although the target of a con-
centrated fire and with its staff scarred in nine places
by shells, was shot away and fell among glowing cin-
ders. Peter Hart, an old servant of Major Anderson
who was in command, took the Flag from Lieut. Hall
who had rescued it from the cinders, and, climbing the
196 THE DRAMATIC STORY OF OLD GLORY
splintered staff with it in his arms, nailed it in place
again. This act, performed in sight of Moultrie where,
in 1776, Sergeant Jasper had rescued and planted the
Palmetto Flag on the parapet, gave the keynote to the
North at the opening of the great War. From the
States of the North Atlantic seaboard to the States of
the trans-Alleghany and northern Mississippi River
sections, ran the cry, "The Old Flag has been fired
upon!" with an echoing refrain. 'We must set it up
again, and hold it on high!" The Stars and Stripes
became instantly a flaming torch of war for the North,
and its hold on the devotion of its people grew in
strength and in its power of calling forth expressions
of passionate loyalty, as the struggle continued.
We open the pages of books and newspapers of the
year 1861, and read columns of matter literally aglow
with Old Glory. Well nigh every oration and fully
three-fourths of the multitude of poems written, con-
tain references to the Flag. Many a speaker and writer,
who commenced their speeches, articles and poems in
a subdued mood, found themselves swept away by the
tides of their feelings, when they came to the point of
introducing Old Glory. We give a few passages from
brief newspaper reports of April, 1861 :
On April 19, at Kingston, N. Y., John B. Steele,
who presided at a meeting, said on taking the chair:
"It must never be supposed that the flag could be desecrated
without touching the soul of every genuine American. No mat-
ter what it must cost, the Stars and Stripes must wave. But
one heart beats here and that is the true American heart."
STARS AND STRIPES AT SUMTER 197
When the scholars of the Newburyport (Mass.)
High School raised Old Glory near their building on
April 24, Caleb Gushing said :
"Long may this glorious flag wave above our heads the ban-
ner of victory and the symbol of our national honor."
The Independent, New York City, in its issue for
April 25, 1861, gives us a composite picture of the
second Sunday that followed the firing on Sumter:
"Dr. Bethune's sermon was from the text *In the name of
our God we will set up our banners.' In Dr. Bellows' church
the choir sang 'The Star-Spangled Banner,' which was vig-
orously applauded. At Grace Church, Dr. Taylor began by
saying 'The Star-Spangled Banner has been insulted.' Dr.
Osgood's text was, 'Lift up a standard to the people.' "
Down from Massachusetts, to appear in the Press
of New York, came stirring sentences from Wendell
Phillips and Edward Everett. The former stated the
position of the entire North, as pictured in the attitude
of the new President, Abraham Lincoln:
"When Abraham Lincoln swore to support the Constitution
and the laws of the United States, he was bound to die under
the flag of Fort Sumter, if necessary."
Everett, in his address at Boston on April 27, gave
a remarkably accurate statement of the sudden trans-
figuration of Old Glory through the smoke and fire of
Sumter :
"Why is it that the flag of the country, always honored,
always beloved, is now, all at once, worshipped, I may say,
with the passionate homage of this whole people? Why does
it float, as never before, not merely from arsenal and mast-
head, but from tower and steeple, from the public edifice, the
198 THE DRAMATIC STORY OF OLD GLORY
temple of Science and the private dwelling? Let Fort Sumter
give the answer."
As we examine the files of Northern papers for that
ominous month of April, we come upon frequent edi-
torial allusions to the Stars and Stripes. They always
present it as the symbol of a united people, as an em-
blem that has been foully insulted and that must be
defended with the full limit of all resources. Here
are three excerpts:
"Henceforth each man, high and low, must take his position
as a patriot or a traitor, as a foe or a friend of his country,
as a supporter of the flag of the Stars and Stripes or of the
rebel banner."
Philadelphia Press.
"The cannon which bombarded Sumter awoke strange echoes,
and touched forgotten chords in the American heart. Ameri-
can loyalty leaped into instant life, and stood radiant and
ready for the fierce encounter. From one end of the land to
the other, in the crowded streets of cities and in the solitude
of the country, wherever the splendor of the Stars and Stripes,
the glittering emblem of our country's glory, meets the eye,
come forth shouts of devotion and pledges of aid."
New York Times.
"We know no cause save to wipe an insult from our flag,
and to defend and maintain an assailed Government and a
violated Constitution. We care not who is President, or what
political party is in power; so long as they support the honor
and the flag of our country, we are with them. Those who are
not, are against us, against our flag, and against our Govern-
ment. 'Take your places in line!' The American flag trails
in the dust."
Philadelphia Enquirer.
A voice from Kentucky, from the borderland of the
seceding States, is well worth bringing back, if only
for its ringing tones. The Hon. Archie Dixon said, at
STARS AND STRIPES AT SUMTER 199
the opening of his address at Louisville on April 21,
1861:
"Whose flag is that which waves over us? To whom does
it belong ? Is it not yours, is it not our own Stars and Stripes,
and do we mean ever to abandon it*? That flag has ever
waved over Kentucky soil with honor and glory. It is our
flag, it is Kentucky's flag. When that flag is trailed in the
dust and destroyed, I pray Heaven that the earth may be de-
stroyed with it, for I do not wish, and I trust I shall never
look upon, its dishonor. It is our flag, ours while we have a
country and a Government. I shall never surrender that flag.
I have loved it from boyhood, and have watched it every-
where, and imagine it in this dark hour still waving amid the
gloom, and feel that its stars will still shine forth in the
smoke of battle, and lead our country forth to honor and
glory."
The Hon. Archie Dixon's sentences were rather
staccato in their broken eloquence. But he voiced the
sentiments of thousands of men throughout the North
in 1861, who actually feared for the life of the Gov-
ernment and dreaded the possibility of the destruction
of the Stars and Stripes. Old Glory was indeed the
flame that led to war.
If we could go back nearly sixty years and find our-
selves in New York City on April 21, 1861, and stand-
ing in Union Square near the equestrian statue of
George Washington, we could get into our minds and
our souls the whole spirit of that tremendous hour in
our national history. On that day New York was given
over to mass-meetings and addresses, the principal
meetings being in Union Square. Major Anderson
with his officers, was there from the battered walls
of Sumter, and he had brought with him the Old Glory
of Sumter, which was placed on the arms of the bronze
200 THE DRAMATIC STORY OF OLD GLORY
Washington. Fortunately, we have complete records
of all the addresses delivered in Union Square on that
day. We glance over them rapidly and select a few
burning paragraphs that were fired by the presence of
Sumter's "smoke-stained banner."
Rev. Dr. Spring, of the Brick Church, before his
opening prayer, spoke briefly :
"When I think of the little band of men who took such a
noble part in the struggle at Fort Sumter, maintaining the
flag of their country while burning fires were about them
(turning to Major Anderson and the other officers present), I
feel cheered. The dead lips of the Father of his Country speak
to you and to me. And what do they say*? 'United we stand
— divided we fall.' "
Then stepped forward General John A. Dix, the
chairman of the meeting, who, only three months be-
fore, when Secretary of the Treasury, had written his
famous letter to New Orleans that closed with the
bugling words, "If any one attempts to haul down the
American flag, shoot him on the spot I" You can im-
agine the wild cheering when he said, pointing to
Major Anderson and to the Old Glory in the arms of
Washington,
"There hangs the flag under which they upheld the honor of
our country; and its tattered condition shows the desperate
defence they made."
Soon after General Dix had finished speaking. Sen-
ator E. D. Baker of Oregon, who was to die within
six months while leading his men at Ball's Bluff, gave
one of his spirited speeches so characteristic of his
brave, imaginative thought. It was punctuated with
STARS AND STRIPES AT SUMTER 201
tremendous cheering, from the moment he began with
the first sentence to the words at the close. We copy
a few outstanding sentences :
"The hour for conciliation is past. It may return; but not
to-morrow, nor next week. It will return when that tattered
flag (pointing to the flag of Fort Sumter) is avenged. — The
hour of conciliation will come back when again the ensign of
the Republic will stream over every rebellious fort of every
Confederate State. — I am not here to speak timorous words of
peace, but to kindle the spirit of manly, determined war. I
speak in the midst of the Empire State, amid scenes of past
suflfering and past glory; the defences of the Hudson above
me ; the battlefield of Long Island before me, and the statue of
Washington in my very face, the battered and unconquered
flag of Sumter waving in his hands. . . . To have star after
star blotted out! (Cries of 'Never, Never!') — to have stripe
after stripe obscured — (Cries of 'No! No!') — to have glory
after glory dimmed; these are infinitely worse than blood!"
(Tremendous cheers).
Senator Baker was followed by Robert J. Walker
who said, in the course of his address:
"This is the question now to be decided: have we a Union,
have we a flag, are the Stars and Stripes a reality or a fiction ?
— If we are defeated, the last experiment of self-government
will have failed. We will have no flag, we will have no
government, no country, and no Union."
Note how Walker placed the Flag first in his four
prerequisites of nationality. His words were followed
by a letter from Archbishop Hughes, which was read
from the platform. It closed with these words on
Old Glory:
"It is now fifty years since I took the oath of allegiance to
this country under its title of the United States of America.
The Government of the United States was then, as it is now,
202 THE DRAMATIC STORY OF OLD GLORY
symbolized by a national flag, popularly called 'The Stars and
Stripes.' (Loud applause). This has been my flag, and shall
be to the end. (Cheers). I trust it is still destined to display
in the gales that sweep every ocean, and amid the gentle
breezes of many a distant shore, as I have seen it in foreign
lands, its own peculiar waving lines of beauty. May it live
and continue to display those same waving lines of beauty
whether at home or abroad, for a thousand years and after-
wards as long as Heaven permits, without limit of duration."
While that meeting was in tumultuous progress, an-
other one was being conducted on a stand on the north-
west corner of the Square. There, David S. Codding-
ton said, during his speech :
"Do you wonder to-day to see that flag flying over all our
reawakened national life, no longer monopolized by masthead,
steeple or liberty pole, but streaming forth a camp signal
from every private hearthstone."
Among the speakers on the stand at the southwest
side of the Square, was C. H. Smith. He reached his
high notes of patriotism in these words,
"We have assembled in one common brotherhood, to take
measures for the protection of that glorious old flag, which had
been borne through the Revolution of '76, baptized in the
blood of our forefathers, and is sacred to the memory of liberty
and popular institutions. . . . We won't submit. To-day the
common sentiment that thrills the common heart of the North
is. Our country and our country's flag."
On a stand before the Old Everett House, at the
north side of Union Square, a slender, graceful figure
stood. Professor O. M. Mitchell, the astronomer, later
a Major General in the Union Army, was speaking.
As he spoke, in words that were frank, inspiring, "iired
with nervous eloquence and patriotism," the crowd
STARS AND STRIPES AT SUMTER 203
about him stood hushed. His address gives us the
very soul of the North in April, 1861 :
"I owe allegiance to no State, and never did, and, God help-
ing me, I never will. A poor boy, working my way with my
own hands, at the age of twelve years turned out to take care
of myself as best I could, and beginning by earning but four
dollars a month, I worked my way onward until this glorious
Government gave me a chance at the Military Academy at
West Point. There I landed with a knapsack on my back,
and, I tell you God's truth, just a quarter of a dollar in my
pocket. There I swore allegiance to the Government of the
United States."
We have given this bit of autobiography, word for
word as General Mitchell gave it from that stand, as
it furnishes a background to his intense patriotism as
revealed in his pathetic close to his address, which we
now quote:
"There was a man of your city who had a beloved wife and
two children, depending upon his personal labor day by day
for their support. He went home and said, *Wife, I feel it
is my duty to enlist and fight for my country.' 'That's just
what I've been thinking of, too,' said she ; 'God bless you and
may you come back without harm. But if you die in defence
of the country, the God of the widows and the fatherless will
take care of me and my children.' That same wife knew pre-
cisely where her husband was to pass as he marched away.
She took her position on the pavement, and finding a flag, she
begged leave just to stand beneath those sacred folds and take
a last look on him whom she, by possibility, might never see
again. The husband marched down the street ; their eyes met ;
a sympathetic flash went from heart to heart ; she gave a shout
and fell senseless upon the pavement, and there she lay in a
swoon. She was ready to meet this tremendous sacrifice upon
which we have entered, and I trust you are all ready. I am
ready. God help me to do my duty. I am ready to fight in
the ranks or out of the ranks. I only ask to be permitted to
act; and in God's name give me something to do."
204 THE DRAMATIC STORY OF OLD GLORY
We have printed in italics the little flag-scene at
the center of this quotation. Who of us can imagine
the result of General Mitchell's words in the minds
and the feelings of his hearers, on that day nearly
sixty years ago? A footnote to a newspaper report
of his address, says, "The scene that followed the close
of Professor Mitchell's eloquent and patriotic remarks
baffles description."
We have tried to reproduce the feeling of the North
after the news of the firing on Sumter's Flag had trav-
eled through all its cities, towns and villages. No
pages that we could write would give any conception
of the incarnation of nationality of that momentous
April, 1861, when the North stood face to face with a
death-struggle for the Stars and Stripes, so dramatic-
ally vivid as the passionate words of men who then
lived and suffered, but are now for the vastly greater
part, gone, forever. They loved Old Glory.
XXXVI
The Flag Goes to the Front
IN reply to Lincoln's call, Northern regiments began
their journey to the front that was to be for four
heavy years a line of iire dividing the Nation into two
peoples. New York City was the meeting-place of
converging channels along which traveled the men of
New England and of the Empire State's cities and
towns. A Massachusetts man had received the call
to arms while plowing in the field where his great-
great grandfather, also at the plow, had heard the cry
that sent him on the run to his musket and to Lexing-
ton. A nineteen-year-old boy of a regiment of the
same State, dying in the streets of Baltimore, had
raised himself on one arrn and cried, "All hail to the
Stars and Stripes !" Men saw, as in a vision, the past
sweep of their country's history culminating in one
moment of terrific import. They knew but one symbol
of that history, the Flag, and they displayed it with
a fervor of devotion that was both glorious and pa-
thetic.
The day came for the departure of New York's
Seventh Regiment. A newspaper reporter strolled over
from old Newspaper Row to Cortlandt street, and this
is what he saw: "The Stars and Stripes was every-
205
2o6 THE DRAMATIC STORY OF OLD GLORY
where, from the costliest silk, twenty, thirty, forty feet
in length, to the homelier bunting, down to the few
inches of painted calico that a baby's hand might
wave. Cortlandt street showed a gathering of flags, a
perfect army of them. They were not, in that com-
paratively brief space from Broadway to the Jersey
City ferry, to be numbered by dozens or by scores.
Every building seemed like 'Captains of Fifties.' It
was flag, flag, from every window from the first floor
to the roof, from every doorway; in short, it was flag,
flag, till the wearied eye refused the task of counting
them. Such was the display along the route of the
Seventh. Such is and will be the route for all noble
troops entering our City from the New England
States."
Behind that screen of Old Glories on Cortlandt street,
there is a scene that must not fail reproduction here.
We are told, by a paper of '61, that the "unprece-
dented demand for flags rendered it impossible for the
manufacturers to get one up in less than ten or twelve
days." As there were at that time very few plants in
the country equipped for making flags, and, as the
demand for them was immediate and insistent, loyal
women and girls volunteered to furnish all the Stars
and Stripes that were needed. In one little group of
women and girls at work on an Old Glory, in New
York City during that third week of April, 1861, four
generations were represented. The oldest woman, sev-
enty years of age, had memories of George Washing-
ton. As she plied her needle, "tears fell on the bunting
while she recounted vivid recollections of the war of
1812."
THE FLAG TO THE FRONT 207
A New England regiment on the eve of depar-
ture for Washington, found at the last moment that
they had no Flag. One of their officers told his sister
of their predicament. At dawn of the next day, she
came to his room and knocked on the door. In her
hands was a Stars and Stripes that she, with girl friends
summoned to her aid, had made during the night. The
boy took the Flag in his arms and kissed it. There,
indeed, was an Old Glory for which to fight and to die.
But, even though many patriotic women and girls
gave of their time to the making of fiags, there were
regiments that reached Washington without standards
or with extremely poor representations of the Stars
and Stripes. Three or four graphic incidents, taken
from a long list of contemporary accounts of flag-pres-
entations, will show how the lack of colors was rem-
edied.
When the Third Maine Infantry, commanded by
Col. O. O. Howard, later a Major General in the
Union Army, went through New York, the Maine men
of the city presented them with a Flag that had been
made especially for the purpose. One manly sentence
stands out from the speech of presentation: "Your
brethren in this hour of battle would give you a strong
man's gift, your country's flag."
On June 13, '61, "a magnificent silk banner was pre-
sented by the ladies of the Relief Committee of New
York city" to the Sixth New York Infantry. After,
the Rev. S. H. Weston had made his speech of presen-
tation, "Col. Wilson received the flag from the hands
of Mrs. George Strong and, carrying it into the ranks,
gave it into the hands of the color-sergeant. Col. Wil-
2o8 THE DRAMATIC STORY OF OLD GLORY
son and the color-sergeant then returned to the foot
of the steps, both grasping the banner of liberty. The
Colonel seemed deeply affected and his utterance was
choked for some time. His wife stood on the stoop,
regarding him with tearful emotion."
