6 minute read
Flags of our Fathers
Every schoolchild in America knows what our nation’s first flags looked like: 13 white stars in a circle on a navy-blue canton (that’s flag-speak for the squarish section in the corner) and 13 alternating red and white stripes. The Betsy Ross flag! Right? Well…
In the era before textile mills or factories — when flags, clothing, sails, and other fabric creations were handmade — no two flags would have looked the same. Maybe Betsy Ross did sew a flag like the one in our collective imagination. There’s actually no historical evidence for that story. But even if she did, images were not as easy to transmit back then as they are now. Seamstresses throughout the 13 colonies were on their own as they tried to interpret the June 14, 1777 directive of the Continental Congress calling for a single American flag to replace the various standards flying at the time.
There was no advice on how to place the stars, or how many points they should have. There was no advice on whether to start with a red stripe or a white one. Flags were different sizes, and different ratios. Some were almost square, others long rectangles.
Our second national flag, authorized in 1794 after Vermont and Kentucky had joined the Union, was supposed to feature 15 stars and 15 stripes. But once again, no direction was forthcoming about how to arrange either the stars or the stripes, so variants abounded.
Soon we developed textile mills and factories; slowly, flags became standardized. Thousands of individual seamstresses were replaced by a handful of manufacturers, cranking out flags that, if not identical, were pretty darn close. This is true not only for our modern flag — the 50star flag in use since Alaska and Hawaii joined the Union in 1959 — but for historical flags as well.
Despite knowing full well that no two 13- or 15-star flags were alike, modern flag-makers have settled on the “Betsy Ross” version of the former and the “Star Spangled Banner” version of the latter. And why not? Everyone recognizes them and knows the stories.
In the case of the Star-Spangled Banner, the 15-star, 15-stripe flag flying over Baltimore’s Fort McHenry during its September 1814 bombardment by the British inspired Francis Scott Key to write his poem “The Star-Spangled Banner.” His poem was later set to some weird borrowed music (an old drinking song called “Anacreon in Heaven”) and the result eventually became our National Anthem.
And here’s the kicker: unlike Betsy’s flag, that flag definitely did exist, and still does! It can be copied. We know for a fact that there were many variations on the 15star, 15-stripe flag in use from 1794 to 1818. But the simplicity and power of the Star-Spangled Banner story has trumped the reality that every flag was different. Nowadays, anyone seeking to interpret this era can either order a flag based on the Ft. McHenry flag, or sew their own damn design!
Currently, there are a number of sailing vessels flying that standardized 15-star, 15-stripe flag. First and foremost, there is Old Ironsides herself! But there are also several historical replicas, among them:
US Brig Niagara, a representation of Oliver Hazard Perry’s flagship in the pivotal 1813 Battle of LakeErie;
Pride of Baltimore II, a representation of the highly-successful Baltimore privateers of the War of 1812;
Lynx, a representation of a letterof-marque topsail schooner built in 1812, which was captured by the British but so admired that her lines were taken off by the Admiralty;
Friends Good Will, a representation of an 1810 merchant vessel pressed into military service on the Great Lakes; and
Fame, a representation of a fishing schooner commissioned in 1812 as a privateer out of Salem.
How accurate is it for these vessels to be flying a flag that replicates the ones sewn for Ft. McHenry’s commander in 1814 by Mary Pickersgill, her daughter, her two nieces, and an indentured African-American girl?
Did the Army’s flags match the Navy’s flags? Given the rivalry between the two services, there are no guarantees.
Would a flag sewn on the Lakes, or in Salem, have matched a design popular hundreds of miles away in Baltimore? Given the shortages of pretty much everything in Oliver Hazard Perry’s Erie shipyard, coming up with nine large and identical ensigns was probably a reach.
Would a privateer or a letter of marque fly the same flag as a naval vessel? The British, for one, were quite explicit about the various flags allowed to naval vessels, privateers and provincial vessels.
We can only guess what flags these vessels were flying. It is safe to say they were not all the same. But even if we can’t guarantee historical authenticity, there’s value in flying a flag that provokes thought by emphasizing the differences between now and then.
There is also value in recognizing that in this case, as in so much else, storytelling has actually warped our understanding of history. A chaotic narrative, involving thousands of separate actors, can hardly compete with a powerful story, set to music, with a relic on display at the Smithsonian!
What else do we think we know about our history, which is based on a simple story rather than on complex facts?
