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Let's Celebrate Betsy Ross! Hooah!
"While Americans recognize and celebrate collective achievements such as the writing of the Declaration of Independence, victory in the Revolutionary War, or the landing of a man on the Moon — it is individual accomplishment that is cherished the most. The "stars" of the aforementioned events — Thomas Jefferson, George Washington, and Neil Armstrong — outshine the collective constellation. One person's contribution can define the course and meaning of history.
When we view the flag, we think of liberty, freedom, pride, and Betsy Ross. The American flag flies on the moon, sits atop Mount Everest, is hurtling out in space. The flag is how America signs her name.
It is no surprise that Betsy Ross has become one of the most cherished figures of American History.
Betsy would often tell her children, grandchildren, relatives, and friends of the fateful day when three members of a secret committee from the Continental Congress came to call upon her. Those representatives, George Washington, Robert Morris, and George Ross, asked her to sew the first flag. This meeting occurred in her home some time late in May 1776. George Washington was then the head of the Continental Army. Robert Morris, an owner of vast amounts of land, was perhaps the wealthiest citizen in the Colonies. Colonel George Ross was a respected Philadelphian and also the uncle of her late husband, John Ross.
Naturally, Betsy Ross already knew George Ross as she had married his nephew. Furthermore, Betsy was also acquainted with the great General Washington. Not only did they both worship at Christ Church in Philadelphia, but Betsy's pew was next to George and Martha Washington's pew. Her daughter recalled, "That she was previously well acquainted with Washington, and that he had often been in her house in friendly visits, as well as on business. That she had embroidered ruffles for his shirt bosoms and cuffs, and that it was partly owing to his friendship for her that she was chosen to make the flag.
In June 1776, brave Betsy was a widow struggling to run her own upholstery business. Upholsterers in colonial America not only worked on furniture but did all manner of sewing work, which for some included making flags. According to Betsy, General Washington showed her a rough design of the flag that included a six-pointed star. Betsy, a standout with the scissors, demonstrated how to cut a five-pointed star in a single snip. Impressed, the committee entrusted Betsy with making our first flag.
According to Betsy Ross's dates and sequence of events, in May the Congressional Committee called upon her at her shop. She finished the flag either in late May or early June 1776. In July, the Declaration of Independence was read aloud for the first time at Independence Hall. Amid celebration, bells throughout the city tolled, heralding the birth of a new nation.
Much suffering and loss of life would result, however, before the United States would completely sever ties with Britain. Betsy Ross herself lost two husbands to the Revolutionary War. During the conflict the British appropriated her house to lodge soldiers. Through it all she managed to run her own upholstery business (which she continued operating for several decades after the war) and after the soldiers left, she wove cloth pouches which were used to hold gunpowder for the Continentals.
On June 14, 1777, the Continental Congress, seeking to promote national pride and unity, adopted the national flag. "Resolved: that the flag of the United States be thirteen stripes, alternate red and white; that the union be thirteen stars, white in a blue field, representing a new constellation."
"While Americans recognize and celebrate collective achievements such as the writing of the Declaration of Independence, victory in the Revolutionary War, or the landing of a man on the Moon — it is individual accomplishment that is cherished the most. The "stars" of the aforementioned events — Thomas Jefferson, George Washington, and Neil Armstrong — outshine the collective constellation. One person's contribution can define the course and meaning of history.
When we view the flag, we think of liberty, freedom, pride, and Betsy Ross. The American flag flies on the moon, sits atop Mount Everest, is hurtling out in space. The flag is how America signs her name.
It is no surprise that Betsy Ross has become one of the most cherished figures of American History.
Betsy would often tell her children, grandchildren, relatives, and friends of the fateful day when three members of a secret committee from the Continental Congress came to call upon her. Those representatives, George Washington, Robert Morris, and George Ross, asked her to sew the first flag. This meeting occurred in her home some time late in May 1776. George Washington was then the head of the Continental Army. Robert Morris, an owner of vast amounts of land, was perhaps the wealthiest citizen in the Colonies. Colonel George Ross was a respected Philadelphian and also the uncle of her late husband, John Ross.