The Second Wisconsin Infantry, coming down from
the Northwest, reached Martinsburg, then in Virginia,
in July, '61. It was significant of the attitude of the
people of the section, later to be citizens of the loyal
State of West Virginia, that the women of the town
made and gave to this regiment "a beautiful national
ensign." One of those loyal women made the presenta-
tion-speech, which we give in full: "Soldiers of the
Wisconsin Regiment, we have met this bright and*
beautiful morning to present to you this emblem of
our national glory as a token of our high regard for
you and your cause; we welcome you into our midst
bearing this flag of our glorious country, trusting in
God. This flag has protected the oppressed of all
lands, who have sought its shelter, and so long as this
flag shall wave the oppressed shall be free. Believing
from what you have already accomplished, it will
never be disgraced in your hands, you will accept this
token from the ladies of Martinsburg, Berkeley
County, Virginia."
Out in Michigan, on June 4, 1861, a delegation of
thirty-four young girls, representing all the States of
the United States, and dressed in red, white and blue,
came to the cantonment at Grand Rapids. With them
was a Flag that they had made for the Third Regi-
ment, Michigan Infantry, then quartered at Grand
Rapids.
THE FLAG TO THE FRONT 209
The annals of the Fifth Massachusetts Infantry,
Col. Lawrence, furnish us with an interesting flag-
episode. Early in the war, this regiment, then in
Washington, received orders to march over "the Long
Bridge into Virginia, and filed out of the Treasury
Building." Then they discovered, to their dismay,
"that they had only their State color, not having re-
ceived the national ensign." Immediately a search
was made for a Stars and Stripes. It chanced that cer-
tain women of the city had made "a beautiful new
cashmere flag, of the finest quality," for a local hotel.
Massachusetts men in Washington begged for this Flag,
obtained it, mounted horses and rode after the march-
ing regiment. When they came up with Lawrence
and his men, the regiment was halted and Old Glory
was handed over with an impromptu but impressive
ceremony.
Baltimore, determined on wiping out the stain of
April 19, gave Flags, made by its patriotic women, to
a number of Northern regiments as they passed through
on the road to Washington and to Abraham Lincoln.
Both the Sixth and the Eighth Massachusetts Regi-
ments received Old Glories in that city. In the case
of the Sixth, the presentation had a deep significance,
as that regiment was the one that suffered in the un-
fortunate riot. As its Flag was given in July, it is
probable that a detachment from the regiment was
detailed from Washington to go over to Baltimore to
receive the Stars and Stripes. The Second Massachu-
setts Infantry received its Old Glory from the women
of Harper's Ferry on July 3, 1861.
These gifts of Flags to Northern Regiments soon
210 THE DRAMATIC STORY OF OLD GLORY
came to be a rule of the day. We find a number of
instances, illustrative of the deep sympathy between
the Union States, where Stars and Stripes were sent
across country from one State to another. No more
dramatic instance of this expression of kinship be-
tween States during the Civil War can be found for
this chapter, than that of the Flag given by Massa-
chusetts to the Ninth Iowa Infantry. This regiment,
at the battle of Pea Ridge, Arkansas, 1862, fought for
ten solid hours after a forced march of forty-two miles,
without a Flag under which to rally. Word of their
valor reached Massachusetts and, five months after the
battle, an Old Glory, made by women of Boston, came
to them in camp. We find the following in their rec-
ords : "Camp Ninth Iowa, near Helena, Arkansas, Sun-
day, August 3, 1862. The regiment was formed at
2 P. M., to receive the stand of beautiful colors sent
by a committee of ladies of Boston, Mass., as a testi-
monial of their appreciation of our conduct at Pea
Ridge. Colonel Vandever delivered a short speech at
the presentation and seemed much affected, as did
many others present, at the respect and honor thus
manifested by the noble women of a distant State, and
at the associations connected with the occasion."
This Flag had a magnificent history, won for it by
Iowa men who fought under its folds. At last, shot
to pieces, "no longer fit for service, it was placed on
the retired list and returned to the original donors in
Massachusetts." Within a month, another Flag ar-
rived from Boston, to take the place of the tattered Old
Glory. The great story of that first Stars and Stripes
THE FLAG TO THE FRONT 211
of the Ninth Iowa will appear in another chapter of
this history.
And so it happened that hundreds of Old Glories
went fluttering on their long roads to the front in 1861
and 1862. In a book written in 1867, to commemorate
the part the Northern women took in the Civil War,
we find this passage: "The loyal soldier felt that he
was fighting, so to speak, under the very eyes of his
countrywomen, and he was prompted to high deeds of
daring and valor by the thought. In the smoke and
flame of battle, he bore, or followed the flag made and
consecrated by their hands to his country's cause."
One of those very women gave us, in her journal of
the Civil War, a glimpse of Old Glory going forward
at the front: "They have gone; they have all passed by.
Nothing can be seen of them now but a long line of
flashing bayonets, passing close under the brow of yon-
der hill. A few hours pass on, and looking far away,
over the hills, we see a long, dark line in motion. As
they come out of the shadow of the hill, their bayonets
begin to gleam. Now, in the sunshine, they look like
a line of blazing light. They come pouring on, officers
riding at the head of their various commands, colors
and battle-flags waving on the air, some of them
pierced and torn in many places, but borne all the
more proudly, and guarded the more sacredly, for
that!"
We thought we had finished this chapter. We laid
aside our manuscript, and closed our desk. And then,
one of those marvelous bits of prose-painting that one
so frequently comes upon in the books on the Civil
War written by men who were in the heart and the
212 THE DRAMATIC STORY OF OLD GLORY
heat of it as boys, came to us in all its subdued beauty.
You will find it in General Morris Schaff's "The Battle
of the Wilderness." Let us present it in a little panel
by itself:
"Two days of awful suspense for the North have
gone by, and city is calling to city, village to village,
neighborhood to neighborhood. What news from
Grant*?' Hour after hour draws on, and not a word
from him. The village grocer has closed, and his habit-
ual evening visitors have dispersed. The lights in the
farm-houses have all gone out. Here and there a lamp
blinks on the deserted, elm-shaded street, and in the
dooryard of a little home on the back road off among
the fields — the boy who went from there is a color-
bearer lying in Hancock's front — a dog bays lonelily."
XXXVII
Old Glory's Devoted Followers
IN August, 1863, Dahlgren's fleet moved up to attack
Fort Sumter, on whose walls the Stars and Stripes
had been shot away on April 13, 1861. In the fleet
was the monitor Catskill^ commanded by George W.
Rodgers, son of Commodore Rodgers of the War of
1812. After the Catskill had gone in toward her fight-
ing position, Commander Rodgers withdrew her from
range and, stepping into a small boat, was rowed over
to the flagship to get a Stars and Stripes which he lov-
ingly called "my own flag." It was the one under
which he had fought, on the Catskill^ during the April,
'63, attack on Sumter. He wished to have it over him
and his ironclad through the coming fight.
When Rodgers returned with his Old Glory in his
arms, the father of the writer of this book met him
on the deck of the Catskill, Rodgers' Old Glory was
hoisted, and then the two men went up into the iron
pilot-house to watch the effect of the shot on the walls
of Sumter. A shell struck the house and Rodgers'
dead body fell into the arms of his loved comrade.
A contemporary account says that *'his body was
wrapped in the same flag and was conveyed on board
the flag-ship which but a few minutes before he had
left."
213
214 THE DRAMATIC STORY OF OLD GLORY
That is the story of the Old Glory referred to in
the Dedication of this book. A blood-stained fragment
of that Flag is before the writer as he begins this chap-
ter. H. Clay Trumbull, a Chaplain-in-Chief of the
Commandery-in-Chief of the Loyal Legion, tells us that
George W. Rodgers was "a naval Havelock or Hedley
Vicars," one of the finest men in the Northern service.
His Flag was to him a part of his religion.
Charles G. Halpine, writing under the pseudonym
of "Miles O'Reilly" in 1863, contributed a stanza in
a rich brogue, mourning the death of Rodgers :
"Woe's me ! George Rodgers lies
With dim and dreamless eyes.
He has airly won the prize
Of the sthriped and starry shroud."
The "idolatrous love for the Stars and Stripes," as
a Southerner rather contemptuously referred to the
passionate devotion of the North to Old Glory, was
mirrored, time and time again during the great War,
in the lives of individual men. Even women were
caught up in the sweep of ardent patriotism at the
front, and gave more than one proof, while under fire,
of their willingness to suffer all things for their Flag.
A group of events, each minute in the tremendous pan-
orama of the war's tumult, yet glowing with the in-
tense flame of a loyalty that ever burned fiercely, will
suffice to reveal the love of the soldier for his Stars
and Stripes, the supreme symbol of his country.
On April 14, 1864, Major L. F. Booth fell while
fighting against heavy odds, defending Fort Pillow.
One of the few survivors of his command saved the
OLD GLORY'S FOLLOWERS 215
blood-stained Flag of the fort and carried it with him,
though desperately wounded, to the hospital at Mound
City. There, Mrs. Booth, the widow of the former
commander of the regiment at Fort Pillow, found her
husband's Stars and Stripes in the hands of the wound-
ed soldier. She at once went to the remnant of Major
Booth's old command, that had been incorporated with
the Sixth United States Heavy Artillery, taking the
Flag with her. She stood before them with their Old
Glory in her arms, and said, ''Boys, I have given to my
country all I had to give, my husband, — and such a
gift! Next to his dead self, the dearest object left to
me in the world is that Flag, the Flag that waved in
proud defiance over the works of Fort Pillow. Soldiers,
this Flag I give to you, knowing that you will ever re-
member the last words of my noble husband, 'Never
surrender the Flag to traitors I' " Colonel Jackson re-
ceived from her hand, in behalf of his command, the
blood-soaked Flag, and called upon his regiment to re-
ceive it as such a gift should be received. He and
every man of his regiment fell on their knees and swore
to avenge their fallen commander and never surrender
the Flag.
A group of Northern soldiers was imprisoned at
Libby Prison in 1863. On July Fourth came news,
brought in by an old slave, that Lee had been defeated
at Gettysburg. At once, "the very walls of Libby
quivered in the melody as five hundred joined in the
chorus of the Battle Hymn of the Republic." And
then those sick, starving fellows decided to have an
Old Glory and display it. The Rev. C. C. McCabe,
Chaplain of the One Hundred and Twenty-first Ohio
2i6 THE DRAMATIC STORY OF OLD GLORY
Regiment, one of the prisoners in the group, continues
this story for us: "A man was found who wore a red
shirt; another had a blue one; white (^) shirts were
plenty. From a combination of these at last emerged
the emblem of liberty with all its thirty-four stars.
I never saw men gaze so long and earnestly at a flag
before or since."
Libby Prison had witnessed a similar scene on the
preceding Fourth of July, when twenty-five men of
the Ninth Massachusetts Infantry, including Timothy
J. Regan of Company E, who had been imprisoned
after being captured at Malvern Hill, made up their
minds that they would have a real Old Glory. Accord-
ing to the Boston Globe^ "Regan offered his blue flan-
nel shirt as a field for the stars. Other prisoners bought
through the guards about four yards each of unbleached
white cotton and a very poor quality of red worsted,
which was torn lengthwise into strips to form the
stripes. Pieces of white shirts were used for the stars,
which Regan cut out; and the men set to work to
fashion their flag with the needles and thread that
they had been permitted to retain. The flag was not
finished until the morning of the Fourth, when Regan
climbed into the rafters, and there unfurled the ban-
ner to the delight of the little band of patriots."
There is a pretty sequel to this incident. This im-
provised Old Glory was torn into twenty-two pieces,
to prevent its falling into the hands of the Confed-
erates. A piece was given to each man who had helped
to make it. These pieces were concealed in the cloth-
ing of the men and, later, carried away from Libby.
After the War was over, Regan decided to get together
OLD GLORY'S FOLLOWERS 217
these fragments and recreate their Stars and Stripes.
It was not until 1897, thirty-five years after the mak-
ing of the Flag, that he secured the twenty-second
piece and saw his Old Glory complete once more. This
Flag, eleven feet nine inches by six feet seven inches,
is now in the possession of the Thomas G. Stevenson
Post 26, G. A. R., of Roxbury, Mass.
But there were many men, penned within the walls
of Southern prisons, who never caught a glimpse of the
Flag they loved so deeply. Out from Andersonville
came, in 1865, men who seemed to have emerged from
"some strange outer world, some horrible land of dim-
ness and groans." One day a company of them, shuf-
fling by, was asked, "Boys, how did you live through
it^" A grim old Tennesseean replied, instantly,
straightening up as if to salute, " 'Twas the flag that
kept us up."
Old Glory nerved its followers to face Death, and
there are many recorded instances of men and boys
dying with the Flag as the last mental picture absolute
in their thought. William Starr, of one of Ohio's regi-
ments, was dying in a hospital in April, 1865. Word
that Richmond had fallen was brought to him. "Now,"
said he, "I am ready to go. When I am gone, cover
me with the Flag." In his last moments, a little boy
came to bid him good-bye, carrying in his hands a tiny
Flag. Starr's failing sight caught the gleam of the
child's Stars and Stripes. He reached out, took it,
waved it feebly down and up, once, and then, for him,
no more the sight of Old Glory. That night a "splen-
did silk flag" was brought in and laid over his body.
Private Andrew McGurk, of the Eleventh Illinois In-
2i8 THE DRAMATIC STORY OF OLD GLORY
fantry, lay near a window of a hospital in Nashville.
His regiment had been terribly cut to pieces at Fort
Donelson and Shiloh, and memories of those bitter
fights surged through his mind. He whispered, "Fought
till — almost — the — last — man — fell." There came a
final lucid interval. A glance through the window
gave him Old Glory floating from the dome of the
Nashville Capitol. "Ah I the — old — flag! — it — waves
— still." And Private Andrew McGurk was gone.
Chaplain H. Clay Trumbull gives two dramatic evi-
dences of devotion to Old Glory. The first follows:
"After one of our battles in South Carolina, while
preparations were making for another fight, I saw a
newly appointed color-sergeant lying in line with the
men, and tenderly shielding the colors with his body
from a driving rainstorm.
" 'Sergeant,' I said, T hear that the colonel has given
you the colors to carry. I congratulate you.'
" 'Yes, Chaplain,' he replied, looking down on his
charge with affectionate pride; 'and I don't know of
anything better than this that I'm fighting for.' "
Here is the second incident. "In the first severe en-
gagement of which I was a witness, our color-sergeant
and one of the color-corporals were badly wounded,
and were borne to the rear and laid on the ground side
by side at the field hospital. As I knelt by the corporal
his first words were:
" 'I did what I could to guard the colors, Chaplain.
I'd stand by them to the last.'
" 'I know you would, Corporal. You were always
faithful!'
" 'Where's the regiment now?' he asked.
OLD GLORY'S FOLLOWERS 219
" 'It's gone on and finished its work,' I said.
"'Glory I' he cried.
"Just then the major of the regiment made his ap-
pearance, the battle being over. At once the wounded
sergeant called to me :
" 'Chaplain, there's the major. Won't you ask him
if the colors are safe^' "
Trumbull then continues with these words: "The
colors were first in the thoughts of their soldier guard-
ians, at the front and at the rear. Patriotism, loyalty,
devotion, centered in the flag as a symbol, as it could
not, in the nature of things, center in anything else.
Soldiers came to love and honor the flag above all other
visible objects."
We cannot omit from this chapter at least one anec-
dote illustrating the heroism of loyal women during
the Civil War. Nashville, Tenn., was the only city in
the seceding States that contained a number of genuine
Unionists who had the courage to stand by their colors
openly and in defiance of Southern sympathizers. In
that brave little regiment of men and women was Mrs.
Hetty McEwen, and her breed was not the kind to
haul down Old Glory for any man. She was an old
woman, in 1861, having been born while Washington
was President. Six of her uncles fought at King's
Mountain, in 1780, and four of them were killed in
that wild fight.
Hetty McEwen with her own fingers stitched togeth-
er a Stars and Stripes. There was talk of secession in
her neighborhood, and she intended to stand true to
the Nation, and to have every one know her position.
At length came a day of crisis. Her husband, Colonel
220 THE DRAMATIC STORY OF OLD GLORY
McEwen, who had fought under Andrew Jackson,
fastened a pole into one of the chimneys of their house
and nailed his wife's Old Glory to it.
We are glad to be able to quote a Civil War record
at this point: 'The hostility now became fiercer than
ever. The Colonel was told that the flag must come
down from that roof if the house had to be fired to
bring it down. He asked his wife what they had better
do about the flag, adding that he would sustain her in
any course she thought best to adopt. 'Load me the
shot-gun, Colonel McEwen,' said the heroic old wom-
an. And he loaded it for her with sixteen buckshot in
each barrel. 'Now,' added she, 'I will take the respon-
sibility of guarding that flag. Whoever attempts to
pass my door on his way to the roof for the star-span-
gled banner under which my four uncles fell at King's
Mountain, must go over my dead body.' " Old Glory
stayed over Hetty McEwen's house, unmolested.
