The Stars and Stripes

Improvement Era Vol. XX JULY, 1917 No. 9 The Stars and Stripes By Levi Edgar Young, Professor of History, University of Utah Our national flag was approved by an Act of the Second Continental Congress, June 14, 1777. In June of the previous year, General George Washington, Robert Morris, and Colonel George Ross went to the home of Betsy Ross in Philadelphia, and presented a drawing which General Washington had made, and requested her to make a flag according to the sketch. Mrs. Ross suggested some changes in the design, among which was that the stars be five pointed instead of six, as "the five-pointed star is an ancient symbol of authority and dominion, and later became a symbol in the Christian churches of the early cen- turies of our era." The flag was accordingly made, and after due examination by Congress, the following resolution was passed: "Resolved, That the Flag of the United States be thirteen stripes alternate red and white, that the Union be thirteen stars white in a blue field representing a new constellation" The first battle in which the Stars and Stripes were used was that of Fort Schuyler, in August, 1777. The colonial army was without an emblem, so one day, during the siege of the fort by the British forces, a flag was made from old clothing, and before sunset, it was flying over the bastions of the fort. A large number of flags were made as provided for by the resolu- tion of Congress, and every division of the army was furnished with them. At Yorktown, when Cornwallis surrendered to Gen- eral Washington, in October, 1781, the Stars and Stripes were conspicuous on every hand, and Washington received General Cornwallis under a large flag, which floated from a high pole. When the Constitutional Convention met, in September, 1787,

760 IMPROVEMENT ERA old Independence Hall was gayly decorated with the national emblem, and from every public house and private home in Philadelphia the flag was unfolded to the breeze, indicating the patriotism of the American people. In 1794, Congress provided that the flag should have fifteen stripes and fifteen stars, as there were at that time fifteen states in the Union. This flag was used for twenty-three years when, in 1818, it was changed to thirteen stripes and twenty stars, the Independence Hall, Philadelphia, Pa. stars denoting the number of states at the time. From that year to the present, with the addition of a state to the Union, a star has been added to the canton. National flags are the symbols of the ideals of the govern- ments that they represent. The Roman legions had their em- blems representing the imperial power of the Empire, and Con- stantine marched under banners denoting the military and po- litical sway of the Roman government. During the first Crusade,

THE STARS AND STRIPES 761 in 1095, Pope Urban II believed that the troops of each Chris- tian nation should carry or wear crosses "emblematic of Christ and the character of the holy war in which they were then to be engaged." He accordingly assigned crosses to the several nations of the army, in order that all the soldiers might remain with the proper divisions. To the Spanish he gave a red; to the French, a white; to the Italians, a blue, and to the English, a yellow cross. We are told that in the later crusades, similar assignments were made. In fact, the Cross of St. George of Scotland was brought home from the continent to Edward of Scotland, and accepted as the emblem of England, and in 1606, the Union Jack was adopted which was the union of the Cross Willow taken from Napoleon's Tomb at St. Helena, Mt. Vernon, Va. of St. George and the white cross of St. Andrew, used by the Scotch. This flag was adopted by Act of Parliament in 1707. During the colonial period of American history, a number of the colonies had flags. Massachusetts adopted the pine tree with the motto "An appeal to Heaven," Rhode Island had a flag in the centre of which was an anchor, and above it the word "Hope." Within the blue canton were thirteen stars, said to be the first flag on which the thirteen colonies were rep-

762 IMPROVEMENT ERA resented by thirteen stars. New York had an emblem showing a while heaver on a white field; and the Virginia flag had a coiled rattlesnake in the eentre, underneath which were the words: "Don't tread on me." When General Washington left for Cambridge, Masaehusetts, to take command of the American forces, he was escorted across New Jersey and New York by the First Troop of Light Horse, organized in Philadelphia. This company had a beautiful flag, in the centre of which was a knot tied with thirteen cords, and in the canton, thirteen horizontal stripes, alternating blue and silver. It was quite natural that with the outbreak of the Revolution, the colonists desired an emblem that would denote the union of colonies in their strug- gle with the mother country. Our flag has experienced some very romantic episodes in its history. During the war of 1812-14, it floated over Fort Mc- Henry, which became the scene on the night of September 12, 1814, of a heavy bombardment by the British forces. At the time, Francis Scott Key was on a ship in Baltimore Harbor, where he watched with anxious feelings the firing by the enemy. All day long, the roar of cannon continued. Into the night the bombardment continued. Key retired very late, expecting that on the morrow, the American flag would have been replaced by the Union Jack. Early in the morning, he came out on deck, and saw the Stars and Stripes still floating over the fort. So stirred was he, that he took an old envelope from his pocket, and sitting upon a box, he wrote the poem which is the most popular of our national anthems. The American flag was first sa- luted by a foreign power, France, Feb. 14, 1778, when John Paul Jones anchord his flag-ship, the Serapis, in the harbor of Qui- beron. From that day to this, the flag has come to be respected by every civilization, in the world. It stands for the highest ideals of liberty, freedom, and civic life, and is the sacred em- blem of our United States, the Land of Promise. One of the most significant events that has ever occurred in connection with our Flag was on April 29, of this year, when the war diplomats of France met the diplomats of Eng- land, at the tomb of Washington, and placed wreathes on the grave of the Father of our Country. With Secretary Lansing of the State Department, the representatives of England and France stood under the Stars and Stripes, the Union Jack, and the Tricolor of France, and paid honor to the man who was the first President of this great Republic. It was all significant of the fart that the United States, England, and France will lead in the Federation of the World, when "the war-drum shall sound no longer."

The Tomb of Washington, Mt. Vernon, Va. Here it was that, on April 29, 1917, the United States, Great Britain, and France, pledged themselves each to the other in the name of the dead, to prosecute the present mighty struggle against autocracy, on the lines Washington followed in bringing the United States into being. After a speech by the eloquent master of oratory, the ex-premier of France, M. Rene Viviani, Marshal Joffre, victor of the Marne and idol of the French people, spoke two brief and impressive sentences in veneration of the name and memory of Washington, after which he placed on the tomb the bronze palm from the French mission, the humblest and the highest mark of honor which the French nation can accord the dead. Arthur James Balfour, foreign secretary of Great Britain, then spoke, and read the following words prepared by the British mission for the wreath of lilies and oak leaves, tied with the colors of the three allied nations, which he then placed beside the bronze token of the French mission, on the stone coffin of the Father of our Country: "Dedicated by the British mission to the immortal memory of George Washington, soldier, statesman, patriot, who would have rejoiced to see the country of which he was by birth a citizen, and the country which his genius called into existence, fighting side by side to save mankind from subjection to a military despotism." At the ceremony "there was neither music nor applause. Except for the brief words of the speakers, the eternal silence and peace of the place were not broken."