This resolution was made public September 3, 1777; and Colonel Trumbull represents the flag made in pursuance of it as used at Burgoyne's surrender, October 17, 1777.

From the above resolution and what has preceded, it is apparent that the object of that resolution was simply to give the authorization of Congress to a color existing, so far as the stripes and part of the flag called the union were concerned; but it is worthy of remark that the character of the new emblem for that union is specially described as representing "a new constellation."

The use of some emblem of union different from the British crosses, the United States having declared themselves free and independent States, was eminently natural, but the description of the emblem substituted for them as "representing a new constellation," involves the idea that some constellation, in some way emblematic of union, had been presented to the minds of those adopting this resolution. It may be said that the adoption of a star, as the representative of a State, would naturally lead to the idea of a constellation; but, as the emblem to be altered was one of union, we are inclined to think that the first idea suggested was that of some constellation, which of itself implied union, and that the representation of a State by a star was involved in it.

The question that now arises is, was there any constellation which implied union? The answer is, there was the constellation Lyra. The next point is, to ascertain if the first flag displayed under this resolution bore that constellation. If not, in what form the stars were presented on that flag, and whether any connection can be traced between it and the constellation Lyra.

Let us first consider the fitness of the constellation Lyra to indicate union. In Charles Anthon's Dictionary of Greek and Roman Antiquities, we find the following account of the Lyra. He says:—

"Lyra. The Latin name fides, which was used for a lyre as well as a cithara, is probably the same as the Greek σφιδες, which, according to Hesychius, signifies gut-strings; but Festus takes it to be the same as fides (faith), because the lyre was the symbol of harmony and unity among men." The quotation from the Astronomicon of Manilius, presented in the following letter from Mr. Charles Francis Adams, grandson of Mr. John Adams, confirms the attributes above ascribed to the lyre, and its corresponding constellation "Lyra."

The following is a translation of the above quotation:—

Conspicuous among the stars, its horns wide spread over the heavens, is the Lyre, with which Orpheus was wont to captivate everything to which he addressed his song, and even made a journey through Hades itself, and put to sleep the infernal laws. Hence, its celestial honor; and, by the same power with which it then drew rocks and trees along, it now leads the stars, and whirls along the immense orb of the revolving world.

This last line shows that the constellation Lyra, as an emblem of union for the United States, would have been an amplification of the attribute of "fascination" ascribed to the Rattlesnake, as an emblem of union for the United States, in the account we have already given of the Rattlesnake as such, in describing the standard of the commander-in-chief of the American navy; for the constellation Lyra would not only imply "that those who consider the liberty and blessings which America affords, and once come over to her, never afterwards leave her, but spend their lives with her," but that by their union and harmony the United States would "whirl along the immense orb of the revolving world," to follow their example in their forms of government.

Having thus shown how appropriate the constellation Lyra would have been as an emblem of the union of the United States, we proceed to ascertain if the first flag displayed under the resolution of June 14, 1777, bore that constellation. In Trumbull's picture of the surrender of Burgoyne, and Peale's picture of Washington, the thirteen stars are represented as arranged in a circle; it now remains to show the existence of some record exhibiting a connection between the constellation Lyra and the circle of thirteen stars.

We find this record on a form for a passport of the United States, prepared under Mr. John Quincy Adams, when Secretary of State, in 1820, which form is now in use. In adopting the form in question, the arms of the United States, previously used on U.S. passports, were replaced by a circle of thirteen stars surrounding an eagle, holding in his beak the constellation Lyra, and the motto, Nunc sidera ducit.

Mr. W. J. Stone, of Washington City, gives the following account of the preparation of the device above described, and presented in the vignette to the title-page. In it, the constellation Lyra is represented as radiating into a circle of thirteen stars.

Had not this device been substituted, on the form for a United States passport, for the arms of the United States, by Mr. John Quincy Adams, we should not consider the constellation Lyra, radiating into a circle of thirteen stars, as having any special meaning; but as, at the time the circle of thirteen stars was introduced into the flag of the United States as an emblem of union, his father, Mr. John Adams, was chairman of the Board of War, we think it has.