When the Civil War broke out, the Hon. J. F. H.
Claiborne was living on a cotton plantation in the far
south-western comer of Mississippi. His only son was
in the Confederate service, and his own sentiments were
well known. To him came one day Captain Rockwell,
of the Thirty-first Massachusetts Infantry, demanding
that he give up a flag which was said to be in his home
and was undoubtedly a Confederate standard. Clai-
borne denied that he had any flag of that type. A rigid
search was made. No flag appeared. Then Claiborne
said, "Now, sir, you have failed to find a flag, but I con-
fess I have one. I will never part with it. If you take
me you shall take it; and if you take it^ you shall take
tner
OLD GLORY'S FOLLOWERS 221
He then ordered a servant to bring a certain trunk.
It was old and dilapidated. It was opened, and there,
before Rockwell's astonished eyes, were a bundle of
commissions and a moth-eaten Flag, a real Stars and
Stripes. Claiborne smiled and said, "General Clai-
borne, my father, had been ensign, lieutenant, captain
and adjutant of the First Regiment of the United
States, in Anthony Wayne's army; and this was the
old flag of that regiment."
So, after all's been said, there were Southern hearts
in '61 that beat in tune to the music of the whispering
folds of Old Glory. A captured Confederate officer
told the truth when he remarked, ''Oh, well, as to that,
the Stars and Stripes are just the sauciest rag to fight
under that ever was swung on a battle-field. I don't
wonder they like that flag."
XXXVIII
The Immortal Color-Bearers
"But I have seen thee, bunting,
To tatters torn upon the splintered staff,
Or clutched to some young color-bearer's breast
With desperate hands.
Savagely struggled for."
Walt Whitman.
IN July, 1913, the writer went to Gettysburg and
found himself one in a host of men with a million
memories. After sunset, from the crest of Little Round
Top, he watched the myriad fireflies weaving their deli-
cate mantle of fire over a consecrated ground. As a far
bugle sounded "taps," he wrote on a slip of paper these
words :
You men In the Grey and the Blue,
There are boys in the dusk here with you.
They gather in ranks,
On your front, on your flanks,
In the fire-fly maze and the dew.
Again, in December, 1917, alone on the field, he
stood at nightfall on Little Round Top. On the chill
wind came the ghostly voices of the boys of Sedgwick's
Sixth Corps of the Army of the Potomac, singing afar
in the night as they swung along in their great march to
Gettysburg. He saw them come in near Little Round
222
IMMORTAL COLOR-BEARERS 223
Top, dusty, tired, indomitable, with their color-
bearers carrying the Old Glories of many desperate
fields. And then the vision vanished. But one young,
slender color-bearer came to his side with a spectral
Stars and Stripes, and pointed down to the line of me-
morials where in July, 1863, many a Northern lad bore
Old Glory into the whirlpool of action, fell and never
rose again. And then he, too, faded into the darkness.
Wisconsin. Gettysburg, July, '63. Meredith's
Iron Brigade, the advance-guard of the Army of the
Potomac, strikes the swinging flail of the onrushing
Confederate left, to the north of Gettysburg town.
The gray line, bursting into view, greets the Second
Wisconsin Infantry with a volley. Down goes nearly
a third of the regiment. Twenty-three of the thirty-
three in the color-company are killed or wounded in
thirty minutes. Soon the last color-bearer is killed.
In the ranks of the Second Wisconsin is Private R. E.
Davison, who has been wounded at Antietam while
saving Old Glory. He runs to the side of the last
staggering color-bearer, catches the Flag as it drops,
turns to the regiment behind him and shouts, "Come
on!'' The men of the Northwest answer with a yell
and follow him up to and into the Confederate lines,
breaking them.
Night comes. Beneath a Stars and Stripes so rid-
dled and torn by bullets that it will never again wave
over a field of battle, fifty men out of the regiment's
three hundred of the morning, answer at roll-call.
Minnesota. Gettysburg, July, '63. Longs treet,
commanding the right wing of Lee's Army of Northern
Virginia, has hurled brigades from his Corps upon
224 THE DRAMATIC STORY OF OLD GLORY
Sickles' exposed line. The Union front is broken. Con-
federate regiments are drifting through, aiming to
crumple up Meade's left wing, take Little Round Top,
and repeat their victory at Chancellorsville. The brig-
ades of Barksdale and Kershaw, on the run, are pouring
across the field. In the Peach Orchard and around
Bigelow's Battery at the Trostle house, a demoniac
conflict is raging. Hancock comes up on the gallop,
rides straight into a vortex of flame, sees a regiment in
line, reins in his horse and shouts, "What regiment is
that?" Colonel Colville answers, "The First Minne-
sota." "Do you see those lines'?" cries Hancock, point-
ing to the enrolling tide in gray. "Charge them !"
On go the color-guard of those men from the North-
west. Behind them and at their sides are points of
loyal glittering bayonets. They reach a little brook,
its bed dry from the summer heat. There they stand,
faced and gripped on the flanks by three thousand
rifles pouring lead into them in streams. Down goes
Color-Sergeant Ellett P. Perkins, but the Stars and
Stripes does not touch the ground. A corporal seizes
it from his hand. He, too, struck by a bullet, staggers
and hands the Flag to another corporal, who also pitches
forward. But Corporal Dehn is at his side, and Old
Glory still quivers in the tempest of lead.
The little brook begins to trickle into life again, but
now with Minnesota blood. Thank God, reenforce-
ments arrive, and "the First Minnesota is relieved."
Corporal Dehn alone of the color-guard is left, and he
carries out a rent and tattered Old Glory at the head of
forty-seven men of the two hundred and sixty-two
IMMORTAL COLOR-BEARERS 225
who fifteen minutes ago sprang into their bayonet
charge.
Michigan. Gettysburg, July, '63. A gray billow
of men sweeps toward them. Above the rattle of mus-
ketry sounds the triumphant rebel-yell. "Stand firm,
Fourth Michigan I Stand firm I" shouts Col. Jeffords.
Red flags, streaked with blue and with hostile stars, ap-
pear in the drifting smoke, flapping as they come near-
er, nearer. The billow breaks on the men of Michigan,
forces them back into the deadly wheat-field. A swarm
in gray leaps for the Stars and Stripes. Down sinks
the color-guard, every man bayoneted or shot. An arm
in gray shoots forward, wrenches the Flag from the
grasp of a fallen corporal. Jeffords, hat off, sword in
hand, rushes to save his loved Old Glory. A flash of
bayonets, and he is pinned to the ground. Lieut.-
Colonel Lumbard springs toward the Flag, crying,
"Stand firm! Stand firm! This is the time for men
to die." Old Glory becomes the center of desperate
hand-to-hand fighting. Northern bayonets and butts
of rifles do deadly work. The Flag of the Fourth
Michigan and the body of its Colonel are saved.
Pennsylvania. Gettysburg, July, '63. Twelve
Old Glories face nearly double their number of Con-
federate standards advancing upon them in Pickett's
charge. It is high tide for the South at Gettysburg.
With Armistead leading, the red banners burst through
the Union line at the low stone wall and smother
Cushing's Battery. Meade's army is severed at its
center. Sixty yards away, the Seventy-second Pennsyl-
vania is in leash, waiting the word to charge. An
officer rides up on a badly wounded horse. "Sergeant,
226 THE DRAMATIC STORY OF OLD GLORY
forward with your colors !" he cries. "Let the Rebels
see it close to their eyes before they die." The color-
sergeant, grasping the stump of his broken lance in both
hands, waves the Stars and Stripes above his head and
rushes, alone, toward the wall now crested with men
in gray and their flaunting crimson flags.
Men of the Seventy-second Pennsylvania, this is the
soil of your own State. Up and at them I Your color-
sergeant is half way to the wall. A bullet strikes him.
He spins round, totters and falls, dead. With a wild
yell, you rush by him, taking up your Old Glory as
you go. Now it is Pennsylvania against Virginia. At
the "Bloody Angle," where a swirling mass of men
struggles, around Old Glories and flags aflame with red,
tossing and whirling above them, the flood of the gray
invasion strikes a wall of blue, and stops. Armistead
falls, dying, at the feet of a color-bearer of the Seventy-
second Pennsylvania.
Maine. Bull Run, July, '6i. Yesterday, July 20,
the Seventh Maine Infantry was presented with a
glorious silk Stars and Stripes, with slide, rings and
battle-axe surmounting the staff, of solid silver, sent
all the way from California to meet the regiment on its
way to Bull Run. The regiment is now in action.
Twice its men have charged almost to the muzzles of a
Confederate battery. Color-Sergeant William J. Deane
has fallen, mortally wounded, and Color-Corporal A.
V. Moore, who took the Flag from Deane's hands, is
lying dead beside it, near the. enemy's lines. A body of
Confederates dashes out to take Old Glory. The men
from Maine shout, "We must have that flag!" Led
by Colonel Charles D. Jameson, they charge on the
IMMORTAL COLOR-BEARERS 227
men in gray rapidly nearing the Flag, beat them back
and rescue their color.
Color-Sergeant Deane is dying on the grass close
by a little brook. Lieutenant-Colonel Roberts has told
him that his Flag is safe. Deane beckons to Chaplain
Mines, who kneels and puts his ear close to the suf-
ferer's mouth. "It's safe I" says Deane. "What," asks
Mines, "the Flag?" Deane nods, smiles, closes his
eyes, and dies.
Delaware. Antietam, September, '62. The First
Delaware Infantry is advancing through woods and
corn fields. Suddenly it comes to a sunken road, or
ravine, beyond which, behind a breastwork of sod
and wooden rails, are heavy masses of Confederate
infantry. The Stars and Stripes and the State color
emerge from the stalks of corn. There is a thundering
crash, a plunging volley from the breastwork, followed
by an intense, withering fire. In five minutes, two hun-
dred and eighty-six of the regiment's six hundred and
thirty-five men are down, killed or wounded. One by
one the color-bearers fall, but Old Glory goes on until
it is within twenty yards of the breastwork, where the
ninth and last of its heroic bearers drops dead. There
is a dramatic struggle for the Stars and Stripes lying on
the road. Five times the men in gray charge to capture
the Flag, and each time they fall back, discomfited by
the deadly fire of the men in blue.
Delaware, will you give up your Old Glory, around
which lie its fallen bearers? Captain Rickards calls
for volunteers, and thirty men respond. They rush
out into the open, down into the road where their
Stars and Stripes lies with a boy's still hand upon it.
228 THE DRAMATIC STORY OF OLD GLORY
A storm of lead smites them and twenty fall. Lieu-
tenant Charles B. Tanner steps forward from the ranks
and calls for men to aid him in another effort to rescue
the Flag. Twenty men spring to his side. They run
toward the Stars and Stripes. One after another they
reel and fall in the whirlwind of bullets. But Tanner,
his right arm shattered by a minie-ball, plunges on,
drops on his knees by the Flag, seizes it in his left
hand, leaps to his feet and returns with Old Glory.
Rhode Island. Antietam, September, '62. The
Fourth Rhode Island Infantry is on the extreme left
of the Army of the Potomac. It sweeps across a rolling
country, under a heavy artillery fire, and comes into
brisk action with the Confederates in a cornfield. The
regiments in gray are almost hidden in the thick, tall
growth of com, and their positions are determined
mainly by the challenge of their rifle-fire. The Fourth
Rhode Island reaches a low, round hill, on the crest of
which, partly concealed, is a portion of a Confederate
brigade.
Union forces, coming to this hill from another
angle, suddenly divert the volleys from its summit.
They thrust up a Stars and Stripes, its Red, White and
Blue plain above the yellow corn-stalks, as a signal
to the Fourth Rhode Island. "We are firing on our
own men," cries a Rhode Island officer. Then he gives
the command to charge, and the Fourth Rhode Island
dashes up the slope, its Old Glory in the lead. Out
of the screen of corn on the crest crashes a sweeping
fire. Color-bearer Thomas B. Tanner is killed, and his
Flag is wrenched from his hands by a soldier in gray.
The latter falls into the clutches of Lieutenant George
IMMORTAL COLOR-BEARERS 229
E. Curtis, and yields the Stars and Stripes after a sharp
struggle. Above the tumult of Antietam ring the cheers
of the boys of Rhode Island.
Indiana. Stone River, December, '62. The Sixth
Indiana Infantry is at the apex of a right angle. Twice
the regiment has been attacked on this critical day, and
now, a third assault, in a gray sea, sweeps upon it
and envelops it on front, on right and on left. The
Sixth runs a gauntlet of flame, with its colors plung-
ing on in advance. Color-Sergeant John E. Tillman
drops, wounded for the third time, with a ball through
a knee. He hands the Stars and Stripes over to Cor-
poral Carson, who instantly falls with a wound in his
thigh. Three boys. Corporals Young, Meades and
Harold, now bear Old Glory in quick succession; and
all three are shot.
Harold, a mere lad, beloved of the regiment, dies
in saving the Stars and Stripes. His hands are the last
to carry it through the gates of the storm of battle,
and he falls on the threshold of safety. A recorder of
the part the Sixth Indiana takes at Stone River, will
write, in months to come, "Bitter tears were shed when
Harold died, under the banner he had saved with his
blood."
Massachusetts. Fredericksburg, December, '62.
Noon of a raw winter day. The Twenty-first Massa-
chusetts Infantry is drawn up in the town, ready to
cross the Rappahannock and assault the formidable
Confederate works. They cross on the upper pontoon
bridge, and at once rush toward the entrenched lines.
The air about them becomes an inferno of projectiles
which hiss, shriek and burst. Side by side race the
230 THE DRAMATIC STORY OF OLD GLORY
Stars and Stripes and the State color, borne by Color-
Sergeant Joseph H. Collins and Color-Corporal Barr.
Sixty rods from that wall fringed with flame and
smoke, both color-bearers fall. Sergeant Thomas Plun-
kett springs to lift Old Glory as it trails toward the
ground with its mortally wounded bearer; and Color-
Corporal Wheeler stoops and loosens the grasp of the
dying Barr from the staff of the white Massachusetts
color. At the point nearest the Confederate infantry
reached by boys in blue on this terrible day, a shell
bursts on Plunkett and his Stars and Stripes. Both
arms are torn from his body and his Flag is drenched
in his blood. But Color-Corporal Brady H. Olney is
at his side, and Old Glory again streams defiant in the
gusts of shot and shell.
Twenty years from now. Sergeant Plunkett, and
your eyes will be closed forever from the sight of the
Stars and Stripes. But Massachusetts will bring from
her Capitol, to your body lying near her heart at Wor-
cester, the remnant of your Old Glory reddened with
your blood, and lay it gently above you. Nor Death
nor Time can separate you from the moment of your
supreme sacrifice.
New Hampshire. Fredericksburg, December, '62.
The Fifth New Hampshire Infantry has reached the
dead-line, beyond which it can advance no farther, a
rail fence within range of the Confederate rifle-pits.
On that last stretch of open ground, before the protect-
ing fence is reached, lie the color and all its bearers.
Captain James B. Perry starts on the run to save it,
is struck in the breast and mortally wounded. Dying,
he whispers, "I know I shall not recover from this
IMMORTAL COLOR-BEARERS 231
wound, but I am content if I can see the old flag
once more." Captain Murray makes an attempt to get
to the Flag, but is killed, and Captain Moore, follow-
ing him, also falls dying. A little group of determined
men rushes out upon that dangerous open. Their bodies
fall across one another, close to the Flag. Lieutenant
George Nettleton crawls from behind the fence to the
color, is struck by a grapt-shot and mortally hurt. But
he gets back to his regiment with their Flag. Captain
Perry presses the blood-wet folds to his lips, and dies.
Iowa. Vicksburg, May, '63. The Army of the
Tennessee is assaulting the Confederate works at Vicks-
burg. The Flag of the Ninth Iowa Infantry, that
came so many miles from New England as a tribute
to the regiment, flutters on through the storm of bullets
to the very edge of the works, carried by Color-Ser-
geant Elson. He springs to the crest of the redoubt
and plants the Stars and Stripes firmly in the ground,
cheering the regiment on to protect it. A bullet strikes
him in the thigh and he falls, dragging Old Glory
with him. Captain George Granger draws the Flag
from under Elson's bleeding body and hands it to
Color-Corporal Otis Crawford, who soon falls with it
in his arms. In swift succession, Color-Corporals
Curtis, Moore, Strunk, Gipe, Moulton, Logue and
Smith, are shot while carrying the beloved color. The
assault ends in a disastrous repulse. The survivors of
the regiment find themselves lying in a ditch, behind
logs, close to and partly under the protection of the
Confederate earthworks. Captain Granger tears the
Stars and Stripes from its staff and conceals it be-
neath his blouse. Under the cover of the night, the
232 THE DRAMATIC STORY OF OLD GLORY
Ninth Iowa, torn as badly as its Old Glory, retires in
safety.