Naturally, Betsy Ross already knew George Ross as she had married his nephew. Furthermore, Betsy was also acquainted with the great General Washington. Not only did they both worship at Christ Church in Philadelphia, but Betsy's pew was next to George and Martha Washington's pew. Her daughter recalled, "That she was previously well acquainted with Washington, and that he had often been in her house in friendly visits, as well as on business. That she had embroidered ruffles for his shirt bosoms and cuffs, and that it was partly owing to his friendship for her that she was chosen to make the flag.
In June 1776, brave Betsy was a widow struggling to run her own upholstery business. Upholsterers in colonial America not only worked on furniture but did all manner of sewing work, which for some included making flags. According to Betsy, General Washington showed her a rough design of the flag that included a six-pointed star. Betsy, a standout with the scissors, demonstrated how to cut a five-pointed star in a single snip. Impressed, the committee entrusted Betsy with making our first flag.
According to Betsy Ross's dates and sequence of events, in May the Congressional Committee called upon her at her shop. She finished the flag either in late May or early June 1776. In July, the Declaration of Independence was read aloud for the first time at Independence Hall. Amid celebration, bells throughout the city tolled, heralding the birth of a new nation.
Much suffering and loss of life would result, however, before the United States would completely sever ties with Britain. Betsy Ross herself lost two husbands to the Revolutionary War. During the conflict the British appropriated her house to lodge soldiers. Through it all she managed to run her own upholstery business (which she continued operating for several decades after the war) and after the soldiers left, she wove cloth pouches which were used to hold gunpowder for the Continentals.
On June 14, 1777, the Continental Congress, seeking to promote national pride and unity, adopted the national flag. "Resolved: that the flag of the United States be thirteen stripes, alternate red and white; that the union be thirteen stars, white in a blue field, representing a new constellation."
Betsy Ross - American Revolution - HISTORY.com
Posted from history.com
American History
Congress
Freedom
Philadelphia
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"Shoot if you must this old grey head, but spare your country's flag." "March on" he said. Is this about Betsy Ross??
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LTC John Griscom
By Ron Soodalter
11/7/2017 • America's Civil War Magazine
Even if it didn’t happen, Barbara Fritchie’s is a darn good tale.
An old woman of 90 leans from the attic window of her Frederick, Md., home, holding a bullet-rent United States flag, and defies the massed forces of Stonewall Jackson to destroy it. This is the stuff of which epic poems are made—and in fact, one was.
“Barbara Frietchie,” a stirring saga of 30 verses, was practically required reading for generations of American school kids. It was written for Atlantic Monthly by John Greenleaf Whittier, the newspaper editor and zealous anti-slavery activist. Generations of students—myself included—were assigned the task of memorizing it (“Up from the meadows rich with corn…”). And, in truth, it is a ripping yarn.
According to the poem, Lee’s forces are marching through Frederick during the Confederate invasion of Maryland in September 1862.
“Over the mountains winding down, Horse and foot, into Frederick town. Forty flags with their silver stars, Forty flags with their crimson bars…”
As a contingent of soldiers under General Thomas J. “Stonewall” Jackson approaches Barbara Frietchie’s house, the commander’s attention is drawn to the Stars and Stripes the doughty nonagenarian has hung in defiance.
“Up rose old Barbara Frietchie then, Bowed with her fourscore years and ten; Bravest of all in Frederick town, She took up the flag the men hauled down; In her attic window the staff she set, To show that one heart was loyal yet.”
The affront draws an immediate response from the irate general, who orders his men to fire a volley at the flag.
“It shivered the window, pane, and sash; It rent the banner with seam and gash. Quick, as it fell, from the broken staff Dame Barbara snatched the silken scarf. She leaned far out on the window-sill, And shook it forth with a royal will.”
Without hesitation, Barbara challenges the Rebel chieftain with words that still raise goosebumps on the reader:
“‘Shoot, if you must, this old gray head, But spare your country’s flag,’ she said.”
