The doughty American seamen would not wait for attack upon them, but went forth aggressively against the squadron of the British. Oddly enough, considering the condition of the poorly equipped navy, they were remarkably successful and captured more than two hundred and fifty prizes. The following year, however, the British gained the ascendency, and in 1814 came in with sea force and land force and sacked and burned the Capitol at Washington and all public buildings except the patent office.
They then proceeded against Baltimore. The land troops were almost in sight of the city of their desires, when they were halted and held in check by American troops under General Sticker, whose name, it may be said, meant as it sounded, and who effectually prevented their further advance. But the fleet on the waters sailed into the bay of Baltimore and up to Fort McHenry at the mouth of the Patapsco River, in the determination to bombard the fortress and compel entrance to the city in that way. The British admiral had boasted the fort would fall to his hand an easy prey.
Prior to this, Dr. William Beane, a citizen of Baltimore and a non-combatant, had been captured at Marlboro and was held a prisoner on one of the vessels of the British fleet. To secure his release, Francis Scott Key and John Skinner set out from Baltimore on the ship Minden flying a flag of truce. The British admiral received them kindly and released Dr. Beane; but detained the three on board ship pending the bombardment of the fort, lest in their return to land the intentions of the British might be frustrated.
From sunrise to sunset they watched the shot and shell poured into the fort and noted with infinite joy that the flag still flew.
Thus from the side of the enemy they were constrained to witness the efforts of destruction urged against the protecting fortress of their own city. From sunrise to sunset they watched the shot and shell poured into the fort and noted with infinite joy that the flag still flew. Through the glare of the artillery, as the night advanced, they caught now and then the gleam of the flag still flying. Would it be there at another sunrise? Who could tell! Suddenly the cannonading ceased. The British, despairing of carrying the fort, abandoned the project. In the emotion of the hour and inspiration born of the victory, Key composed the immortal lines now become our national anthem, “The Star-Spangled Banner.”
The flag is preserved in the museum of Washington and is distinctive in having fifteen stripes and fifteen stars, one of the very few national flags with this number.
THE STAR-SPANGLED BANNER
OH, say, can you see, by the dawn’s early light,
What so proudly we hailed at the twilight’s last gleaming;
Whose broad stripes and bright stars thro’ the perilous fight
O’er the ramparts we watched were so gallantly streaming?
And the rocket’s red glare, the bombs bursting in air,
Gave proof through the night that our flag was still there;
Oh, say, does that star-spangled banner yet wave
O’er the land of the free and the home of the brave?
On the shore dimly seen through the mists of the deep,
Where the foe’s haughty host in dread silence reposes,
What is that which the breeze o’er the towering steep,
As it fitfully blows, half conceals, half discloses?
Now it catches the gleam of the morning’s first beam,
In full glory reflected now shines in the stream;
’Tis the star-spangled banner; oh, long may it wave
O’er the land of the free and the home of the brave!