But other color-bearers of the Ninth Iowa will carry
their Old Glory through days glorious with victory. In
their hands it will travel two thousand miles over Con-
federate soil, toil up the rocky steep of Lookout Moun-
tain, stream on the brow of Missionary Ridge on a chill
night after a terrific struggle at Chickamauga, in the
midst of shivering, tired, hungry soldiers; and at last,
a mere shred, a ghost of its early beauty, it will pass
out of service and into immortality.
Illinois. Chickamauga, September, '63. The Fed-
eral right at Chickamauga has been ripped to pieces by
terrific Confederate assaults. Hosts of fugitives with
artillery, limbers and caissons, are pouring to the rear.
Thomas and his Corps, on the left, stand like a rock,
steadfast in the torrent. They have taken the form of
a huge horseshoe, a band of steel that cannot be bent
or broken. Distant, at McAffee Church, is General
Steedman with a division of infantry, three four-gun
batteries and two squadrons of cavalry. He has been
ordered to stay there, but, the roar of Thomas' stub-
born defense coming to him on the air, he decides to
disregard orders, and go to the field of Chickamauga.
Thomas, on his horse under a clump of dead trees,
sees a thick cloud of dust rising from the Lafayette
road. A column of marching men comes into sight.
They and their Flags are so covered with dust that
Thomas cannot distinguish them as friend or foe. A
color-bearer waves his Flag, high over his head. A
sprinkle of gray dust floats from it. The Stars and
IMMORTAL COLOR-BEARERS 233
Stripes signals to the tight-gripped men of the blue
horseshoe that help is at hand.
On the extreme right of the curved line there is
imminent danger of a collapse under stem pressure.
There, on a front of seven hundred yards, twelve thou-
sand rifles exchange volleys. The ground slopes from
the blue regiments up to those in gray. Steedman re-
ceives orders from Thomas to charge up that slope
and break the Confederate grip. He rides to the head
of the One Hundred and Fifteenth Illinois Infantry,
seizes a Stars and Stripes from its bearer, and shouts,
''Boys, I'll command you. I'll bear your flag if you'll
defend it. 'Tention! Forward — double — quick —
march!" A stream of bullets tears Old Glory into
shreds, as Steedman, galloping on, holds it above him.
His horse, struck and plunging forward, hurls rider
and Flag over his head. Man and color lie tangled on
the ground. The One Hundred and Fifteenth Illinois,
charging by with a yell, lift Old Glory into its home
amidst the hurricane of shot, and break, bayonet clash-
ing against bayonet, into the heart of the Confederate
line.
Ohio. Missionary Ridge, November, '63. An eagle
soars above Chattanooga Valley. Below him on Mis-
sionary Ridge, are eight thousand gray riflemen and
fifty cannon. The gothic rim of the crest is a lip of
flame; rifles and heavy guns all blazing down a slope
that rises to them five hundred feet on an angle of forty-
five degrees. Up this steep, on a front well over a
mile wide, moves a line of blue, infantry of the Army
of the Cumberland. At intervals the line is pushed
forward into inverted Vs. There are waving wings at
234 THE DRAMATIC STORY OF OLQ GLORY
fifteen of these points, Stars and Stripes moving up-
ward irresistibly, borne by their color-guards. These
Flags have gone through hurricanes of shot at Pea
Ridge, Shiloh and Stone River, and have been riddled
at Chickamauga.
Near the center of Sheridan's upsweeping front, Old
Glories ripple over men from Ohio. The Ninety-sev-
enth Ohio Infantry approaches the fire-rimmed crest. A
color-bearer falls. For a moment the Stars and Stripes
wavers at the tip of its V, a broken wing faltering. It
swings up again into its right of leadership. Now the
great broom of blue grazes the fringe of the summit
and scatters the ranks in gray who so tenaciously have
clung to their guns. In the west the sun is but its own
breadth from the wall of the hills. The golden rays,
bridging the valley from Chattanooga to the Ridge, fall
upon and illumine the regiments in blue, the glitter-
ing bayonets and the waving, triumphant Stars and
Stripes. The eagle turns, soars to the west and disap-
pears in the sunset.
Connecticut. The Wilderness, May, '64. Chaos
in the Wilderness. Through tangled brush and twist-
ing branches, a desperate battle is raging. The Four-
teenth Connecticut Infantry, on the left of the Federal
line, is engaged in driving back the enemy's outposts.
So great is the din that orders cannot be heard. The
adjutant, seeking for a means of rallying the men,
touches a color-bearer on the shoulder, points to a
fallen tree, and shouts to him to kneel by it, holding
the Flag over him. Around the two. Stars and Stripes
and boy, gather officers and men of the Fourteenth
and other regiments. With this vivid point of loyalty
IMMORTAL COLOR-BEARERS 235
as a base, the line is extended as skirmishers. Color-
Corporal Charles W. Norton, standing by the Flag,
is severely wounded.
In the afternoon Longstreet throws his fresh Corps
against the Union line, into a battle-ground thick with
a pall of smoke and ablaze with burning trees and
grass. The Wilderness becomes an inferno. The
Fourteenth Connecticut is wellnigh surrounded. Color-
Corporal Henry K. Lyon, standing in an exposed po-
sition, staggers and sinks to the ground. Lieutenant-
Colonel Moore, at his side, takes Old Glory from his
hands. "Take it. Colonel I I have done my best," says
Lyon, and dies. Moore gives the Stars and Stripes
to Color-Sergeant John Hirst, and with him it goes
through the rest of the awful fight, to find quiet only
as the stars come out above it and the Wilderness hears
the whip-poor-wills calling mournfully in the tangled
depths, above the living and the dead, the Blue and
the Gray.
New York. Peach Tree Creek, July, '64. The
One Hundred and Forty-ninth New York Infantry is
in a field thick with undergrowth and trailing vines.
Its brigade, in reserve in a column of regiments, is
ordered forward, each regiment advancing as it be-
comes deployed. As each regiment comes into close
range, it is at once a focus of converging fire. The
One Hundred and Forty-ninth traverses a ravine filled
with the hum of bullets and, with its colors ahead,
enters a maze of tangled brush clouded by a swirl of
smoke stabbed by spurts of flame. Six of the bearers
of the Stars and Stripes are lying in the ragged grass.
Color-Sergeant W. H. H. Crosier stands, a solitary
236 THE DRAMATIC STORY OF OLD GLORY
figure, outlined with his Flag against the drifting
smoke. Out of this smoke rushes a knot of men in
gray. They leap upon Crosier. "Take my Flag, if
you can I" he yells. The staff is grasped. He rips
Old Glory from its lance, tucks it under his blouse
over his heart. Then, with a dive, he breaks through
the gray circle around him and runs toward his regi-
ment. A bullet strikes him, but he goes on. Stained
with blood, he emerges from the thicket, and is con-
fronted by his Colonel, who demands, "Where is that
Flag?" Crosier unbuttons his blouse, pulls out Old
Glory, says faintly, "Here it is. Colonel," and sinks
to the ground.
General H. A. Bamum will recommend Color-Ser-
geant Crosier for the Congressional Medal of Honor.
In the letter which he will write he will say, "Crosier's
act was one of superb bravery in action and of devotion
to the flag, in which he held life as nothing to the sav-
ing of the starry banner."
Vermont. Cedar Creek, October, '64. Break of
day. With the speed of a whirlwind, Jubal Early
strikes a section of the Army of the Potomac, deter-
mined on breaking its grip on the Army of Northern
Virginia. The Eighth Vermont Infantry, a part of
General Stephen Thomas' Brigade, a mere handful of
men, is thrown in to stem the torrent. General Crook's
Corps, to the left, has been surprised, smashed and
swept away. Under Major Meade, the Green Moun-
tain Boys hold a terribly exposed position, for the
enemy, with deafening yells, moves swiftly in from
front and flank. Regiment after regiment of the
Eighth Corps crumbles and goes by to the rear. Two
IMMORTAL COLOR-BEARERS 237
companion regiments, the Twelfth Connecticut and the
One Hundred and Sixtieth New York, frightfully
broken, cling to their ground, but with ever widening
rifts between as the Confederate swarm breaks upon
them in fury.
Suddenly a mass of men in gray confronts the twin
Flags of the Eighth Vermont, demanding their sur-
render. "Never! Never!" is the reply of the men in
blue, forming a compact ring of defense around their
colors. Instantly begins one of the Civil War's most
desperate and ugly hand-to-hand struggles for flags.
Men become demons, fight with fists, clubbed muskets
and bayonets. Color-Corporal Petre, shot in the thigh,
pitches forward to the ground. "Boys, leave me ! Take
care of yourselves and the flag!" he cries. As he
crawls away to die. Corporal Perham seizes Old Glory
and raises it aloft. A soldier in gray reaches to grip
the staff, but Color-Sergeant Shores places the muzzle
of his musket against his breast and fires, killing him
instantly. A flash from another musket, and Perham
falls, dragging the Stars and Stripes to the earth with
him. Again, in a din of yells, the Flag goes up, held
stoutly by Color-Corporal Blanchard.
Color-Sergeants Shores and Simpson, now standing
by the colors, become the center of a terrific man-to-
man fight. Three Confederates attack them at once
and attempt to take Old Glory. Simpson fires at one,
and Shores bayonets another. Down the line bursts
forth wild cheering. Sheridan has come from Win-
chester, miles away, and the tide of battle, that has
been ebbing so swiftly for the Army of the Potomac,
turns into a flood of victory. At the heart of the Eighth
238 THE DRAMATIC STORY OF OLD GLORY
Vermont stands a little group of stunned and bleeding
boys, the faithful, heroic color-guard. Salute Ser-
geants Moran, Shores and Holt, and Corporal Worden,
who are willing to die, but not to yield the Stars and
Stripes.
New Jersey. Fort Mahone, April, '65. A New
Jersey boy, James Jarvis, of the State's Thirty-ninth
Infantry, gives a superb picture of heroism under Old
Glory. It is the early dawn of April 2, '65. The regi-
ment is moving forward, under a pitiless fire, to the
assault on Fort Mahone. Jarvis runs ahead, scales
the earthwork and, mounting the parapet, plants the
Flag squarely in the face of the enemy. Immediately
he is the target for a hail of bullets. Forty-three balls
pierce his Old Glory, and one slices his right arm. But
he stands, refusing to yield an inch, clinging to his
Flag, until he sees his regiment beaten back by the un-
yielding fire. With one last defiant glance at the mus*
kets leveled at him, he leaps from the crest of the
parapet and brings off the Stars and Stripes, tattered
but glorious.
Maryland. Five Forks, April, '65. The war is
at the eve of Appomattox. Fighting doggedly, the
worn and battered Army of Northern Virginia is re-
vealing, in its final hours, the splendid temper of its
steel. Pushed back, struck repeatedly by an army of its
own tough fiber, it is standing with its back to the wall,
dangerous in its extremity. Sheridan, moving with
dazzling rapidity, is opening his brilliant battle at
Five Forks. In the Fourth Maryland Infantry, as it
goes into action, is a boy color-bearer. Corporal Jacob
R. ^Turner, and the day is his twentieth birthday. Over
IMMORTAL COLOR-BEARERS 239
his head as he advances, flutters a standard nearing the
close of its first century in history, about to witness
the last event of the greatest canto of its long epic.
Corporal Tucker sees no Appomattox ahead of him as
he runs. The brown line of a Confederate entrench-
ment is before him, blazing with flame and crested with
smoke. Can he plant the Stars and Stripes on that
line? He outstrips his comrades of the Fourth Mary-
land, reaches the brown slope, scales it and stands,
silhouetted against the murky cloud, waving Old Glory
above the Confederate flag. With a cheer the Fourth
Maryland billows up to and around him, clears the
barricade and leaps to cross bayonets with men in
gray.
Within four months, Corporal Tucker, you will re-
ceive from General Grant, a letter of praise, commend-
ing your "gallantry and heroism in battle," as one his-
torian says, "the only letter of the kind ever sent by
a commanding general to a private soldier during the
war."
XXXIX
The Flag Comes Home
"Imagine what it was like to see a bullet-shredded old battle-
flag reverently unfolded to the gaze of a thousand middle-
aged soldiers, most of whom hadn't seen it since they saw it
advancing over victorious fields when they were in their prime.
And imagine what it was like when Grant stepped into view
while they were still going mad over the flag; and then right
in the midst of it all somebody struck up 'When we were
marching through Georgia.' Well, you should have heard
the thousand voices lift that chorus and seen the tears stream
down. If I live a hundred years, I shan't ever forget these
things, nor be able to talk about them." — Mark Twain, in let-
ter to Howells, November, 1879.
THE men who came North from Appomattox in
1865, brought with them the memory of an un-
usually dramatic scene. We have been strict, in this
history, in our adherence to the story of the Stars and
Stripes. We have closed the door on such flags as
have come into life on the soil of the United States,
hostile to our Flag and its meaning as the perfect sym-
bol of federated States bound in an indissoluble Union.
But there was an hour at the very close of the Civil
War, so pathetic, so interpretative of the splendid
armies that fought for the Confederacy, that we open
the door and give a swift view of the last moments at
Appomattox.
Brigadier-General Joshua L. Chamberlain was del-
240
THE FLAG COMES HOME 241
egated by Grant to receive the surrender of Lee's Army.
A detachment of that Army, led by Lieutenant-Gen-
eral John B. Gordon, came marching with their arms
to the place designated for the formal act of surrender.
Chamberlain, a soldier and a man, thrilled with a noble
pity, gave a sharp command, and the Union muskets
came to an attitude of salute. Gordon reined his
horse, turned in his saddle, drew his sword, and, with a
magnificent sweep, acknowledged the salute and its
significance. As the torn and ghostly banners of the
South went by, the Stars and Stripes dipped in a com-
radeship of heroism not wholly without reverence; not
for the flag that had gone down in defeat, but for the
men, Americans, who had fought under it.
Then, with a painful reluctance, the flags of the
Lost Cause were leaned against the stacks of muskets
or laid gently on the ground. The hour of parting had
come, and, regardless of discipline, the gray ranks
broke and the men rushed to their flags, folded them
in their arms, pressed them to their lips and wept over
them.
From the front of four bitter years, Old Glory came
home. There is a literature in itself on the return of
the Northern battle-flags. One paragraph, >written at
the time, presents a picture more graphic than any we
can give: — "The multitude raised a shout and cheered,
but the impulse was but momentary, for at the sight
of the array of tattered rags the noise of the tumult
died away, and a half-suppressed sound was heard as
through the hearts of the people there flashed a thrill
of mingled pride and pain. Those who saw it will
never forget the scene. In the center the tattered silk
242 THE DRAMATIC STORY OF OLD GLORY
of the colors, and on the fringe and in the background
a wonder-stricken crowd, as past uncovered heads, past
dimmed eyes and quivering lips, the old flags were car-
ried."
We turn to a page of Connecticut's history for our
final view of the Old Glory of the Civil War. The
ceremony of returning the battle-flags of the State was
held at Hartford. It was decided to gather the regi-
mental standards, repair those that could be repaired,
and deposit them in the State Capitol for preservation
and as a memorial of a great period in the history of
the Nation and of the State. Other Northern States
were carrying out similar ceremonies, and Connecticut's
battle-flag day did not differ in essentials from the
routine followed throughout the North. But there
were two or three incidents in the Hartford episode
of a peculiarly tender significance.
A committee of women and girls was appointed to
take the Flags into their hands for the delicate work
of repairing them in such a way that they should re-
tain their torn and bullet-pierced appearance and yet
be fortified for the decades to come. One girl was
given, for her handiwork, the Flag under which her
brother had died in action. A young woman took the
last stitches in a Stars and Stripes which, during the
war, had more than once been returned to her for re-
pair, from the regiment in which her husband was an
officer.
On the day of the Flag-ceremony, veterans came to
Hartford from all quarters of the State. Burnside was
there on the platform, and with him was General
Joseph R. Hawley, Connecticut's own soldier. During
THE FLAG COMES HOME 243
one of the addresses, as the rent Old Glories were
brought in, one by one, a Flag was seen approaching
with its old color-guard beneath it. Between two com-
rades, one at each arm, limped a crippled man who,
a boy, had carried that Flag into the center of battle
and fallen under its folds. His eyes, filled with tears,
were lifted to the Stars and Stripes as he stumbled on.
"Those relics, tattered as they are and intrinsically worth-
less, possess a sacred value in the eyes of the soldier and the
patriot, second only to the national honor itself." — Benj. R.
Cowen, Adj. General, Ohio, December, 1864.
"There's a strange love for the old flag burning in our hearts.
It is inconceivable, indescribable, absolutely unknown to one
never in battle or active service. , . . Our wild battle-cry will
be heard no more forever. Our battle-flag will come forth
no more to war. Our flag is furled." — George N. Carpenter,
Historian, Eighth Vermont Infantry.
XL
The Stars and Stripes Goes to the Heart of
Africa
BY a curious freak of circumstances, Africa, that
had been an indirect cause of the Civil War,
called to America in 1869 for aid in finding the lost
David Livingstone, the great Scotch missionary who
had gone with the Cross from one end of the dark
continent to the other. The call found its answer in
an ex-Confederate soldier, Henry M. Stanley, then in
Spain as a newspaper correspondent. James Gordon
Bennett, Jr., who financed the search, gave his orders
to Stanley in one brief but adequate sentence : "Find
Livingstone and bring news of his discoveries or proofs
of his death, regardless of expense."