On page 6, vol. iii. of the Life and Writings of John Adams, we find the following entry in his journal:—

A change being contemplated in the emblem of union in the flag, the Board of War would, doubtless, have had charge of the preparation of the substitute; and from the above, we perceive the chairman must have been particularly connected with its preparation.

We have thus presented the data upon which is based the conclusion that the constellation Lyra was originally proposed for the union of our Flag, in 1777, at the time the circle of thirteen stars was adopted. The reasons for that conclusion are the following:—

Pl. III.

It was a Union flag that was to be altered. The United States having become independent of Great Britain, the British emblem of union was no longer appropriate; some other emblem of union was to be substituted.

The constellation Lyra was a time-honored emblem of union. The language of the resolution of June 14, 1777, evidently has reference to such an emblem, representing a constellation. The Lyra was not adopted. A circle of thirteen stars was. At this time, Mr. John Adams was chairman of the Board of War.

Mr. John Adams's son became Secretary of State in 1820. Striking out the arms of the United States, he presented on the passport a device, representing the constellation Lyra radiating into a circle of stars—the stars thirteen in number. At this time there were twenty-one States in the Union—hence this circle of thirteen stars referred to an earlier day. The first instance of a circle of thirteen stars being used as a national device, was in the U. S. Flag, and its being presented on the passport must have referred to that use of it, as constituting it a well-known emblem of the United States, indicative of their union, while the constellation Lyra, occupying the centre of this circle, indicates the origin of the circle of stars, as an emblem of union "representing a new constellation," in that time-honored emblem of union. The other circumstances we have adduced point to Mr. John Adams as the source from which his son derived his information. We suppose the circle of stars was preferred to the Lyra because it indicated the perpetuity of the Union, which was distinctly intimated by the Rattlesnake Standard, laid aside when the flag of the United States, commonly called the Stars and Stripes, was adopted. It may not be improper to observe that these deductions are in keeping with the general rules, presented in our Introduction, as deduced from the practices of nations relative to national emblems.

Compare Fig. 6, Plate II., the Flag of the United States, as first presented under the resolution of June 14, 1777, with Fig. 1, Plate III., the flag as we suppose it to have been proposed when Mr. John Adams was chairman of the Board of War, and both of the above with the vignette to the title-page, the device introduced into the passport in lieu of the arms of the United States, by Mr. John Q. Adams, when Secretary of State.

In making these comparisons, the eagle, only adopted for the arms of the United States in 1782, must be kept out of view, or rather considered as having no part in the question about the stars.

In the preceding pages, we have established the origin of the part of the flag called "the union," also that of the circle of stars as an emblem for that union, together with that of the stripes, as clearly as analogy will enable us so to do. As corroborating the views we have advanced, we now present to the reader the reports on the adoption of the arms of the United States, copied by permission from unpublished records of the State Department, from which it appears that certain of those who prepared the devices for the Flag of the United States, were also engaged in the preparation of the device for a Great Seal.

"JOURNALS OF CONGRESS."

In regard to this Report, we observe Mr. John Adams was one of those engaged in preparing it. The emblems to represent countries were the rose for England, the thistle for Scotland, the harp for Ireland, &c. May not this train of ideas have suggested to his mind the lyre and its corresponding constellation to mark the Union of the United States of America in the flag of those States?

We observe the reference to the Sacred Volume in the device for the reverse of the proposed Seal. May not the idea of stars, as the representatives of dependent States, have been borrowed from the same source, and applied in the case of the flag as States dependent upon union, and thus constituting a constellation?

This Committee made a Report, May 10. Vide No. 2.

We have not thought it worth while to present the drawing above referred to.

Mr. Barton also presented the following:—

Mr. Middleton, Mr. Boudinot, and Mr. Rutledge, reported a modification of this, June 13, 1782, which was referred to the Secretary of the United States, in Congress assembled, to take order.

Device for a Great Seal, as adopted June 20, 1782.

