The uniqueness and logic of this 13-striped banner no doubt appealed to the Congressional Committee and it required no great change to make it adaptable to the new requirements in the civil strife with England. Just change the blue to red and they had the 13 stripes, alter nate red and white. Nor was that the only prior flag which contained the 13 stripes, since we find that the East India Company in its colonial trade ambitions had a flag which had a red cross on a white union and 13 stripes, alternate red and white, and this standard was seen in American harbors from 1704 to 1834. This remarkable flag may be seen in The British Museum, and pictures of it in the fourth edition of J. Beaumont, Jr.!s book, 'The Present State of the Universe' (London 1704). It appears that the East India Com pany did not always float this flag, but in the 'Dominion and Laws of the Sea' (London 1705) the flag had but 10 stripes, five red and five white.
A Holland book on flags shows a colonial trade flag with 13 stripes, yellow and red; the date on the flag is 1738. This antedates our flag of 1775 by 37 years. A similar Holland flag of even earlier date can be seen in heraldic entry in the Paris Municipal Library in the volume entitled, 'La Connoissance Des Pa vilions ou Bannieres de La Plupart Des Nations,' published at La Haye in 1737. Then there is also the English flag called °Pavillon De Rang ou de Division d'escadre," having 13 stripes, alternate red and white, a union argent (white) with red cross of Saint George, floated in 1736. A flag of North Holland had 13 stripes, alternate yellow and red, floated in 1736.
In the interest of truth we must enter this matter, even if it seems to set aside that the colonies were first to thus symbolize or that the idea of such striped flag had never existed before the Grand Union flag which was devised by the committee in the last days in December 1775, and hoisted and saluted by General Wash ington and his soldiers on 2 Jan. 1776. And in the south a flag of 13 stripes, alternate blue and red, with a serpent diagrammed bend dexter and the words above it "Don't Tread on Me," also contained the emphatic idea of rep resentating the colonies and employing the idea of the stripes. The same idea appeared in a southern flag of 13 stripes, alternate red and white.
Writers and speakers are mistaken when they state that the first raising of a starry flag in the new world was at the birth of the United States emblem. Rhode Island in 1776 and
early 1777 had a blue flag with white stars; and Cortez had a flag with stars in a circle more than 200 years before. Hon. J. W. Foster, who saw this flag in the Mexico City Museum, says that the Cortez flag has 12 stars.
It came to the writer's notice while studying the writings of John Dryden, English poet (b. 9 Aug. 1631; d. 1 May 1700), that his lines well express our unity: " A constellation is but one Though it is a train of stars." These lines were written near 100 years before our forefathers chose the constellation of stars as a symbol of unity and harmony. and Dryden's writings were well known to the colonists. The constellation idea also em phatically indicated that the stars were to travel by laws of concord and not each star for itself and independent or indifferent to its neighbors, but with a destiny of the entirety — a united, concerted body of stars or states. This was a wonderful conception; time has attested its truth and established the fact that the stars are not a mere collection, hut a con stellation, and represented a new ideal in polit ical and governmental affairs. Charles J. Lukens has told it well in this poem: " Thirteen blazed at onee in their new constellation The daughters of Freedom, a star for each mate; A new silver star is the fine augmentation Of honor they granted for every new State.
As the Stars and the Stripes are our States interwoven Having grown thus from weakness to far spreading might Then perish the villain who, wanting them cloven.
Would quench their resplendence in treachery's night ".
Another favorite flag in the New England dis tricts was a white field with a green pine tree in the middle with the motto: "An Appeal to Heaven." It was endorsed by the Massachu setts Council, which, in April 1776, passed a series of resolutions providing for the regula tion of the sea service, among which was the following: "Resolved that the uniform of the officers be green and white, and that they furnish themselves accordingly, and that the colors be a white flag with a green pine tree and the inscription "An Appeal to Heaven." In the Southern Colonies a blue flag with the word °LIBERTY* in large white (sometimes golden) letters waved over many a fort and battle. It was such a banner which Sergeant Jasper restored at the Sullivan fortress on 28 June 1776; the news of the victory was an added impulse to the signers of the Declaration of Independence.