On January 10, 1871, Stanley, under the Stars and
Stripes, landed at Zanzibar to plunge into a wild and
practically unknown country in search of a missionary
lost while serving under the Union Jack. He enlisted
twenty-seven native soldiers, one hundred and fifty-
seven carriers, and, with two white men, struck inland
on March 21, 1871. For nearly eight months the little
caravan toiled on, through thorns and jungles, across
rivers and swamps many miles in length. Men de-
serted, and the oft-recurring fever delayed and les-
sened by death, Stanley's train of followers. For hun-
244
STARS AND STRIPES IN AFRICA 245
dreds of leagues . . . once traveling fivic hundred and
twenty miles to cross an air-distance of one hundred
and twenty miles . . . the search-party literally hewed
a road into Africa. At length came rumors, picked up
from the natives, that a white man had recently arrived
at Ujiji from Manyuema.
This golden piece of information spurred Stanley
on with greater speed. On November 9, 1871, he
looked down on the splendid expanse of Lake Tan-
ganyika. What occurred on the following day is best
told by Stanley himself: — "At this grand moment we
do not think of the hundreds of miles we have marched,
of the hundreds of hills we have ascended and de-
scended, of the many forests we have traversed, of the
jungles and thickets that annoyed us, of the fervid
salt plains that blistered our feet. Our dreams, our
hopes, our anticipations are about to be realized.
" 'Unfurl the flags and load the guns I'
" 'Ay, Wallah, ay. Wallah, bana,' responded the
men eagerly.
"A volley from nearly fifty guns roars like a salute
from a battery of artillery.
" 'Now, Kirangazi, hold the white man's flag up
high, and let the Zanzibar flag bring up the rear. And
you men keep close together, and keep firing until we
halt in the market-place, or before the white man's
house.'
"Before we had gone one hundred yards our re-
peated volleys had the desired effect. The mere sight
of the flags informed every one that we were a caravan,
but the American flag, borne aloft by the gigantic
Asmani, whose face was one broad smile on this day,
246 THE DRAMATIC STORY OF OLD GLORY
rather staggered them at first. However, many of the
people who now approached us remembered the flag.
They had seen it float above the American consulate,
and from the mastheads of many a ship in the harbor
of Zanzibar, and they were soon heard welcoming the
beautiful flag with cries of 'Bindera Kisungu!' . . .
a white man's flag. 'Bindera Mericani!' ... the
American flag."
Through an avenue of Africans went Stanley, with
Old Glory at his side. At the end of the avenue stood
a white man with a gray beard, before a semi-circle
of Arabs. Stanley walked up to him, took off his hat
and said, very simply,
''Dr. Livingstone, I presume."
"Yes," replied Livingstone with a gentle smile, lift-
ing his hat slightly.
And so, in Central Africa, the Stars and Stripes,
piloted by an ex-Confederate soldier and carried by a
black African, found the Union Jack and its Christian
representative, David Livingstone.
XLI
Old Glory at Samoa
ON the 15th and 16th of March, 1889, a terrific
gale swept over Apia, Samoa, driving ashore
every vessel in the harbor except the British ship Cal-
liope. Three nations were represented by men-of-war
in the general fleet anchored at Apia in that month;
Germany by the Adler^ the Eber and the Olga; Eng-
land by the Calliope; and the United States by the
Trenton^ the Vandalia and the Nipsic, When the
storm abated, the Nipsic and the Olga were held
gripped by the sand on the beach, and the Trenton^ the
Vandalia^ the Adler and the Eber^ were wrecks. The
Calliope alone, with the aid of her powerful engines,
had fought her way out to sea and to safety. From
the chaos of that hurricane emerges one of the most
powerful scenes in the Flag's long drama.
The three ships that figure in our rendering of the
critical moments of the hurricane, are the Calliope,
the Vandalia and the Trenton, At about ten o'clock
on the morning of the 16th, the last named of the
three was seen from the shore to be helpless. Titan
waves were breaking over her, lifting her stern clear of
the sea. Her rudder and propeller had been wrenched
away by the twisting grip of the waters. The Vandalia
and the Calliope were coming together rapidly. A
247
248 THE DRAMATIC STORY OF OLD GLORY
collision could not be averted. The iron prow of the
British ship rose high in the air and fell with a crash
on the port quarter of the Vandalia. Every man on
the American ship near the point of collision was hurled
from his feet.
Then came an heroic moment. Captain Kane, of
the Calliope^ swung her round into the wind and gave
orders to work the engines to the limit. It was the
one last desperate chance for life. One break in the
machinery, and Death was at hand for three hundred
men. Slowly the British ship struggled on, inch by
inch, through a weltering riot of waters, passing be-
tween the Trenton and the reef. The Trenton's fire
had gone out, and she lay, tossing and rolling, almost
in the path of the Calliope. At close quarters with
Eternity, the American seamen, as the straining Brit-
isher toiled by them, sent over the white spume a ring-
ing cheer, the Stars and Stripes greeting the Union
Jack, "Three cheers for the CalliopeP' Captain Kane
said, later, "God bless America and her noble sailors."
By three P.M., the Vandalia^ a complete wreck, was
giving up men to the hungry sea. The sailors that
were left were clinging in, or were lashed to, the rig-
ging. The officers of the Trenton^ believing they, too,
were doomed, flung out the Stars and Stripes, the first
flag to appear in the storm on any ship, determined
to go down with Old Glory streaming above them.
Caught by the tide and the wind, they were slowly
drifting down on the Vandalia. It was then after
seven o'clock, and daylight was beginning to fade.
Soon the last light paled away, and night came on.
To the men on the Vandalia^ with arms and legs cut
OLD GLORY AT SAMOA 249
by ropes, came through sheets of blinding spray the
apparition of the towering Trenton moving down upon
them through the darkness. Across the surges, trav-
eling on the wind, rang a great shout, American call-
ing to American, the Trenton cheering the Vandalia^
"Three cheers for the VandaliaP^
From the shivering masts of the stricken Vandalia
breathed a response like a whisper. Then, from the
deck of the Trenton^ in the mood of the Roman, "We
who are about to die, salute you," rolled forth from
the ship's band "The Star-Spangled Banner." The
crashing chords conquered the tempest. Before each
man rose the vision of Old Glory defiant in the face
of Death, the ever-young, immortal Flag of the great
Republic.
Who knows? Some power beyond mortal divina-
tion intervened as the last trumpet-notes died away
in the gale. The Trenton reached the Vandalia^ but
there was no shock. The two, side by side under the
Stars and Stripes, formed a barrier against the sea.
A correspondent of the Associated Press who wit-
nessed the wreck of the Vandalia and the Trenton^
wrote these words near the close of his report: "Above
the whole scene of destruction the Stars and Stripes
and the flag of Rear-Admiral Kimberly floated from
the shattered masts of the Trenton^ as if to indicate
that America was triumphant even above the storm."
XLII
The Flag in the War with Spain
THE Spanish War of 1898 was almost barren of
scenes in which the Stars and Stripes had an indi-
vidual part. When the Maine was blown up at Ha-
vana, in February of that year, the Flag was hoisted
over the wreck, and was kept there at half-mast for
days. Our ships, in and out of action, furnished no
moments when Old Glory was an outstanding feature.
The long run of the Oregon from the Pacific to the
Atlantic; the battles of Manila and Santiago; the
sinking of the Merrimac; not one of these stirring
events revealed the Flag in a dramatic prominence.
The records of our land forces in the Spanish War
surrender, under search, two stories that are of a na-
ture that admits them to this book. One, that of the
Stars and Stripes of the Rough Riders, is a genuine,
first-class Flag story, possessing the desired elements
of inception, development and stirring finish. The
other, that of the National ensign of the Sixteenth
Regulars, is but a flash-light incident in prose.
The Rough Riders, composed of men from the
Southwest, cow-boys and college men from the East,
assembled in Arizona. The command was an inter-
esting one, having in its personnel men with family
traditions of other wars under the Flag — Bucky
250
THE WAR WITH SPAIN 251
O'Neill's father had stormed Marye's heights in '62
with Meagher — and also serving, in a remarkable de-
gree, as a forerunner of certain divisions in the late
war in France, that were composed of men from many
States.
When the squadron was about to leave for Cuba,
it was found that it had no Stars and Stripes. Now
note how beautifully this little story that follows
echoes the stories of the battle-flags of '61. The women
of the Women's Relief Corps of Phoenix, Arizona,
promptly volunteered to make an Old Glory. They
sat up all night at their work and sewed together "a
beautiful silk standard" with their own fingers and
needles. Unconsciously, those women were in a long
delayed antiphone to old Fort Stanwix of 1777. It
was said there was "much difficulty in finding the
material of which to make it." The same rumor tells
of "a blue gown, which may or may not have been
used as the field for the stars."
When the Flag was finished, the Governor of Ari-
zona presented it to the Rough Riders, handing it to
Captain James M. McClintock. A chorus of girls from
the Territorial Normal School sang ''God Be With
You Till We Meet Again," and, as Edward Marshall,
war-correspondent, adds, the band of the Rough Rid-
ers undoubtedly responded with "A Hot Time."
As the Rough Riders went through the South to
Tampa, they received ovations all along their route.
Theodore Roosevelt's account of this portion of their
Flag's story is so vivid that we repeat it here, espe-
cially as Roosevelt was himself the spirit of Old Glory
incarnate. He says: "Everywhere the people came
252 THE DRAMATIC STORY OF OLD GLORY
out to greet and to cheer us. We were traveling
through a region where practically all the old men
had served in the Confederate Army, and where the
younger men had all their lives long drunk in the end-
less tales told by their elders, at home, and at the
cross-roads taverns, and in the court-house squares,
about the cavalry of Forrest and Morgan and the in-
fantry of Jackson and Hood. Everywhere we saw
the Stars and Stripes and everywhere we were told,
half-laughing, by grizzled ex-Confederates, that they
had never dreamed in the bygone days of bitterness, to
greet the old flag as they now were greeting it, and to
send their sons, as they now were sending them, to
fight and die under it."
The Rough Riders were the first volunteer regi-
ment organized, armed and equipped, in the Spanish
War. They were the first volunteer soldiers in Cuba.
They raised the first Stars and Stripes hoisted by the
military forces of the United States over foreign soil
since the Mexican War. The raising of their Old
Glory on the crest of Loriltires is an incident not to
be overlooked. Surgeon La Motte, Color-Sergeant
Wright, Trumpeter Piatt, and Edward Marshall,
climbed the hill with the Flag, found a deserted block-
house, and prepared to fling out Old Glory above it.
But the block-house had a slippery tin roof, and the
little party was on the verge of despair when an Amer-
ican sailor opportunely appeared. He scrambled up
the tin slope, carrying the Stars and Stripes of the girls
of Arizona with him, and lashed it, by its own staff,
to the little timber that stuck from the peak.
Down on the bay lay the United States transports.
THE WAR WITH SPAIN 253
Their sailors looked like toy men to the group on the
hill. Suddenly some one on one of the ships caught
sight of Old Glory fluttering over Cuba. And then,
as we are told and can readily imagine, there was bed-
lam. Steam-whistles tooted, twenty thousand men
yelled and cheered, twelve bands began to play with
all their strength, and guns of warships banged away
in fervid patriotism.
This Flag of the Rough Riders was carried gallantly
through all the engagements in Cuba. At Las Guasi-
mas, Color-Sergeant Wright was grazed three times on
the neck by bullets, while carrying it, and four holes
were shot through the silk of its folds.
At San Juan Hill, the Stars and Stripes of the Six-
teenth Regulars, Infantry, was the first United States
Flag to reach the crest and the Spanish lines. Stephen
Bonsai wrote of this color as follows: "The leader
of the thin and scattered line, the forlorn hope that
persisted in advancing, was Lieut. Ord. There raced
with him, running neck and neck the gauntlet of death,
a color-bearer of the Sixteenth Infantry, carrying his
great flag unfurled to the breeze ; a private of the Sixth
Infantry; and a little flute-player of the Sixth, a boy
of sixteen. The young private of the Sixth, from Ohio,
the first in the rush-line, fell twenty yards short of the
crest."
XLIII
Old Glory at the Top of the World
THE North Pole, that for years had defied the at-
tacks of men, especially of Englishmen and
Americans, yielded to the assault of Commander Robert
E. Peary of the United States Navy, in 1909. By suc-
cessive stages, in 1900, 1902 and 1906, Peary had
pushed beyond Greely's farthest of 83° 24' north, by
distances of 30 miles, 23 miles and 169 miles. There
remained a strip of 174 miles to cover, in order to
span the whole line of 396 mxiles that had resisted the
foot of any other conqueror. Of Peary's tremendous
struggle with the barrier of the North, we have no
room to tell in this history. We are greatly interested
in the Stars and Stripes which he carried with him.
This particular Old Glory, which had been made
for Peary by his wife in 1894, was of silk and went
with him in all his voyages to the North. On April 6,
1909, with five companions, four Esquimaux and the
negro Henson, Peary stood on the top of the world.
The great quest was ended. The North was no longer
a mystery and a defiance. The Old Glory that had
covered so many weary miles in high latitudes, that
Peary had carried wrapped about his body on every
one of his expeditions northward, was unfurled and
planted to stream in the cold Arctic air. Peary had
254
OLD GLORY AT TOP OF WORLD 255
left fragments of this Flag at each of his successive
"farthest norths ;" Cape Morris K. Jesup, the northern-
most point of land in the known world; Cape Thomas
Hubbard, the northernmost known point of Jesup
Land, west of Grant Land ; Cape Columbia, the north-
ernmost point of North American lands; and his farth-
est north in 1906, latitude 87° 6' in the ice of the
Polar Sea. So it was a worn, discolored and patched
Old Glory, typical of the long and severe struggle of
the man who carried it, that marked the victory of the
United States over all nations in a contest of brawn
and mind.
Peary's record, deposited at the Pole, "between the
ice blocks of a pressure ridge," in a glass bottle con-
taining a diagonal strip of Old Glory, read as fol-
lows : —
90 N. Lat. North Pole.
April 6, 1909.
I have to-day hoisted the national ensign of the United
States of America at this place, which my observations indicate
to be the North Polar axis of the earth, and have formally
taken possession of the entire region, and adjacent, for and in
the name of the President of the United States of America.
I leave this record and United States flag in possession.
Robert E. Peary,
United States Navy.
XLIV
Territorial Acquisitions Under the Flag
BEFORE entering upon the part taken by the
Stars and Stripes in the late war in Europe, it
will be well to list the territorial additions to the
United States during the years since the Civil War.
This record applies only to such lands as were, pre-
vious to their dates of acquisition, under other na-
tional flags.
Alaska was purchased from Russia through a Treaty
which was signed on March 30, 1867. Russia relin-
quished, by this Treaty, all claim to the continent of
Alaska and the adjacent islands. The transfer took
place at Sitka, October 18, 1867. The Flag used at
the time was forwarded to Washington, where it is
now preserved.
On June 21, 1898, the cruiser Charleston, Captain
Henry Glass, entered the harbor of San Luis d'Apra,
Island of Guam, and took possession. The Spanish
flag was lowered, and the Stars and Stripes was raised
at about two o'clock that afternoon.
A fleet of United States vessels sailed from Guan-
tanamo, Porto Rico, on July 21, 1898, and reached
Guanica, Porto Rico, on the 25th. The Spanish with-
drew without resistance. At the eastern end of the
beach was a worn and faded Spanish flag, typical of
256
ACQUISITIONS UNDER FLAG 257
the waning control of Spain. This flag was lowered,
and Old Glory was raised. At noon of October 18,
the Stars and Stripes was hoisted at San Juan, and
Porto Rico came completely into the hands of the
United States.
During the Spanish-American War, the Hawaiian
Islands were gathered under the folds of Old Glory.
The formal annexation occurred at Honolulu on Au-
gust 12, 1898. At 1 1.30 of that day, at the Executive
Building, the Hawaiian flag slowly fluttered down
from the flagstaff on the central tower of the building,
and Old Glory went up to take its place.
On August 13, 1898, the city of Manila surrendered
to Rear-Admiral George Dewey and Major-General
Wesley Merritt. The Spanish flag was hauled down
and the Stars and Stripes was hoisted. This act was
a sign of the taking over of the Philippines by the
United States.
On July 4, 1898, a group of officers of the second
Philippine expedition landed on Wake Island and, a
very proper celebration of the day, raised the Stars and
Stripes over land many miles from any other Pacific
shore. On January 17, 1899, Commander E. D. Taus-
sig, United States Navy, in the ship Bennington^ took
formal possession of Wake Island.
Spain, in signing the Treaty of Peace on December
10, 1898, relinquished all claims to Cuba. At Havana,
on July 1, 1899, the act of transfer occurred. At
noon, the day was a Sunday, the Spanish standard
that had for centuries flown above the Island, was
lowered, and the Stars and Stripes was sent to the top
of the staff. The fleet present, and the fortress, fired
258 THE DRAMATIC STORY OF OLD GLORY
salutes before and after the change of flags. The cere-
mony of transfer was free of ostentation, consisting
merely of brief speeches by Captain-General Castel-
lanos and Major-General John R. Brooke. On May
20, 1902, Cuba became an independent Republic.