In most of the above reports, a reference will be perceived to the devices and colors of the flag of the U. States, and many of the ideas presented in them are drawn from it, viz., the chief azure corresponding to the union of the flag, the pales corresponding to the stripes, which together constitute a whole; the constellation of stars also taken from the flag, and indicating a new State (composed of thirteen States) dependent upon their union. As these are the principal ideas presented in the arms of the United States, may we not reasonably conclude that, being borrowed from the flag, they are the views that prevailed at the time of its adoption, presented under another guise? The reference to eternity, in the arms, was indicated by the circle of stars in the flag; the reference to Providence, in the eye, was in the flag presented in the field of thirteen stripes, a combination of the red and white flags, which bore the mottoes: "Qui transtulit sustinet," and an "Appeal to Heaven."

It is intimated, in some of these reports, that the colors for the flag were adopted apart from other reasons, as implying certain virtues; of the fact of their implying them there can be no doubt, but that they were not immediately adopted into the flag for that reason, but rather because they were already in use, with these meanings attached to them, at least so far as the red and white colors were concerned, we think we have conclusively shown. We shall presently offer some suggestions relative to the blue color, which will indicate a more direct reason for its adoption than the virtues implied by it.

But to return to the account of the flag. We remarked, under the head of the Great Union Flag of the Colonies, that the stripes in the field of the flag were not only designed to show the union of the thirteen colonies, but also the number of members which composed it, and their dependence as a whole upon the Union. The first change in the flag of the United States, shows that this conclusion was a correct one. It was directed in the following resolution:—

This was the flag of the United States during the war of 1812-14.

In 1818, the flag of the United States was again altered, and, as we are informed, on the suggestion of the Hon. Mr. Wendover, of New York, a return was made to the thirteen stripes; as it was anticipated the flag would become unwieldy if a stripe was added on the admission of each State; and, moreover, by the plan proposed, the union of the old thirteen States, as well as the number of members composing the existing Union, would be presented by the flag of the United States. Mr. W. also proposed the arrangement of the stars in the union into the form of a single star. In this, there was a departure from the original design, as the perpetuity of the Union ceased to be indicated by the flag, as it had previously been in the circle of stars, except so far as indicated by the several stars forming one large star.

The Resolution of 1818 was as follows:-

The flag planted on the National Palace of the city of Mexico had thirty stars in the union.

The following compliment was paid to this flag.

The union of the United States flag at present contains thirty-one stars. (See Fig. 3, Plate III.)

We have, in the preceding pages, offered many reasons for concluding that the devices in the flag, its colors, and the manner in which they were combined, originated in some circumstance directly connected with the history of the colonies, or in some practice which prevailed in the mother country. Particularly was this the case in the adoption of the emblem of union from the mother country. This leads us to make a few remarks as to the prominence given to the color blue in the reports on the adoption of the device for a Great Seal of the United States, and in its being the ground of the uniform of the United States. We have previously stated that its adoption was due to other circumstances directly, than its being typical of the virtues of perseverance, vigilance, and justice, though indirectly this meaning was involved in its adoption. First, blue was a favorite color in the colonies, as is proved by the fact of its being the uniform of the South Carolina troops in 1775. For we have seen that Colonel Moultrie caused a large blue flag to be made, with a crescent in one corner, to be uniform with the troops; and by the fact that the pine-tree flag of New England was a blue field, containing in the upper canton, next the staff, a St. George's cross on a white ground, and a pine-tree represented in the upper square formed by the cross. A reason for this color being a favorite in New England, may perhaps be found in the circumstance, that, in 1679, when the banner of the league and covenant was raised in Scotland, it was a red flag, the borders of which were edged with blue.[63] Borders of different color from the body of the flag, or from the shield of the coat of arms, are in heraldry, a common distinction, and as such was doubtless applied by the Covenanters (blue being the color of the field of the banner of Scotland, as we have seen), to indicate by whom this red flag was raised, and thus the blue color became identified with the league and covenant. After the defeat of Bothwell's Bridge, many of those people fled to the colonies, particularly to New England and New Jersey.

