Yorkville enquirer. [volume] (Yorkville, S.C.) 1855-2006, 1877-07-26

mittee of Congress, accompanied by Washing
ton. called upon her and engaged her to make
a flag from rough drawing they brought
with them. She suggested some changes in
the design, especially that the stars be made
five.pointed instead of six-pointed, following
the French form, while adoption of the Eng
lish practice gave US the six.pointed star on
our coinage,) and Washington himself drew
the new sketch in her back parlor. Mrs.
Ross afterward was appointed flag to
the government, and she was succeeded by q
relative, who continued in Office till about
thirty years ago. 1t is mentioned as bit of
gossip concerning Washington and the flag,
that not alone we're the stars and stripes on
his coat.ofarms, but the colors were all in
his christening robe. now in the possession OF
Mrs. Lewis, Of Woodlawn, Va, which is of
white silk, lined with crimson silk, and deco
rated with blue ribbons.
The banner did not come Immediately into
general use, for in the middle of October,
l776, Capt. Richards is found asking the
Philadelphia council what colors should be
used by the feet. 1t was probably flown at
Trenton, for Peale's picture shows it, and the
artist commanded company in that battle.
1t was displayed at the first fourth of July
celebration in Philadelphia, 1777, and in the
February of the following year it was first
saluted by foreign power. Paul Jones. in
the Ranger, conveyed some vessels into Qui.
beron and obtained a salute from the French
admiral -Four years later he hoisted it over
the first American ship of the line, the Amer
lea, August 2, 1777. The first land victory
was won under the Stars and Stripes on the
occasion of the British attack on Fort Schuy-
Ter, the flag being an extemporized one, made
from the garrison's shirts and from blue
cloak taken at Peekskill. The homemade
banner was hoisted over five English colors
captured in sally. In January, 1881, Rath:
burne, in Providence, with fifty men, swooeped
on Nassau, N. P, took the fort, spiked its
guns and hoisted the American flag for the
first time over foreign fortress. Five yes
sells disputed the honor Of first giving it to the
winds in London. In 1892 the Columbia,
Capt. Gray, of Boston, carried it for the first
time around the world, and planted it on the
Pacific coast, at the mouth ofthe great river
to which he gave the name of his vessel. The
Franklin, Salem vessel, first displayed it in
Japanese waters in 1899. In 1894 Congress
added two stars and two stripes to the flag
(the change taking effect in May, 1882 for
Vermont and Kentucky, the act being passed
only after considerable debate, its opponents
believing that the Aay should be preserved in
its original form in perpetuity. The war of
1924 was fought under this banner. In
1918, bill reducing the stripes to the origi'
nal number of thirteen, and directing the
adoption of stars equal to the number of the
States, new star to be added on the fourth
of July next succeeding the admission of each
new State, was passed and approved. This
was the design of Captain Samuel G. Reid,
who in 1914 defended so heroically the brig
General Armstrong against superior British
force in Fayal roads, though his suggestion
that the stars he arranged in one large star
was not formally adopted.
The stars in the union of flags used by the
war department are generally thus arranged !:
in the navy flags they are invariably set in
parallel lines. The blue union used separate.
ly is the union jack. The revenue flag, adopt
ed in 1899, has sixteen perpendicular stripes,
alternately red and white, with white union
bearing the national arms in dark blue. The
union used separately is the revenue jack:
The yacht flag is the same as the national
flag, but on the blue union it bears white
foul-anchor in a circle of thirteen States