Tutuila, Manua, and three lesser islands of the
Samoan group came under the shadow of Old Glory
through a Treaty signed November 14, 1899, between
Great Britain and Germany, in the terms of which the
United States acquiesced. Formal possession was
taken at Pago Pago, on April 12, 1900.
Two islands, Caguyan-Sulu and Sibutu, of the Sulu
Archipelago, which caused much discussion between
Spain and the United States in the settling of the
questions brought forward by the results of the Span-
ish-American War, became the property of the United
States, on November 7, 1900, by a payment of $100,-
000 to Spain.
In March, 1917, by purchase from Denmark, the
Virgin Islands, St. Thomas, St. John and St. Croix,
became the eastern wardens of the United States for
the Caribbean Sea. On March 27 of that year. Sec-
retary of the Navy Daniels radioed Captain Pollock
of the transport Hancock to go to St. Thomas and
take over the Islands in the name of the President of
the United States. Pollock dropped anchor in the
harbor of St. Thomas at 5.30 on the afternoon of that
day.
At dawn of the next day the old Olympia, of Dew-
ey's white fleet, appeared, like a ghost, off the harbor.
She transferred her band to the Hancock, took on board
sixty of Captain Pollock's seventy-eight marines, and
ACQUISITIONS UNDER FLAG 259
slipped over to St. Croix. Pollock proceeded at once
to carry out Daniels' orders. As the evening began
to deepen, the crimson Danneborg which had fluttered
above the old town for years, came rippling slowly
down, and a hush fell on the crowd. The Danish
band played the Danish national anthem for the last
time in the West Indies, and then marched away to
the landing-stage, with Kaptan Konow, the late Gov-
ernor, and his marines, behind them. An eye-witness
said, and we believe him, "For a great many people
this part of the picture was rather blurred."
Across the parade came the petty officers of the
Hancock^ each with a folded Stars and Stripes under
an arm. They were tall and slim and brown, and
they went like men with a purpose, straight to their
posts. When their three Old Glories went up into
the air — one on the fort, one on the barracks, and the
largest on the main flagstaff in the saluting battery —
the Islands were of Old Glory's domain.
This chapter opened in Alaska and closes in the
West Indies. As one result of those two additions
of territory, the sun never sets on the Stars and Stripes.
As his last rays of daylight glimmer on Old Glory at
the western capes of Alaska, his glow of dawn gleams
on the Red, White and Blue at the eastern gates of
the Carib Sea.
XLV
The Stars and Stripes and the World War
AT Halifax, Nova Scotia, in December, 1917,
there was a display of the American Flag that
was in itself a sign of the part the United States was
to take in the War in Europe. Halifax was suffering
from the devastation caused by an explosion on a ship
in her harbor. Boston, the nearest of the large cities
of the United States, immediately equipped a Red
Cross unit and dispatched it by train to the stricken
city. The resident American consul donated a large
Old Glory, and it was raised over the entrance to St.
Mary's Hospital. A newspaper correspondent wrote,
under the date of December 12, "The Greater Boston
Red Cross unit paused in its work of mercy to-day to
stand knee-deep in Canadian snows and sing 'The
Star-Spangled Banner,' as for the first time in history
Old Glory was flung, with formal ceremonies, to the
Canadian skies."
There was an unusual coincidence in this display
at Halifax; for there, one hundred and four years be-
fore, the Stars and Stripes came slowly into the har-
bor draped over the dead Lawrence lying on the deck
of the Chesapeake. Halifax, as we remember, re-
ceived the Stars and Stripes and its heroic defender,
in 1813, with ceremonial honor. She sent the body of
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THE WORLD WAR 261
Lawrence back to Boston with words of chivalrous
tribute. It was eminently fitting that the New Eng-
land city should be the one, in 1917, first to arrive on
Nova Scotian soil, under Old Glory, bringing a mis-
sion of practical aid.
This act of mercy at Halifax, carried out beneath
the Stars and Stripes, was a true index of the eminent
part the United States was to assume in crushing the
weaponed tool of autocracy, the German army. For
our entrance into the great struggle was inspired partly
by a humanitarian desire to aid oppressed nations.
We are to see, as we read the last pages of this history,
that Old Glory was more a symbol of beneficence than
an oriflamme of battle, in its appearance in France in
1917. The old days when the Stars and Stripes went
into the swirl at the core of the whirlpool of conflict
are gone, seemingly forever. It will be a surprise to
many readers to learn that the European war yields
few if any flags torn and pierced by bullets and shells.
A French writer. Captain Capart, in his book of remi-
niscences written late in the war, said, through the
mouth of a poilu, "Back of the lines I am a color-bearer.
Here, I am just like the others." Flags were displayed
in France, near the battlefields, but seldom, probably
never, upon them.
It gives us a running commentary on the attitude of
this country toward the European conflict, to follow
and clip references to Old Glory in the daily press
of the United States of the years from 1915 to 1919.
The year 1914 revealed practically nothing. In 1915
appeared a number of brief allusions to the Stars and
Stripes, principally in the form of advice as to proper
262 THE DRAMATIC STORY OF OLD GLORY
methods of display. In June of that year the New
York Times paid its respects to Flag-Day with two
articles, from which we quote. Under the caption,
"Topics of the Times," June 12, appeared these words,
''There are days when flags mean, or should mean a
good deal to everybody, to civilians as well as soldiers.
It is not for nothing that always there has been in
most hearts a capacity to thrill at the sight of specially
ordered bits of cloth." That was a decorous and de-
mure statement of loyalty to Old Glory. It sounds
thin when compared with the passionate utterances of
1861. On June 14, Flag-Day, under the heading "Na-
tion to Honor the Flag To-day," we were told that in
New York City Secretary Franklin K. Lane's eulogy
of the Stars and Stripes would be read in all the public
schools. Secretary Lane's words deserved to be read.
We give these selections from his eloquent personifica-
tion of Old Glory; the Flag is speaking, "I am song
and fear, struggle and panic, and ennobling hope. . . .
I am the mystery of the men who do without knowing
why. ... I am the clutch of an idea and the reasoned
purpose of resolution."
It remained in that summer of 1915, for an ex-
Confederate soldier. Will Henry Thompson, speaking
in a city on the Pacific coast, to renew the old blaze
of fiery patriotism that leaped into flame during the
opening weeks of the Civil War. Thompson, a Geor-
gian, was at sixteen 5^ears of age a soldier in the Army
of Northern Virginia. After Appomattox he set out
to tramp home with other boys in gray. While on their
desolate march, the little group "sat down in dust
and ashes and divided a small square of bunting which
THE WORLD WAR 263
one of them had hidden in his bosom." That torn
fragment was a piece of a Stars and Bars of Lee's
Army. No wonder the Times spoke editorially, in re-
ferring to Thompson's address, of "the meaning of a
flag, the unaccountable love men have for it. The
love of a flag is as little to be analyzed as the love for
a mother."
Thompson's main theme was "The Shadow of a
Flag," and he had set down a part of his thoughts in
verse. We give his story in prose. During the strug-
gle at the "Bloody Angle" a Stars and Stripes was
planted on the frail log breast-work that Thompson
and his comrades were defending. It was riddled by
shot and its staff was splintered, but it kept on float-
ing above boys in Blue and in Gray whose bayonets
were interlocked in savage strife. Suddenly, caught
in the wind, it streamed out, defiant in all its tattered
beauty. Its shadow fell upon the face of the boy from
Georgia beneath it. His heart gave a quick leap, for
the star of Georgia was still "on the old banner." He
saw "Ticonderoga and Yorktown, Monterey and Cha-
pultepec fluttering in its folds as the radiant thing stood
in the shriveling mouth of hell and waved and waved."
Germany had cause to fear when the sons and the
grandsons of the North and the South of '61 tugged
at their leashes in 1917, eager to meet her sons on the
fields of France. For the records of the Civil War
reveal an American courage in battle that defies the
standards of any other nation on the globe. The hour
was at hand. The sinkings of the Lusitania and the
Arabic^ the continued disregard of the rights of the
United States as a neutral nation, the brutality of
264 THE DRAMATIC STORY OF OLD GLORY
German warfare, and, above all, the sinister menace
of the Prussian sword to all civilized Humanity, swept
us as a Nation over the fine dividing line of parley
to the field of determined action. Old Glory was to
be defended, vindicated, made a sign of victory. On
April 6, 1917, President Wilson and the two Houses
of Congress moved finally. The war was on for us,
and the Stars and Stripes blossomed forth on staff,
steeple and roof, and in the windows of a million
American homes. England and France, and their Al-
lies, caught the glow across the Atlantic. The follow-
ing stanza from a poem by Bertrand Shadwell, which
appeared in The London Chronicle^ voices Great
Britain's welcome to Old Glory after it appeared in
force in Europe :
"Here's to the Starry Banner!
Let it shine on our masts and our towers!
And here's to the great Republic
That has welded her strength with ours !
Her flag's in the streets of London;
Her fleet's on the Northern Sea;
And her sons stand firm in the trenches,
To fight till the world is free."
To those of us who find in Abraham Lincoln a liv-
ing text-book of Americanism, a few words spoken by
him at the close of his first Inaugural Address, came
to mind in April, 1917, with a new and more potent
meaning: "The mystic chords of memory, stretching
from every battlefield and patriot grave to every heart
and hearthstone all over this broad land, will yet swell
the chorus of the Union when again touched."
XLVI
The Flag at the Front in France
ON April 9, 1917, Old Glory went into action
for the first time on a battlefield of Europe.
The news flashed across the ocean and sped West,
North and South, throughout the United States. To
Gunner William H. Clancy of the Royal Field Artil-
lery of Canada, goes the honor of showing the Prus-
sians the colors of the Stars and Stripes near the point
of a bayonet. Clancy was born in Boston and lived
for a time in Ipswich, Mass. He later made his home
in Texas and counts himself a Texan. Here is his
story, as told in a hospital : '% William H. Clancy,
a homeless person, put the good Old Glory on the
battlefield at Vimy Ridge on April 9, 1917. On Sun-
day A. M., April 8, we heard through battery orders
that the United States had declared war. I went to
my kit bag and took out the Old Glory I always car-
ried with me."
The rest of Clancy's story deserves a paragraph by
itself. "At 5.30 A. M., Monday, came orders to go
over the top, I tied Old Glory to my bayonet and
made the charge. One young fellow, from Newark,
N. J., was struck by a shell and died in my arms, say-
ing 'I am glad I gave my life for the freedom of the
world.' So I let him lie, but, just before he died he
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266 THE DRAMATIC STORY OF OLD GLORY \
kissed my flag. 'Old Glory !' he said. And I told him ;
'Yes, Old Glory, and new glory, too.' "
Clancy was badly wounded at Vimy Ridge. His
record in France tells us that he took part with the
Canadians at Neuve Chapelle, in the assault on the
Hohenzollern Redoubt, and in the battle of the Somme.
He is for us the sole member of our long line of im-
mortal color-bearers to perpetuate the glorious tradi-
tion in the late war. Across the years, his hand reaches
to the shadowy hands of the boys who carried Old
Glory at Yorktown, Lundy's Lane, Chapul tepee, Get-
tysburg and San Juan Hill. A tablet for William H.
Clancy in our Hall of Flags.
Before we take up the story of our Army in France
as crusaders carrying a Flag with a new meaning for
the Old World, we pause to record two events in which
the Flag had a singularly beautiful part; the burial
of Paul J. Osborne, of New Jersey, and the making of
the Old Glory that waved over the Tuscania's dead.
Osborne died on June 22, 1917, from the effects of
wounds received while driving an ambulance. He was
the first boy from the United States to die in the Great
War under our Flag after our country entered as a
belligerent. At the burial service. General Baratier
of the French Army delivered a brief but poetically
sympathetic address. One of his sentences stands out
imbued with the sensitive pity and chivalry of France :
''Sleep, soldier Osborne, wrapped in the Stars and
Stripes within the shadow of the banners of France."
On February 7, 1918, the British transport Tuscania,
carrying American troops, was torpedoed off the Irish
coast and one hundred and seventy men were lost. A
THE FLAG IN FRANCE 267
number of the bodies drifted to the shore of Scotland
and were tenderly taken into the care of the villagers
of Islay. It was decided to bury these boys from
America with military honors. At dusk of the night
before the ceremony, some one asked if an American
Flag was at hand for unfurling over the graves. A
Stars and Stripes could not be found. A Scotch-
mother had noticed the design of the Flag tattooed
on the arm of one of the dead. She called in three
other mothers, and the four worked with their needles
through the night. As the gray dawn grew over the
sea, they completed a Stars and Stripes. And so, in a
driving rain, with the skirl of the pipers' funeral dirge
and a volley of musketry, and with the whispering of
the sea around the rocks, American boys were laid to
rest in Scotland under the Old Glory of their hearts.
Jessie McLellan, Mary Cunningham, Catherine Mc-
Gregor and Mary Armour, the Stars and Stripes that
you made during that February night of storm and
sorrow, is now with us in America, to be cherished as
a memorial of motherhood that sees in a homemade
flag a symbol of love and of sacrifice.
These Flag-incidents we have related were mere
bits of flotsam in the wide tide of war. They were sig-
nificant, as they were evidences of English and French
realization of the true import of the arrival of the
Stars and Stripes on the battleground. The United
States was willing to suffer, to give of her own blood,
that the principles typified in her Flag should not be
a mockery at Berlin. Once with her face set to the
East, she moved with splendid precision and determi-
nation. On July 13, 1917, six hundred and eighty-
268 THE DRAMATIC STORY OF OLD GLORY
seven thousand men were called to the colors. On
October 27, 1917, the first American shot ever fired
in war on the soil of Europe, sped from a battery to
the German line. During the first week of November,
1917, the first men of the United States to fall in ac-
tion, Private James B. Gresham, of Evansville, Indi-
ana, Private Merle D. Hay, of Glidden, Iowa, and Pri-
vate Thomas F. Enright, of Pittsburgh, Pa., were
buried in the soil of France.
The historian knows that there will be readers of
his book who will say that he gives undue emphasis
to the sad elements of the Story of Old Glory. He
holds that death under and for the Stars and Stripes
is ever the Light of its high Adventure. We cannot
extol too highly the courage of those who have gone
out to fight and to die for the Americanism that shines
blazoned on the Flag. It is our constant duty to give
to our children the history of the Stars and Stripes as
a book of intense patriotism. They must see in our
Flag not mere bunting and stitches, but the heroism
of thousands whose lives have been given freely that
no blot could stain a stripe and no hand remove a star.
That hour in November, 1917, when those three boys
were lowered into French ground, was a mile-post in
the march of the Nation's history.
Beneath a gray sky, and with the rain falling stead-
ily, three companies of infantry from the battalion
to which the three had belonged, American artillery
detachments, and a number of French infantry, formed
a hollow square round the graves which had been dug
in ground already sown thick with the dead of Great
Britain and France. At the head of each grave flut-
THE FLAG IN FRANCE 269
tered a small silk Old Glory. As the caskets wrapped
in the Stars and Stripes were brought to the graves, a
bugler blew taps and the batteries at the front fired
minute-guns, not mere salutes but discharges that sent
shells into the Prussian lines, uttering defiance.
A French general stepped forward, looked at each
of the three Flag-draped cofRns, turned and said, "We
of France ask that the mortal remains of these young
men be left with us forever. We will inscribe on their
tombs, 'Here lie the first soldiers of the Republic of
the United States to fall upon the soil of France in
the cause of justice and liberty.' Private Enright,
Private Gresham, Private Hay, in the name of France
I thank you. May God receive your souls. Farewell I"
A volley of seventy-fives crashed the last word of
farewell through the gray, rain-soaked air. Then
American boys, with tears trickling down their faces,
lowered their dead comrades and covered them over
with the soil for which they had fought and died.
Little by little the great news we here in the United
States were looking for, began to come to us; at first
in brief dispatches that stirred the heart of the Nation,
laconic sentences telling of the endurance and courage
of our men under fire. In March and April, 1918,
France officially recognized these displays of heroism
by decorating American soldiers "for bravery in ac-
tion." The 104th United States Infantry received
one hundred and twenty-two war medals and became
famous as the first American regiment to be decorated
by any foreign government for heroic conduct under
fire. A photograph taken at the time pictures the
ceremony of pinning-on the medals. In the back-
270 THE DRAMATIC STORY OF OLD GLORY
ground are lines of our troops, and at the right stands
the Color-Guard with the Stars and Stripes. It is not
a rent and bullet-pierced Old Glory. It hangs from
its staff in a breathless air, untom, resplendent. Much
as we regret the passing of the day when the Flag
went with its defenders right into the furnace of battle,
to suffer and even to be destroyed with them, we ac-
cept the presence of Old Glory behind the lines of its
supporters in action, calling to them and urging them
onward. They feel it with them, in their hearts and
in their minds' vision, the soul of America inspiriting
to victory.
