Port Tobacco times, and Charles County advertiser. (Port Tobacco, Md.) 1845-1898, 1871-07-28

From Harper's' Magazine for July.
"THE STAR-sPANGLED BANNER. "
How it was Composed and Set to Music.
"And you knew Francis Key?"
knew him !" Why he lived but a
few doors above my fathers house. There
we're once two brothers. John Ross and
Philip Barton Key. Philip was an Off
Ger in the British army during the Revo-
lutionary war, while John was in that OF
the United States. John lived on Pipes
Creek, near Taneytown, Frederick county,
Maryland. where Francis and his sister
Anna, Johns only children, were born.
There was an exiled Scotch man, Mr..
Bruce-said to have been heir to the
throne of Scotland-who had built mill
on Pipes Creek. and there, in the COM
pany of this noble old aristocrat, Frank
spent his very early boyhood. The broth
ers, Philip and John. were large. manly
looking fellows, but Frank and Anna were
of much smaller mould. Anna Key was
a beautiful little girl, with the cheerfulest
face and most pleasant smile I ever saw.
When they moved into town, near my
fathers, Frank was half grown aud ready
to enter as law student with Roger B.
Taney, then at the head of the Frederick
bar. Roger was tall, gaunt fellow, as
lean, they used to say, as a Potomac her
ring, and as shrewd ss the shrewdest. =
He married little Anna. It was like the
union, of hawk with skylark !; but she
lived to be the wife of a Chief Justice ol
the United States, and I never heard that
either repented of their marriage. Mr..
Taney was strict Catholic, and Frank an
Episcopalian, not considered very jealous
and sharp in his profession, and much
given to dreaming. He went to Virginia
and brought home wife much larger and
taller than himself, went to house keeping
on Market street. and had couple of lit.
tie children when I left home in 1909 tc
seek my fortune in Lancaster, Pennsylva.
mia.
"You have heard of Admiral Cockburr
who commanded the British fleet? The
atrocious scoundrel! Words can never
paint the miserable coward and boaster ir
his true colors. After his depredations
along the Eastern Shore of Maryland
there followed the sacking of Washington
the battle of North Point and the attempt
of the enemy to take the city Of Baltimore
by water, as they had failed to do it by
land. You know all about the lombard.
meut of Fort McHenry. September 18th,
1914. | have gone over it again, in fan.
cy. hundreds of times, and I'll tell you
Frank Key, patriotic as he was to bis
hearts core, could not help composing that
poem. 1t was forced out of him. Just
think. He was prisoner on the feet,
which was anchored two miles from Fort
McHenry, the city's main defense. He
could watch all the enemy's preparations,
and he knew the danger they foreboded.
Through the terrific cannonading of that
midnight fight, while the sky was lit up
with the flying bombs, do you think he
could sleep? As the struggle ceased upon
the coming morning and he looked through
the dim twilight for the flag Of his coun-
try, his heart sick with fear and doubt,
could he help the grand outburst of that
first verse? And then as through the
midst of the deep the banner loomed dim
ly in the morning suns first rays, and he
Exclaimed:
"Tis the star-spangled banner oh, long may
it wave
O'er the land of the free and the home of the
brave"
it was prayer and praise all in one; and
there has never been anything like it
since"
Mr.. Hendon stopped to wipe his sweat
ing face with his red bandana handker-
chief, and take few rapid strides across
the floor. He had forgotten his cane and
the weight Of his eighty years in this re-
miniscense of his strong young manhood j;
and if Admiral Cockburn had that mo-
ment stood before him, in the flesh and
blood insolence of his real self, I would
have been the chronicler of his fate.
'Have you heard Francis Keys poem?'
said one of our mess. coming in one even
ing as we lay scattered over the green hill
near the captains marque. 1t was rude
copy, and written in scrawl which Horace
Greeley might have mistaken for his own.
He read it aloud, once, twice, three times,
until the entire division seemed electrified
by its pathetic eloquence. An idea seiz-
ed Fred Durang. Hunting up volume
of old flute music. which was in some
body's tent, he impatiently whistled
snatches of tune, after tune. just as they
caught his quick eye. One called Ana
ereon in Heaven q have played it often,
for it was in my book that he found 1t,
struck his fancy and rivetted his attention.
Note after note fell from his puckered lips
until. with leap and shout, he exclaim-
ed: Boys, I've hit itp and fitting the
tune to the words, there rang out for the
first time the song of the 'Star-Spangled
Banner How the men shouted and
clapped. for never was there wedding of
poetry to music made under such inspir-
ing influences! Getting a brief furlough.
the brothers sang it on the stage of Hol-
liday Street Theatre soon after. It was
caught up in the camps. and sang around
our bivouac fires, and whistled in the
streets, and, when peace was declared and
we scattered to our homes, carried to
thousands of fresides as the most precious