That feelings kindred to those excited among the Covenanters were aroused among the colonists, is shown by the mottoes on "the Union flag with a red field," already spoken of as displayed on a liberty-pole in New York city in 1775. Those mottoes were, "No Popery," and "George Rex and the liberties of America." It was probably in reference to his being commander of the armies of the colonies, united in a solemn league and covenant in defence of civil and religious liberty, that General Washington adopted as his badge a light blue riband, which had already been identified with a similar league and covenant in Scotland. At a later day, on the adoption of an Union flag as the flag of the United Colonies, the color of the field of the union (derived, as was the blue border of the red flag of the Covenanters, from the banner of Scotland) being blue, this color became identified with that which gave nationality to the colonies, viz., their union, and on this account was adopted as the ground of the national uniform, and as the color for the chief or union, both in the arms of the United States and in their flag.

That the prevailing colors of the uniforms of the army at that time corresponded to the colors of the flag, is a well-known fact. Thus the facings of the blue coats were red, the color of the plumes white, tipped with red, &c. The buff and blue, commonly regarded as the continental uniform, was that of the general officers, and not of the body of the troops. In the navy, the same was the case. The prevailing colors of the uniform of the officers of the navy were blue and red; those of the uniform of the marine officers, green and white: the colors of the flag of the United States, and of the flag of the floating batteries, before given, viz., white, with a green tree in the middle, &c. &c.

That such considerations operate in the selection of colors for uniforms, is proved by the fact that the uniform of the United States corps of cadets, a corps instituted and kept up with a view to foster and preserve military knowledge in our country, instead of being of the national color, blue, is gray trimmed with black. This color for the uniform of that corps was chosen in 1815, out of compliment to the services of the brigade commanded by General Scott at Chippewa, &c., in the war of 1812-14. The embargo and the war having cut off the supply of blue cloths, the commissary-general of purchases was forced temporarily to supply that brigade with a substitute of gray, trimmed with black.

As this, then, was the origin of the color of the uniform of the corps of cadets, may we not conclude that, for the reasons assigned, blue was adopted as our national color, out of compliment to the Union, with which, as we have shown, it was intimately connected.

Having given the preceding account of our National Flag, we now add the names of those connected with its different phases.

1st. General Washington.

2d. Benjamin Franklin, Mr. Lynch, and Mr. Harrison; the Committee of Conference, with General Washington, on the organization of the army, of which Colonel Joseph Reed was Secretary.

3d. The Marine Committee; Mr. Bartlett, Mr. Hancock, Mr. Hopkins, Mr. Deane, Mr. Lewis, Mr. Crane, Mr. R. Morris, Mr. Read, Mr. Chase, Mr. R. H. Lee, Mr. Hewes, Mr. Gadsden, and Mr. Houston.

4th. The Board of War; Mr. J. Adams, Mr. Sherman, Mr. Harrison, Mr. Wilson, and Mr. E. Rutledge.

With this array of names before us, of those who, with others, established our liberty and Union, and the idea we have developed, that the devices adopted by them for the National Ensign of our country were intended to intimate the perpetuity of that country's union, may we not truly say of Washington and his compeers, now resting in their graves, as connected with those devices, There is neither speech nor language, but their voices are heard among them. Their sound has gone out into all lands, and their words into the ends of the world, proclaiming their trust in Providence, that that Union should only perish, when the sun and moon shall be darkened, and the stars shall withdraw their light.

Footnotes

    [1] "Standards, somewhat similar to those represented on the Assyrian bas-reliefs, were in use in Egypt. Some sacred animal or emblem was also generally placed upon them."

    [2] Siege of Boston, Frothingham, p. 104, note.

    [3] American Archives, 4th series, vol. ii. p. 863.

    [4] Ibid. p. 1582.

    [5] General Putnam was named Israel.

    [6] American Archives, 4th series, vol. ii. p. 1687.

    [7] The General's tent.

    [8] Adams's Roman Antiquities, p. 322.

    [9] American Archives, 4th series, vol. iv. p. 711.

  [10] Holmes's Annals, vol. ii. p. 227.

  [11] Brande's Dictionary of Literature, &c. Crescent.

  [12] American Archives, 4th series, vol. iii. p. 1126.