On Bastille Day, July 14, 1918, a detachment of
United States soldiers paraded with their French,
British and Belgian comrades, in Paris. Here is what
an American newspaper correspondent wrote as they
went by, ''Next came our Americans. They marched
like men who have had their baptism of fire, men who
have been tried and were not found wanting. I felt
the 'Star Spangled Banner' in my right shoulder-blade,
'Dixie' in my left, and 'America' all up and down my
backbone.
"Such stem-set faces. Not a man was smiling, not
a man looked to right or left. The mouths were level
as the edge of a ruler. If ever I saw the autograph
of an inflexible determination, it was written in these
firm and resolute countenances of men with a charge
to keep, a trust to which they will be true.
"They showed their training. These were not
amateurs. They were men of a seasoned hardihood.
They were men who had gone over the top and seen
their pals fall beside them, and made good against
THE FLAG IN FRANCE 271
the boche. They did not carry bayonets. But they
looked preeminently businesslike, undecorative and
solidly irresistible.
"Not a hint of the screaming eagle was here, not a
trace of the 'we'11-show-you attitude, not a sign of
anything but cool and clear decision, of preeminent
physical fitness, of the health of men who took care
of themselves in cities, if they did not come from the
windward side of the continent.
"Oregon shouldered the Dakotas, New Mexico and
Idaho marched cheek by jowl, and man after man
surely pinches himself now and then to see if he will
not suddenly wake in Maine or Pennsylvania or South-
ern California."
Philip Gibbs, the prince of correspondents, found
in Old Glory the signal of defeat for Germany. This is
what he saw early in 1918 through his British eyes:
"There are now men on the road of a new race who
were not in the war when it began, but are now of
our side, men who came in their hundreds of thou-
sands."
How finely he introduces Old Glory as we read on:
"I saw outside a French cottage the answer to the great
challenge which the enemy has now flung down. A
flag was hanging up outside the garden gate and a
sentry guarded it. It was the flag of the Stars and
Stripes outside an American headquarters. If we hold
the enemy for the next few months, the American
armies in France will so tip the wheel of fortune that
never again will the enemy have the initiative on the
western front. With this great aid to French and
British arms, the strength and spirit of the Ger-
272 THE DRAMATIC STORY OF OLD GLORY
man war machine will be sapped and shattered.
"The little flag outside the cottage which I passed
yesterday was a symbol of the great power that is
behind us, and further on there were living witnesses
of the American army that is growing and spreading
with a giant stride. They are splendid to see, these
men."
From Paris, on July 17, 1918, flashed a message
that brought the United States to its feet cheering.
An American general in command of American forces
south of the Marne received word from the French
commander to the effect that, although he and his
troops had been forced back by German assaults, there
was no need of a counter-attack and it might be ad-
visable to give the Americans an hour's rest. This
was the response: *'We regret being unable on this
occasion to follow the counsels of our masters, the
French, but the American flag had been forced to re-
tire. This is unendurable, and none of our soldiers
would understand their not being asked to do whatever
is necessary to reestablish a situation which is humili-
ating to us and unacceptable to our country's honor.
We are going to counter-attack."
A Paris paper. Matin, made this terse but satisfac-
tory comment: "The Americans launched their coun-
ter-attack and the lost ground was soon recovered,
with an additional half mile taken from the Germans
for good measure."
We have anticipated history a little, for the rea-
son that we wished to isolate the episode of the Flag
that would not retire, before entering upon the story
of the dramatic last days of the war. In the opening
THE FLAG IN FRANCE 273
week of June, 1918, the German machine of men and
guns was rolling on towards Paris. Steadily, with the
cruel surety of a moving wedge of iron, it crept on-
ward. On June 4, American and French troops, fight-
ing side by side, flung themselves at the apex and the
sides of the wide wedge. It slowed up, was splintered
in places. On June 6, at Chateau-Thierry, of im-
mortal memory, with the United States Marines fight-
ing on ahead like demons, the Allied Divisions halted
the advance, stopped in its tracks. On June 11, those
same Marines, determined on adding a new word to
their flag, to make a trio with Tripoli and Mexico,
smashed through the machine-gun fire in Belleau Wood
and captured the position at the point of the bayonet.
Does any one imagine that Paris received the news
of Chateau-Thierry in stoical calm^ John Scott, an
American who was in the city at the time, answers the
question. "In Paris," he says, "there was a little
playlet being given for war relief work. In it a small
French girl was tossing the Star Spangled Banner. I
saw the show one night after I first went to Europe.
The American air was applauded warmly when the
child had finished."
We turn over the page of Mr. Scott's story and go
on with him. "I was in Paris the night after the day
on which it was announced American troops had
hurled back Hun thousands when they appeared to be
marching right down the road to French homes. I
want to tell you the exhibition of gratitude and en-
thusiasm shown for the American flag and the Amer-
ican national air was heartrending. I walked down
to the theatre where this benefit play was being staged.
274 THE DRAMATIC STORY OF OLD GLORY
The play proceeded until the baby came out and started
to lisp the words of 'The Star Spangled Banner.'
"There was instant chaos. There was wild cheering
and roars of applause. There were tears and smiles
and yells. Hats went into the air and old women
cried and wrung their hands. It was a sight worth
while. France had seen the American soldier kill the
hungry wolf at the doorstep, and she was thankful."
Gunner Clancy, you were right in what you said at
Vimy Ridge. There is now "new glory" for Old
Glory, the glory of a noble sacrifice that a sister tri-
color may float free from the black shadow of the
Prussian ensign.
The end of the war came dimly into sight when,
on September 12, 1918, the American First Army with
shot and steel ironed out flat the St. Mihiel salient in
twenty-seven hours, taking fifteen thousand prisoners
and reducing the line of battle by twenty miles. The
end was vividly within range of vision when Old Glory
sent forward its eager thousands to rip open the Hin-
denburg line on September 29, and then on again, on
October 3, into the mazes of the Argonne Forest to the
Meuse, and up to the Kriemhilde line. On November
7, Sedan fell into the grip of the regiments in khaki,
and Germany threw up her hands in dismay. On
November 8, German envoys entered the French lines
and conferred with Marshal Foch, requesting an armis-
tice. The Kaiser had learned that the United States
has a long arm and a glove of steel on her good right
hand.
It is impossible in this book, to give credit to any
one of the valiant divisions that fought for Old Glory
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in France. Regimental and Divisional histories to
come, will pay honor where it is due and in full
measure. We are following the story of Old Glory
and clinging closely to historic episodes in the chronicle.
Our work would have been complicated if the Stars and
Stripes had actually gone into action in France, for
then we should have been face to face with a real test,
that of selecting and reproducing in words a number
of the more dramatic scenes in which the Flag would
have borne a part.
On November 16, 1918, Marshal Foch addressed a
message to the Allied armies. It closed with these
words, "Be proud. You have adorned your flags with
immortal glory. Posterity preserves for you its rec-
ognition."
Old Glory came forth vividly as a sign of libera-
tion even before the armistice was signed. A fore-
gleam of what was to happen in history shone in Paris
when, on December 24, 1917, the Stars and Stripes
flew beside the Tricolor on the Strasburg monument
in the Place Concorde. On July 24, 1918, the event
thus foretold took place, as American troops in Al-
sace-Lorraine held a grand review in which the Stars
and Stripes was carried for the first time on soil that
had been for a while German. Color-Sergeant Guy M.
Nunemacher, of Elmira, N. Y., claims the honor of
holding Old Glory aloft on that day.
The real significance of the Flag in Europe was
revealed in the early hours of occupation of Prussian
dominated land, under the terms of the armistice. A
former German soldier, now an American citizen, said
in 1917, "As a general thing, flags meant in Germany
276 THE DRAMATIC STORY OF OLD GLORY
only so much bunting. The regimental colors were our
highest conception of a flag because, whether unfurled
or wrapped, we had always to give them the same
salute as that accorded to his Majesty himself. In
other words, the flag represented a personality instead
of being an emblem of noble ideals."
After reading that clear statement, it is easy to
comprehend the joy with which Old Glory was greeted
in the liberated towns of France, Belgium, and even
of Austria and Bulgaria. When Bulgaria withdrew
from the war, a letter was sent from a man with the
Bulgarian army to friends in this country. Here is a
part of it: "Thousands of Bulgarian soldiers laid
down their arms with delight. I know forty of them
who had been students in the American Presbyterian
Agricultural College outside Salonica. Always from
the flagstaff of the school floated the Stars and Stripes.
Under that flag they learned to read and write both
the Bulgarian and the English languages. Not one
of those boys could have fired on the American flag."
Now for the advance to the Rhine. On November
11, 1918, Verdun came into its own. The old town
was in a frenzy. On that day, for the first time in
many months, no shells fell within the walls. The
Prussian guns were silenced. "A large American flag
was carried by the men of the New England Division,
while the French buglers bore the Tricolor of France,"
was the Associated Press story in a nutshell.
Our searchlight now swings to Arras. The Bishop
of Arras, in the United States during that wonderful
November, said to Cardinal Gibbons, "Arras is no
longer habitable, and three hundred villages in my
THE FLAG IN FRANCE 277
diocese have been razed to the ground until all the
land resembles a desert. But the nuns of the Carmelite
order are staying at their post to make the flag that
will be given to the regiment from Philadelphia," the
315th, because, as the nuns said, "it was in Philadel-
phia that freedom was reborn."
The following rather lengthy but interpretative ac-
count of Old Glory in the wasted lands, is taken ver-
batim from an American newspaper: "November 19,
1918. The American soldiers have seen their flag
waving in equal love with that of brave France and of
doughty Belgium. Ask any doughboy, from New
York or San Francisco, what thing he has seen sticks
in his mind. He will tell you it was the homemade
American flags.
"Two months and a little more ago came word to
those held under the Prussian bayonet that Americans
were fighting their way toward them. They began to
make American flags against the great day. These
flags were made secretly, where prying Hun eyes could
not see. From school books they got the design which
they worked on. When the great day came, by the
side of the French flags in French towns and the Bel-
gian flag in Belgian towns, flew the homemade Stars
and Stripes.
"Flown from the housetops and churches in towns
and villages in Northern France and Southern Bel-
gium, they seemed most lovely emblems, for they told
the story of America, why she v/ent to war. They told
that our boys had won that for which they came to
France to fight. They told that those boys had won
respect and admiration ; aye, more, had won love.
278 THE DRAMATIC STORY OF OLD GLORY
"To me those homemade flags meant more than em-
pires gained or billions paid. They meant that the
people who made them could not celebrate their day
of rejoicing without the Stars and Stripes.
*'Who can explain the phenomenon of those home-
made flags? What spirit could have prompted the
women of half a hundred towns to do the same thing
in the same way? These women had no means of
communicating. The display could not have been
planned. But to-day in many towns in Belgium and
France behind our lines those little flags are flying. I
saw them in Montmedy and in Virton. I saw them
in Longuyon and in Etain. And I saw them in Con-
flans. What could they represent but love of Amer-
ica?'
Constantine, while on a campaign in the Rhine
country, had a vision of a cross in the heavens. Then
and there, according to the old legend, he determined
to fight under the new sign and for it, since it revealed
to him the conquest of light over darkness.
The United States came to the Rhine in the twen-
tieth century under its glorious sign, the Stars and
Stripes, a symbol set against the blue sky for people
seeking the flame of true leadership under justice and
a divine compassion.
AN OLD GLORY WITH ELEVExX SIX-POINTED STARS AND
SEVEN STRIPES, MADE IN SECRET BY THE
FRENCHWOMEN OF METZ.
.LIBRARY I
XLVII
Concord Among the Tricolors
IN Westminster Abbey, London, on Sunday, Feb-
ruary 9, 1919, Englishmen and Americans met in
a memorial service, an impressive tribute to Theodore
Roosevelt. At the close of the service the choir sang
"How Firm a Foundation" and "The Battle Hymn of
the Republic." Then, as the archdeacon and the clergy
left the Abbey in solemn procession, the western sun-
light poured through the western windows and the
organ burst forth with "The Star Spangled Banner."
There was a mystical benediction in that flood of
western light entering Great Britain's Holy of Holies
as the strains of our national anthem filled the great
nave. England and the United States have sealed their
brotherhood, with France as the third hand clasped, in
the deaths of their sons in a common cause. In their
keeping is the security of the world's happiness. The
three great Tricolors are in harmony.
On May 12, 1918, an Englishman, John Truscott,
who lives twenty-eight miles from London, went up
to the city and was granted a vision. He stood beneath
"Big Ben," the tall clock tower of the Houses of
Parliament, near the Abbey, with the still taller Vic-
toria Tower and its flagstaff near by. From the staff
two great flags were flying side by side.
"No need to say what they were," he wrote. "As
279
28o THE DRAMATIC STORY OF OLD GLORY
I watched, the Union Jack momentarily drooped and
clung around the mast. Then the Stars and Stripes,
like a living thing, flew out bravely its utmost. The
other, as one aroused, flew out also its very fullest.
The two together then streamed out in the rising breeze,
suggestive of the times and circumstances and emblem-
atically defying the reactionary forces of the world."
In the last sentences of his letter, Mr. Truscott
reaches the heart of the Anglo-American union. "Let
no one measure our joy by the volume of the shouting,
the number of the flags or the frequency of the grasp-
ing hands of brotherly greeting. These are but ripples
upon a wide, deep, rapid stream of international broth-
erhood."
We cross the channel. Georges Clemenceau, Pre-
mier of the French Republic, and a little six-year old
girl, fatherless through the fate of war, speak for
France.
Clemenceau said, on February 9, 1919, "The friend-
ship between our peoples which has subsisted for a
century and a half is a very beautiful thing. The
like of it has never existed for the same length of
time between any other two peoples. This cordiality,
cemented by our contact during the war, must endure
in closer measure hereafter. To this end our minds
must meet."
The little girl whose father lies beneath the sward
near the Marne, was given a tiny Stars and Stripes in
July, 1917. Greater is she than the Premier of France
when she says, "I begged my little mother to put the
little flag in a locket and to hang it around my neck.
And now I have the flag always with me."
XLVIII
Patriotism and the Flag
SIR THOMAS BROWNE, one of England's mas-
ters of prose, on a night of a decade near the
middle of the seventeenth century, had been writing
in his study at Norwich. "The declining constella-
tions warned him to lay down his pen." Before he
laid aside his manuscript for the night he finished a
peculiarly beautiful page that afterwards evoked the
praise of Coleridge. On that page occur the words,
"The huntsmen are up in America."
Sir Thomas Browne was in error in that statement,
for midnight at Norwich means sundown on our At-
lantic coast. The real interest for us lies in an infer-
ence. We believe that Sir Thomas turned, looked out
through a north window and saw the mighty galaxy
that glittered in the Arctic heavens. If so, he must
have seen what we see even in this later time — for
the stars are eternal by man's hourglass — the North
Star, Polaris, and its attendant constellations, the Great
Bear and the Little Bear, known to us as the Great
Dipper and the Little Dipper. These two groups of
stars, with the North Star, were the guides for mari-
ners on the North Atlantic. Columbus sailed by them,
and the Cabots, Verazzano, Hudson, Cartier, Cham-
plain, Frobisher, Davis, the Pilgrims, all that wonder-
281
282 THE DRAMATIC STORY OF OLD GLORY
ful company of intrepid souls kept constant watch by
night on these unerring friends, when sleet and snow,
mist and rain, did not blot out their mighty chart.
Turn to the Second Act of Othello and read these
magnificent lines in the First Scene:
"The wind-shaked surge, with high and monstrous mane,
Seems to cast water on the burning bear,
And quench the guards of the' ever-fixed pole."
To the Englishmen of the seventeenth century the
Northern heavens at night were a clock of the hours
and a guide for the wide sea-roads. They readily sug-
gested far adventure and — America. We have spoken,
in another chapter, of the constellation Cygnus, the
Northern Cross. When the Mayflower dropped
anchor at Plymouth in December, 1620, the Cross of
Calvary stood upright before the Pilgrims on the bleak
hills. They could not see what the telescope has re-
vealed to us, the nebula of the United States in North
America, held guarded within the arms of that Cross.
Yet the United States, even the stars of its glorious
Flag, were before them, hidden in the blue-black deeps
of the great Mystery of the years, awaiting the proper
hour of revelation.
Forty years before the Pilgrims crossed the ocean,
Voltaire said, in one of his essays — we give Florio's
translation — "Our world hath of late discovered an-
other, no less large, fully-peopled, all things yielding
and mighty in strength, than ours ; nevertheless so new
and infantine that he is yet to learn his ABC. This
late world shall but come to light when ours shall fall
into darkness." Europe did "fall into darkness" in
PATRIOTISM AND THE FLAG 283
August, 1914. The United States did "come to light,"
a country accepting the cross of supreme sacrifice. Sir
Thomas Browne, had he come as a shadow into his
old study at Norwich, in April, 1917, could have writ-
ten once more, "The huntsmen are up in America."
