BATTLE OF BUNKER HILL (From the celebrated painting by Trumbull)
BATTLE OF BUNKER HILL
(From the celebrated painting by Trumbull)

Immortal Songs Of Camp and Field The Story of their Inspiration together with Striking Anecdotes connected with their History. By Rev. Louis Albert Banks, D.D. Author of Immortal Hymns and Their Story, "Christ and His Friends" "The Christian Gentleman," Etc. Etc. With Portraits and Illustrations CLEVELAND: The Burrows Brothers Company, Publishers Mdcccxcix

Copyright, 1898
by
The Burrows Brothers Co.
———
ALL RIGHTS RESERVED

Imperial Press
CLEVELAND

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Illustrations

JOSEPH RODMAN DRAKE
JOSEPH RODMAN DRAKE

The author of The American Flag was born to poverty, but by hard work he obtained a good education, and studied medicine under Dr. Nicholas Romayne, by whom he was greatly beloved. He obtained his degree and shortly afterward, in October, 1816, he was married to Sarah Eckford, who brought him a good deal of wealth. Two years later, his health failing, he visited New Orleans for the winter, hoping for its recovery. He returned to New York in the spring, only to die in the following autumn, September, 1820, at the age of twenty-five. He is buried at Hunt’s Point, in Westchester County, New York, where he spent some of the years of his boyhood. On his monument are these lines, written by his friend, Fitz-Green Halleck,—

Drake wrote The Mocking-Bird, one of his poems which has lived and will live, when a mere boy. It shows not only a happy facility but an unusual knowledge of the imitative faculty in the young poets of his time.

MOUNT HOOD
MOUNT HOOD

These lines were very unsatisfactory to Drake, and he said to Fitz-Green Halleck, “Fitz, can’t you suggest a better stanza?” Whereupon the brilliant author of Marco Bozzaris sat down and wrote in a glowing burst of inspiration the four concluding lines:—

Drake immediately agreed that these were a splendid improvement on the former ending, and incorporated them into his one poem that is certain of immortality. It was first published in the New York Evening Post, in a series known as the Croaker Pieces, The American Flag being the last one of the series.

Drake’s impulsive nature, as well as the spirit and force, yet simplicity, of expression, with his artless manner, gained him many friends. He had that native politeness which springs from benevolence—that would stop to pick up the hat or the crutch of an old servant, or fly to the relief of a child. His acquaintance with Fitz-Green Halleck arose in a romantic incident on the Battery one day when, in a retiring shower, the heavens were spanned by a rainbow. DeKay and Drake were together, and Halleck, a new acquaintance, was talking with them; the conversation taking the turn of some passing expression of the wishes of the moment, Halleck whimsically remarked that it would be heaven for him, just then, to ride on that rainbow and read Campbell. The idea was very pleasing to Drake. He seized Halleck by the hand and from that moment until his untimely death they were bosom friends.

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ROBERT TREAT PAINE
ROBERT TREAT PAINE

STATUE OF THE MINUTEMAN AT CONCORD, MASSACHUSETTS
STATUE OF THE MINUTEMAN AT CONCORD, MASSACHUSETTS

In 1792 young Paine fell deeply in love with an actress, a Miss Baker, aged sixteen, who was one of the first players to appear in Boston. Their performances were at first called dramatic recitations to avoid a collision with a law forbidding “stage plays.” He married Miss Baker in 1794, and was promptly turned out of doors by his father.

The next year, on taking his degree of A.M. at Cambridge, he delivered a poem entitled The Invention of Letters. There was a great deal of excitement over this poem at the time, as it contained some lines referring to Jacobinism, which the college authorities crossed out, but which he delivered as written. The poem was greatly admired, and Washington wrote him a letter in appreciation of its merits. It was immediately published and large editions sold, the author receiving fifteen hundred dollars as his share of the profits, which was no doubt a very grateful return to a poet with a young wife and an obdurate father. The breach with his family, however, was afterward healed.

Mr. Paine was also the author of a poem entitled The Ruling Passion, for which he received twelve hundred dollars. Still another famous poem of his was called The Steeds of Apollo.

The next to the last stanza of Adams and Liberty was not in the song as originally written. Paine was dining with Major Benjamin Russell, when he was reminded that his song had made no mention of Washington. The host said he could not fill his glass until the error had been corrected, whereupon the author, after a moment’s thinking, scratched off the lines which pay such a graceful tribute to the First American:—

Instead of being added to the hymn it was inserted as it here appears. The second, fourth, and fifth stanzas have been usually omitted in recent publications of the hymn.

Liberty Bell
Liberty Bell

GEORGE WASHINGTON
GEORGE WASHINGTON