This fearless response humbles Jackson, who gives a command:
“‘Who touches a hair of yon gray head Dies like a dog! March on!’ he said.”
Well into the night, the Rebel host marches through the town, as Barbara Frietchie’s bullet-ripped banner floats on the breeze over their heads.
“And ever the stars above look down On thy stars below in Frederick town!”
And so, the saga ends with Barbara achieving a moral victory. It is a truly inspiring poem—alas, without the least grounding in historical fact. There are only a few elements that bear any resemblance to reality: There was a Barbara Frietchie—actually spelled “Fritchie”— living in Frederick at the time, she was in her mid-90s and she did own a flag. Old Stonewall, however, never saw it, since his route of march brought him nowhere near the Fritchie house. While many of the troops did, in fact, walk down Barbara’s street, Jackson took a different route, hoping to find a relative of his wife. It is unlikely Fritchie saw Jackson at all.
Nor did Barbara unfurl her banner until the following week, when she reportedly waved it in support of Maj. Gen. Ambrose Burnside’s Union forces as they marched through town after the Confederates left. According to her niece, Barbara was standing on the porch, watching the troops pass, when her cousin advised her to wave a flag, and handed her the banner that had long been folded in the family Bible. Barbara feebly waved the flag at the soldiers, who responded with emotion. “Some even ran into the yard,” her niece reported “‘God bless you, old lady.’ ‘Let me take you by the hand,’ ‘May you live long, you dear old soul,’ cried one after the other.”
Apparently, there was a Frederick native—Mary Quantrell or Quantrill— who stood at her gate with her small daughter waving a Union flag at passing Confederates. If Jackson saw it, his response was never noted, though he likely would have ignored it. One Rebel officer, whose name is unrecorded, was impressed by her zeal and reportedly responded by saluting, with the comment, “To you, madam, not your flag.”
It isn’t difficult to understand how the account twisted, turned and—like Topsy—“jes’ growed.” Barbara Fritchie was apparently something of a well-known local figure, if for no other reason than as a surviving relic of the days of the American Revolution and George Washington. There is a local story that she and Francis Scott Key staged a memorial service in Frederick at Washington’s death. Through the workings of oral tradition, the cast of characters in the flag-waving tale changed, and by the time poet Whittier heard the story, Fritchie had become the heroine. Studying her recorded image, she certainly looks the part, her bonneted, toothless but defiant countenance staring sternly into the camera. Barbara died just three months after the Rebel incursion, precluding any opportunity for her to set the record straight.
For decades, John Greenleaf Whittier claimed he penned the story as it had been given to him by his friend, the famed Victorian novelist Mrs. E.D.E.N. Southworth. Even allowing for poetic license, he’s probably correct. But in the brief interval between the invasion and the time Whittier wrote the poem, folklore had taken its toll on events, and he was re-telling a much altered tale.
Meanwhile, in nearby Middletown, Md., a local girl did in fact taunt the invading Rebels with the Union flag, and in so doing, inspired a poem of her own. Seventeen-year-old Nancy Crouse— described in a Frederick County newspaper as a “beautiful and superbly formed young lady”—had hung the Stars and Stripes from a second-story window when the Confederates marched through. A contingent of Rebel soldiers climbed her stairs and demanded the flag, whereupon she took the banner from its staff and wrapped it around her body, defying the soldiers to remove it. The late-19th-century poet T.C. Harbaugh paints the dramatic picture in his“Ballad of Nancy Crouse”:
“Closer to her form she claps
The beauteous flag our fathers gave,
And the rebel’s oaths and gasps
Threaten her with early grave;
‘Not for you!’ her words rang true,
‘Not for you this banner fair;
You wear gray, its friends wear blue,
It was blessed with many a pray’r.’ ”
A Confederate captain drew his pistol, held it to “Nannie’s” head and threatened her with imminent death if she didn’t surrender the flag. In the poem, she refuses, and the Rebels ride away in frustration, leaving the flag to “taunt the gray.” According to the local newspaper, Nannie—staring down the barrel of a Rebel pistol—allowed discretion to play the better part of valor, and handed the flag to the captain, who “tied it around his horse’s head and rode away.”