In a vague way, the Old World turned to the New
many years ago, in the hope that here was to be found
the lost Atlantis, the country where Utopia could be
made a reality. America was to be the land of the
perfect patriotism, Voltaire's world "come to light."
To be direct, do we as a People know what patriotism
is? Have three centuries and more of colonizing,
town-building and developing, produced a nation that
is one under its Flag? We cannot fulfil the hopes
of the poets and the prophets of old Europe until we
are one Unit, a People that reflects in itself the com-
plete harmony of its one recognized symbol, the Stars
and Stripes. And it is our duty, more so to-day than
ever before in our history, to come together in States
shoulder-to-shoulder in a definite, common Purpose for
the good of the World. In the stars resides the em-
blem of our nationality. Each constellation in the
firmament is a union of distinctly individual members ;
but the great group defies Time in its fixed cohesion.
"The morning stars sang together," said the writer of
the Book of Job, and in that superb phrase is to be
found the very soul of the greater America to come,
that we believe is just ahead of us, within the span
of the living generation of men and women.
To achieve this splendid unity, we must realize pa-
triotism in our national life. What is patriotism? Ask
an American of to-day to tell you what patriotism is.
284 THE DRAMATIC STORY OF OLD GLORY
He is apt to give you a verbose explanation of a devo-
tion too frequently colored by waving flags and punc-
tuated with cheers. His country is "big," "the first
in the world," "the refuge of the oppressed races
of effete Europe," "the mighty melting-pot of nation-
alities," "the saviour of Europe." Would that we had
a more devout interpretation of America.
We find in a poem in French, by Emile Cammaerts,
a Belgian poet, a singularly beautiful presentation of
the passion of true patriotism. The following is a
fairly accurate translation:
"It is the accent of a voice,
The sound of a distant bell,
A gleam in the woods,
A ray of sunHght on the plain.
It is a certain home beneath a certain sky,
And the measured tread of one on the river-bank.
It is a woman on her knees before a chapel
By the road where many tapers burn.
It is the fragrance of the grass around the pools,
And the scent of the dust in the road.
It is the flash of a glance, . . .
A vision of the Past that swiftly fades.
It is all that one cannot tell.
And all that one feels ;
All that he can express only in song."
How closely that fine, sensitive creed of love of na-
tive-land is echoed in the following, taken from a
French textbook, "La Patrie," "Do you know what
the motherland is? It is the house where your mother
has carried you in her arms. It is the lawn on which
you play your joyous games. It is the school where
you receive your first instruction. It is the town hall
where floats the flag of France. It is the cemetery
PATRIOTISM AND THE FLAG 285
where your ancestors rest. It is the clock which you
see again with a new joy on each return to the village.
It is the fields which bear the traces of the labor of your
fathers. It is the hills, the mountains, which you have
so many times climbed."
Young Paul Lintier wrote, in his "My '75," at the
time of the retreat of the French before the battle of
the Marne, "During the days of defeat we had just
been passing through, what a picture of our country had
been revealed to us ! An army immediately victorious
cannot plumb the depth of patriotism. One must have
fought, have suffered and have feared — even if only
for a moment — to lose her, in order to understand what
one's country really means. She is the whole joy of
existence, the embodiment of all our pleasures visible
and invisible, and the focus of all our hopes. She alone
makes life worth living. All this united and person-
ified in a single suffering being, begotten by the will of
millions of individuals — that is France."
Edward Hutton, in his introduction to "England of
My Heart," says, "England is not merely what we see
and are. It is all the past and all the future. It is
inheritance, the fields we have always ploughed, the
landscape and the sea, the tongue we speak, the verse
we know by heart, all we hope for, all we love and ven-
erate, under God. And there abides a sense of old
times gone, of ancient law, of friendship, of religious
benediction."
We have been told that we, as a Nation, lack historic
background, that, having little reverence for our Past,
we are wanting in the first principles of patriotism. Is
it that our country is so vast, that we have no intelli-
286 THE DRAMATIC STORY OF OLD GLORY
gent patriotism? Robert Herrick, in his "The World
Decision," seems to imply this condition as a determin-
ing force when he says, "This primal love of the earth
that has borne you and your ancestors seems to me in-
finitely stronger, more passionate with the European
than with the American. We roam; our frontiers are
still horizons." Yes, and New Orleans and San Fran-
cisco and Seattle are almost like cities under skies that
do not bend over us on the Atlantic coast. Yes, and
we have to face and solve the eternal problem of an
ever flowing tide of immigrants pouring in and around
the towers of our old establishment, with faces that
see no shapes of our Past. They must be made to real-
ize America, or their mingling with us to create a new
People will give us no Future grounded in our Past.
We need a patriotism based in a definite, sympathetic,
general knowledge of our History. That the United
States is a Purpose for Good; that, despite failures
and bafflings, she is at soul a Democracy with a far-
flung vision; we and those whom we accept to share
our citizenship, must realize and, realizing, build ever
with better beams and bricks.
While reading Professor Ferguson's "Greek Impe-
rialism," we came upon a passage that threw light not
only on the history of Greece but on our own as well.
Greek history teems with the rivalries and the wars
of Athens, Sparta and Thebes. National unity was
ever balked by state jealousies. Ferguson says, "Mem-
ories of great actions done in olden times were pre-
served by monuments of bronze and marble, and re-
vived annually by appropriate ceremonies. Legend
and fact, blended in an edifying tradition, — the repos-
PATRIOTISM AND THE FLAG 287
itory of the yearnings and ideals of dead generations, —
inspired the living to bear themselves worthily in all
national crises. 'Love thou thy land with love far-
brought from out the storied past,' was an admonition
of which Greek cities of the classic epoch stood in
little need. The mischief was that the land which
they loved was not all Greece, but merely the territory
of a single state.^'
That last sentence has in it the explanation of the
real weakness of our sense of patriotism. We do not
think in terms of the nation, but in terms of the state,
even of the city. Years ago Ralph Waldo Emerson
confessed another truth, that Americans worship for-
eign traditions and not their own. He said, "Where
the heart is, there the muses, there the gods sojourn,
and not in any geography of fame. Massachusetts,
Connecticut River, Boston Bay you think paltry places,
and the ear loves the names of foreign and classical
topography. But here we are; and, if we will tarry
a little, we may come to learn that here is best."
"Here" is best. When a man can wander through
his native village and read, in its landmarks, its early
houses and its graves, the chapter-headings of a ro-
mance of devotion and fortitude, he is in accord with
the first pages of his country's history. There are
Westminster Abbeys in every century-old town in the
United States. It is our duty as patriots who have
keys to these shrines, to open the doors to those who
come to us seeking citizenship. Give these men who
are to be our brothers a share in our heritages of na-
tional inspiration. From the hill of vision over a small
area of history, that of the city or the town, lead them
288 THE DRAMATIC STORY OF OLD GLORY
to heights where broaden on the view the reaches of
the State and the vistas of the Nation.
We are not going to have a united Nation, passion-
ately devoted to its ideals, until we have a nation-wide
realization of the meaning of the struggles, the tears,
the prayers, the sacrifices, the devotion of the men and
women who have made the United States.
On the night of July l, 1913, we stood on a hill at
Gettysburg overlooking the encampment of veterans.
A faint star hung in the west and we heard the clear
tones of a bugle distant across the fields, poured out
like an echo of long ago. Then came darkness and
with it the misty columns of regiments of boys with
tattered Old Glories. They were the shapes of the
immortal lads who gave all that the things for which
the Flag was a symbol might endure. Hilaire Belloc,
in one of his brief essays, voices his feeling of awe when
he endeavors to realize the Past in the Present. At the
close of this essay is a paragraph that condenses the
whole of his thought into a few sentences. We change
but two words that refer to localities famous in the
story of the conflict at Waterloo, and, by substituting
the names of two hills that were crucial at Gettysburg,
have the following: — Nearly "all those boys who held
the line of the low ridge or rather swell of land from
Gulp's Hill to Little Round Top have utterly gone.
More than dust goes, more than wind goes; they will
never be seen again. Their voices will never be heard
. . . they are not. But what is the mere soil of the
field without them*? What meaning has it save for
their presence^"
To-day we ask again, with the thought of our heroic
PATRIOTISM AND THE FLAG 289
dead in France, "What meaning has it save for their
presence'?" Apply that sentence to the Stars and
Stripes, under which they gathered here to prepare
themselves for their mighty crusade, under which they
crossed the Atlantic, and for which they fought and
died. "What meaning has it save for their presence?"
They made the United States a "land of light" for a
Europe in "darkness." The Italian poet-aviator D'An-
nunzio, wrote in 1917, "The stars in the great flag of
your Republic are our constellation of hope, even as
the Pleiades — sign of guidance to the mariners — are,
and appear to us as a constellation of salvation." Those
stars have glittered along the highways of France, have
been reflected in the waters of the Rhine, have glowed
in the sunlight on the roads of Germany. And every-
where they have carried the story of a Nation resolute
in its voyaging by the Pole Star of its Destiny, the
Good of the World. Are we to forget them, the boys
who suffered and died for that Flag?
Old Glory must fly over every schoolhouse between
the two oceans. But it must fly with a new and far
deeper meaning. No flag ever devised by man has so
clearly expressed the ideals of true democracy in its
design. No flag carries in its own picture so much of
national history. All that we have been as a Nation,
and all that we hope to be, are embodied in the Stars
and Stripes. Our feet are on the earth, and the stripes
may well represent that basis of solid foundation; but
our dream of the Future is in the firmament. Our stars
are for us an omen of years to come. They beckon us
upward to a divine fulfillment of the stupendous Truth
of our meaning and our mission in the world's history.
290 THE DRAMATIC STORY OF OLD GLORY
They repeat what the lives of great men have told us,
what they have often toiled for, not knowing the signif-
icance of their tasks, — the presence among men of the
Perfect State won only through human endeavor and
human sacrifice. In time we, as a People, will perceive
the beauty of the reality of our forty-eight stars achiev-
ing, merging into, concord through a passionate devo-
tion to an Ideal not for self but for the Commonwealth.
At the side of the road stands a country schoolhouse.
Over it floats Old Glory. In the little room within,
a woman is giving her boys and girls the story of an ad-
venture in our History. There, in that plain room, is
the source of our real patriotism. She is aware of the
privilege of her calling. She is lifting that lesson of a
page up to a region of romance. She tells her chil-
dren a story; and we listen at the door. "A French boy
lay dying on the field of the Marne. Another boy, at
his side, heard him whisper, Turn me over, that my
heart may beat against that of my mother.' 'Your
mother!' said his kneeling comrade in surprise. 'Yes.
France,' answered the dying poilu.
She brings that little story of a lonely death on a
remote battlefield home into her quiet schoolroom, with
the shadow of the fluttering Stars and Stripes outside
on the snow. The page on Valley Forge, open before
her on her desk, begins to glow. She transmits the
glow to her boys and girls. They see the dying men
in the huts. They realize that here in the United
States, men and boys have died that the heart of the
Nation might beat on in Life. The future of the Flag,
as a faithful symbol of the United States, is at home
in such schoolrooms of the Republic, the true commun-
PATRIOTISM AND THE FLAG 291
ity centers, the altars where the flame of Nationality
must never flicker or fade.
If we are to lower Old Glory from its poles above
public buildings, and remove it from the windows of
our homes, let us at least keep it flying over every
schoolhouse in the land. Its Story is our Story. With
us it has grown from formless weakness to definite
strength. It has been, literally, the guiding-star of our
pioneers, explorers, humanitarians and soldiers. It has
interwoven its threads into the texture of every chapter
of our national Romance. No man or child can com-
prehend the majesty of the History of the United
States, who is ignorant of the Story of Old Glory.
XLIX
Old Glory and the Schoolhouse
WE have given a picture of Old Glory flying over a
country schoolhouse. We have suggested a way
in which an episode in the Flag's history, the winter at
Valley Forge, may be used to illustrate a lesson given
over to the period of the American Revolution of 1777-
1778. This method of connecting the Flag, in the
minds of scholars, with important events in our nation-
al story, can be employed all along the route from 1775
to the present time. Even the Colonial flags of the
early months of the Revolution have an evident mean-
ing, the desire for expression of a freedom greater than
the union with Great Britain permitted. This feeling
was typified in the Pine Tree, Rattlesnake, Palmetto,
Beaver, Anchor, and other Colonial ensigns. They
were positive indices of a drift of opinion. The chap-
ter on The Forerunners of the Stars and Stripes may
be read in classrooms in connection with the study of
the periods of unrest and of actual outbreak in armed
resistance. This chapter also amplifies the story of the
siege of Boston as given in school histories of the
United States.
The chapters on the Grand Union Flag and the
Stars and Stripes, that follow, ending with chapter 18,
292
OLD GLORY AND SCHOOLHOUSE 293
can be used at the discretion of the teacher, as material
illustrating the entire period of the Revolution.
Possibly the following set of Flag-Topics, covering
the whole range of the history of Old Glory, will be
of value as hints at methods of emphasizing the Flag
and its meaning: —
A. Describe three of the Colonial flags, and tell how
each was a symbol of the Colony it represents.
B. Write a short paper on the Grand Union Flag,
showing in what way it was an emblem both of Great
Britain and the Colonies.
C. Topic for discussion: Is there sufficient evidence
to warrant the claim that Betsy Ross made a Stars and
Stripes before the year 1777?
D. Topic for discussion: Do Benjamin Franklin's
interests and activities, before and during the Revolu-
tion, support the claim that he may have designed, or
was one of the creators of, the Stars and Stripes.
E. Prepare a diagram of the campaign in New York
during the latter half of the year 1777, showing forts
and jTiaking clear the importance of Fort Stanwix.
Emphasize the episode of the Old Glory of Stanwix as
a lesson in patriotism.
F. Require a short essay or paper on Paul Jones and
his connection with the Stars and Stripes. Consult
chapters 11, 12, 13 and 16.
G. Bring out vividly, in a theme, the meaning of
Valley Forge. Describe the scene when the alliance
with France was announced to the Continental Army.
Tell of the different nationalities represented in the
camp, and show in what respect Valley Forge was a
type of the United States to come.
294 THE DRAMATIC STORY OF OLD GLORY
H. Compare the mode of acquisition of the old
Northwest Territory by George Rogers Clark with
methods revealed in later additions to the area of the
United States, and explain the part the Flag had in
each. See chapters 15, 20, 21, 23 and 44.
L Write a brief paper showing in what way the
three Tricolors were involved in the causes of the War
of 1812. Consult chapter 24.
J. Give a iive-minute talk on the Stars and Stripes
in exploration and humane work. Consult chapters
19, 21, 23, 31, 32, 34, 40 and 44.
K. On Flag-Day, June 14, emphasize the story of
Old Glory over a log schoolhouse. See chapter 25.
For supplementary reading, chapters 18 and 41 are
suggested. Of course, chapters 6, 28, for the "Star
Spangled Banner," 29 and 30 cannot be overlooked
on this day.
Every Northern State represented in the dramatic
episodes of the color-bearers, chapter 38, can have its
individual story read in its schools on the day that is
the anniversary of the battle in which the incident oc-
curred, on Flag-Day or on Memorial Day.
The significance of the Stars and Stripes in Europe
during the late war, is covered in the closing pages of
this history. Teachers will find in chapters 45, 46
and 47, a concise presentation of this most important
phase of the Story of Old Glory.
The chapter on Patriotism and the Flag was written
with the community in view, although it gives material
that should be of decided value in the schoolroom, in
teaching loyalty to the country. We suggest that the
quotations from French and English authors be read on
OLD GLORY AND SCHOOLHOUSE 295
Flag-Day, to give scholars a conception of certain Eu-
ropean standards of pure patriotism. The poem by
Cammaerts is perhaps too subtle for immediate com-
prehension by the average boy or girl; but it is so deli-
cate a revelation of love of home-land, that it should
be read thoughtfully and commented upon. It might
be well to invite, not require, the members of a class
to contribute original papers on patriotism, as a part
of Flag-Day exercises. The chapter on the opening
of the Civil War, 35, will furnish material for a score
of essays.
By applying one's power of invention, many of the
pages of The Dramatic Story of Old Glory can be
adapted to community work. We leave it to the teach-
er and the community-leader, to devise programs for
use in making Flag-Day, and other commemorative
days, effective as dates on which men, women and
children will come into the presence of our great Past
made visible in Old Glory, our historic and enduring
symbol.
There is much to do, and little has been done, along
the road of creating a patriotism that is conscious of
the dignity of the Republic and enlisted in the service
of the Commonwealth. If this book has blazed a way,
with the Stars and Stripes leading as a torch of fire,
then it has served a lordly purpose. The twelve tribes
of Israel followed a cloud of smoke by day and a pillar
of fire by night. They had need of a sign and a guide.
We, a people of a hundred tribes, require a flame going
on before us. We shall have, in Old Glory, the perfect
leader when we comprehend its rich meaning as an
interpreter, a symbol of our beginnings, our develop-
296 THE DRAMATIC STORY OF OLD GLORY
ment and our present state as a Nation. Display the
Flag over schoolhouses and civic buildings. In your
own home, hang it over the hearth, that its memories,
its dreams, its vision of the Future, may be guests of
your own thought.
