Grant County herald. [volume] (Lancaster, Wis.) 1850-1968, 1876-07-06
THE HERALD.
Our Flag When and How 1t Came
to be Adopted.

Every American ought to know all
about the Star Spangled Banner. We
give the following occonnt oft from
st. Nicholas for July:
When we were colonies of Eng
land, we sailed and fought under her
flag. Twenty years before the Revo-
luton, when we were at war with the
French and their allies the Indians,
many brave man in some hot skir-
mish with Indians would have well
coined the sight of the red flag Of
England-it would mean aid and com
fort when sorely pressed.
But the time was coming when he
was to hate it as much as he had hat
cd the French colors. i'ho time w IS
coming when the sight of it was to
mean opposition and tyranny to him,
and every feeling of his nature would
be reused against it. Every child
knows how we finally rebelled; it was
nothing less, and to England, our
George Washington was merely a
leading rebel. 1t was bold proceed
ing. We were thirteen little States,
fringed along on the Atlantic coast,
with the unbroken forest behind us,
and among the great family of ma
tons We had neither place nor name.
We, like the last new boy at a public
school-we had to fight to obtain due
respect from all the great old nations
who were looking on.
The Alfred was one of the few
large ships we had, and she carried
the pine tree flag, and beside that,
one with thirteen stripes, in red and
white, but with no stars; while on the
stripes was coiled rattlesnake, with
the motto, sDon't tread on me-" The
rattlesnake being found only in Amer
lea, there was, of course, peculiar
meaning in this emblem.
In the early part of the Revolution,
some of the South Carolina regiments
carried the palmetto tree ON their flag.
That was very good symbol, and
the State yet keeps it on her coat OF
arms, though it grows everywhere in
the South. The palmetto logs at
Fort Moultrie were found very good
things to receive cannon balls when
the fort was besieged by the British
in the June of 1776.
OF course we had no flag; we had
to earn that, too. For year or two
our privateers carried the Massachu-
sets State flag. 1t was better they
thought, than the English flag, at any
rate. The field was Of white bunting;
in the middle green pine tree, and
on the opposite side the motto, cap
| peal to Heaven"
Washington, in his character oil
General in-Chief, commissioned sew
eral privateer schooners, and they all
carried this flag.
There was This multiplicity of flags
because we did not clearly know
what we were. No nation had &C
knowledged us as belonging to their
great family yet; in fact, we had not
quito cut loose from England yet we
were fighting her with all our might,
and it seemed absurd to be under her
colors. In the fight at Bunker Hill,
the flag planted in the corner Of that
famous redoubt was of blue bunting,
with the cross of st. George in red in
the corner, and pine tree-that same
pine tree-in the upper right-hand
quarter of the cross.
Our army at Cambridge celebrated
New Years Day, Jan. 1st, l776, not
as the Chinese, by firing crackers and
Illuminating lanterns in the evening;
not yet by making calls, but by I'M
furling for the first time in an Ameri-
can camp the flag of thirteen stripes.
But even then we had not declared
ourselves independent of Great Brit
ain, and this flag had the British
union in the corner, and the crosses
of ST. Andrew and ST. George.
Finally, on the l4th of June, l776,
Congress, which met then in Phila-
dclphia, settled upon our style Of flag
at shall have" said they, "thirteen
stripes, alternate red and white, and
the union Of the states shall be indi-
Gated by thirteen stars, white, in a
new constellation.
1t was not until about forty years
ago that it was decided to add anoth-
err star for every new State as it join
ed the Union. So that the constella-
ton, as it is now, with nearly forty
stars in it, has grown good deal
from the original thirteen. But the
stripes still remain the same in num-
Der, to remind US of the first little
band of States who "fought it out"
against Great Britain.