By all accounts, the Crouse and Quantrill stories are, at least in the greater details, accurate. And yet, largely owing to the efforts of a recognized poet and public figure, the Fritchie saga has acquired the luster of historic legend, while Mary’s and Nannie’s corroborated acts of defiance are all but forgotten. When Winston Churchill visited Frederick during World War II, he stopped at Barbara Fritchie’s rebuilt house and recited the entire 30 verses of the poem from memory.
According to the Frederick County Chamber of Commerce, the Fritchie house was torn down after the devastating flood of 1868, and rebuilt (albeit smaller and without its attached structures) in 1927 for the budding tourist trade. Although it was once a museum, the building today is privately owned and no longer open to the public. This in itself is not a tragedy, since after all, on that historic day in September 1862 when the Confederates marched through Frederick, nothing really happened there.
11/7/2017 • America's Civil War Magazine
Even if it didn’t happen, Barbara Fritchie’s is a darn good tale.
An old woman of 90 leans from the attic window of her Frederick, Md., home, holding a bullet-rent United States flag, and defies the massed forces of Stonewall Jackson to destroy it. This is the stuff of which epic poems are made—and in fact, one was.
“Barbara Frietchie,” a stirring saga of 30 verses, was practically required reading for generations of American school kids. It was written for Atlantic Monthly by John Greenleaf Whittier, the newspaper editor and zealous anti-slavery activist. Generations of students—myself included—were assigned the task of memorizing it (“Up from the meadows rich with corn…”). And, in truth, it is a ripping yarn.
According to the poem, Lee’s forces are marching through Frederick during the Confederate invasion of Maryland in September 1862.
“Over the mountains winding down, Horse and foot, into Frederick town. Forty flags with their silver stars, Forty flags with their crimson bars…”
As a contingent of soldiers under General Thomas J. “Stonewall” Jackson approaches Barbara Frietchie’s house, the commander’s attention is drawn to the Stars and Stripes the doughty nonagenarian has hung in defiance.
“Up rose old Barbara Frietchie then, Bowed with her fourscore years and ten; Bravest of all in Frederick town, She took up the flag the men hauled down; In her attic window the staff she set, To show that one heart was loyal yet.”
The affront draws an immediate response from the irate general, who orders his men to fire a volley at the flag.
“It shivered the window, pane, and sash; It rent the banner with seam and gash. Quick, as it fell, from the broken staff Dame Barbara snatched the silken scarf. She leaned far out on the window-sill, And shook it forth with a royal will.”
Without hesitation, Barbara challenges the Rebel chieftain with words that still raise goosebumps on the reader:
“‘Shoot, if you must, this old gray head, But spare your country’s flag,’ she said.”
This fearless response humbles Jackson, who gives a command:
“‘Who touches a hair of yon gray head Dies like a dog! March on!’ he said.”
Well into the night, the Rebel host marches through the town, as Barbara Frietchie’s bullet-ripped banner floats on the breeze over their heads.
“And ever the stars above look down On thy stars below in Frederick town!”
And so, the saga ends with Barbara achieving a moral victory. It is a truly inspiring poem—alas, without the least grounding in historical fact. There are only a few elements that bear any resemblance to reality: There was a Barbara Frietchie—actually spelled “Fritchie”— living in Frederick at the time, she was in her mid-90s and she did own a flag. Old Stonewall, however, never saw it, since his route of march brought him nowhere near the Fritchie house. While many of the troops did, in fact, walk down Barbara’s street, Jackson took a different route, hoping to find a relative of his wife. It is unlikely Fritchie saw Jackson at all.
Nor did Barbara unfurl her banner until the following week, when she reportedly waved it in support of Maj. Gen. Ambrose Burnside’s Union forces as they marched through town after the Confederates left. According to her niece, Barbara was standing on the porch, watching the troops pass, when her cousin advised her to wave a flag, and handed her the banner that had long been folded in the family Bible. Barbara feebly waved the flag at the soldiers, who responded with emotion. “Some even ran into the yard,” her niece reported “‘God bless you, old lady.’ ‘Let me take you by the hand,’ ‘May you live long, you dear old soul,’ cried one after the other.”