  [13] Ibid. vol. iv. p. 570.

  [14] American Archives, 4th series, vol. v. p. 568.

  [15] Ibid. vol. v. p. 1299.

  [16] Journal of Congress, vol. ii. p. 165.

  [17] Boston Gazette and Country Journal, Sept. 15, 1777.

  [18] Parker. Terms used in British Heraldry, p. 40.

  [19] Parker. Terms used in British Heraldry, p. 148.

  [200] Ibid. p. 149.

  [21] Parker. Terms used in British Heraldry, p. 42.

  [22] Ibid. p. 273.

  [23] Ibid. p. 9.

  [24] Parker. Terms used in British Heraldry, p. 315.

  [25] Note by Author.—This white edging would, however, show the union of the two flags, which otherwise might not have been apparent. We are told, in De Foe's History of the Union, that great jealousy for the ancient banners of their respective kingdoms, was shown both by Scots and English.

  [26] Parker. Terms used in British Heraldry, pp. 315-16.

  [27] Parker. Terms used in British Heraldry, pp. 315-16.

  [28] Winthrop's New England, vol. i. p. 146.

  [29] Ibid. vol. i. pp. 155-6.

  [30] Ibid. vol. i. pp. 158.

  [31] Winthrop's New England, vol. i. p. 158.

  [32] Winthrop's New England, vol. i. p. 158.

  [33] Ibid. vol. i. p. 180.

  [34] Winthrop's New England, vol. i. p. 187.

  [35] Winthrop's New England, vol. ii. p. 344.

  [36] Hazard, vol. i. p. 554.

  [37] History of the Union of Scotland and England, by Danl. De Foe, p. 528.

  [38] The Boston News Letter, No. 197, from Monday, Jan. 19, to Monday, Jan. 26, 1707.

  [39] Neal's History of New England, p. 585.

  [40] Siege of Boston, p. 104, note.

  [41] T. Westcott, Notes and Queries. Literary World, Oct. 2, 1852.

  [42] American Archives, 4th series, vol. iv. p. 467.

  [43] Siege of Boston, p. 283.

  [44] American Archives, 4th series, vol. iv. p. 711.

  [45] British Annual Register, 1776, p. 147.

  [46] King's Regulations for the British Army, Colors, &c.

  [47] American Archives, 4th series, vol. v. p. 423.

  [48] From this, we may justly conclude that the Committee of Conference, composed of Dr. Franklin, Mr. Lynch, and Mr. Harrison, had the subject of the flag under consideration, and that the flag prepared under their supervision was the one displayed as the flag of the United Colonies, on the day the army organized by them, General Washington, &c., went into being.

  [49] Siege of Boston, p. 261.

  [50] Mass. Historical Collections, 2d series, vol. ii. p. 228.

  [51] American Archives, 4th series, vol. iv. p. 1179.

  [52] American Archives, 4th series, vol. iv. p. 965.

  [53] Ibid. vol. v. p. 823.

  [54] American Archives, 4th series, vol. ii. p. 1582.

  [55] American Archives, 4th series, vol. ii. p. 1662.

  [56] American Archives, 4th series, vol. ii. p. 1738.

  [57] American Archives, 4th series, vol. v. p. 568. South Carolina Provincial Congress.

  [58] Franklin's Works, vol. iii. p. 25.

  [59] Frothingham's Siege of Boston.

  [60] "As the pales or pallets consist of an uneven number, they ought in strictness to be blazoned—Argt. 6 pallets gules; but as the thirteen pieces allude to the thirteen States, they are blazoned according to the number of pieces paleways."

  [61] The pen is run through the words, "with thirteen strings," in the original.

  [62] "In the arms of Scotland, as manifested in the royal atchievement, the double fressure which surrounds the lion is borne flory and counter-flory (with fleurs-de-lis), which is in consequence of a treaty that was entered into between Charlemagne, then Emperor and King of France, and Achius, King of Scotland; to denote that the French lilies should guard and defend the Scottish lion."

  [63] Walter Scott's Old Mortality, vol. ii. p. 116.