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.
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