Apparently, there was a Frederick native—Mary Quantrell or Quantrill— who stood at her gate with her small daughter waving a Union flag at passing Confederates. If Jackson saw it, his response was never noted, though he likely would have ignored it. One Rebel officer, whose name is unrecorded, was impressed by her zeal and reportedly responded by saluting, with the comment, “To you, madam, not your flag.”
It isn’t difficult to understand how the account twisted, turned and—like Topsy—“jes’ growed.” Barbara Fritchie was apparently something of a well-known local figure, if for no other reason than as a surviving relic of the days of the American Revolution and George Washington. There is a local story that she and Francis Scott Key staged a memorial service in Frederick at Washington’s death. Through the workings of oral tradition, the cast of characters in the flag-waving tale changed, and by the time poet Whittier heard the story, Fritchie had become the heroine. Studying her recorded image, she certainly looks the part, her bonneted, toothless but defiant countenance staring sternly into the camera. Barbara died just three months after the Rebel incursion, precluding any opportunity for her to set the record straight.
For decades, John Greenleaf Whittier claimed he penned the story as it had been given to him by his friend, the famed Victorian novelist Mrs. E.D.E.N. Southworth. Even allowing for poetic license, he’s probably correct. But in the brief interval between the invasion and the time Whittier wrote the poem, folklore had taken its toll on events, and he was re-telling a much altered tale.
Meanwhile, in nearby Middletown, Md., a local girl did in fact taunt the invading Rebels with the Union flag, and in so doing, inspired a poem of her own. Seventeen-year-old Nancy Crouse— described in a Frederick County newspaper as a “beautiful and superbly formed young lady”—had hung the Stars and Stripes from a second-story window when the Confederates marched through. A contingent of Rebel soldiers climbed her stairs and demanded the flag, whereupon she took the banner from its staff and wrapped it around her body, defying the soldiers to remove it. The late-19th-century poet T.C. Harbaugh paints the dramatic picture in his“Ballad of Nancy Crouse”:
“Closer to her form she claps
The beauteous flag our fathers gave,
And the rebel’s oaths and gasps
Threaten her with early grave;
‘Not for you!’ her words rang true,
‘Not for you this banner fair;
You wear gray, its friends wear blue,
It was blessed with many a pray’r.’ ”
A Confederate captain drew his pistol, held it to “Nannie’s” head and threatened her with imminent death if she didn’t surrender the flag. In the poem, she refuses, and the Rebels ride away in frustration, leaving the flag to “taunt the gray.” According to the local newspaper, Nannie—staring down the barrel of a Rebel pistol—allowed discretion to play the better part of valor, and handed the flag to the captain, who “tied it around his horse’s head and rode away.”
By all accounts, the Crouse and Quantrill stories are, at least in the greater details, accurate. And yet, largely owing to the efforts of a recognized poet and public figure, the Fritchie saga has acquired the luster of historic legend, while Mary’s and Nannie’s corroborated acts of defiance are all but forgotten. When Winston Churchill visited Frederick during World War II, he stopped at Barbara Fritchie’s rebuilt house and recited the entire 30 verses of the poem from memory.
According to the Frederick County Chamber of Commerce, the Fritchie house was torn down after the devastating flood of 1868, and rebuilt (albeit smaller and without its attached structures) in 1927 for the budding tourist trade. Although it was once a museum, the building today is privately owned and no longer open to the public. This in itself is not a tragedy, since after all, on that historic day in September 1862 when the Confederates marched through Frederick, nothing really happened there.
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Betsy's third husband had been in a British prison with her second husband and brought back news of his death in the prison after the war.
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Great post, thank you! Growing up in Philadelphia, much of my education afforded me great lessons in the history of the Revolutionary War and the beginning of our nation. Being able to visit the house of Betsy Ross and other historical sites "put a face" to the words I was learning, making it all more real in that young mind.
Thanks again!
Thanks again!
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