The Star Spangled Banner

The Fourth of July, the celebration of our country’s independence is upon us. I hope that as we picnic or watch fireworks light up the sky, we remember what we are celebrating. We live in the most wonderful country in the world but without freedom, we would have nothing. As Ben Franklin said in 1759, “They that give up essential liberty to purchase a little temporary safety, deserve neither liberty nor safety.”

I get goose bumps when I hear The Star Spangled Banner and I found a few paragraphs in an old songbook, The Golden Book of Favorite Verse,  about how it came about. I quote it here:

“It was on the evening of September 13, 1814, during the War of 1812, that a British fleet was anchored in Chesapeake Bay. Dr. Beanes, an old resident of Upper Marlborough, Maryland, had been captured by the British and sent as a prisoner to Admiral Cochrane’s flagship.

Francis Scott Key, a young lawyer of  Baltimore, hearing of the misfortune of his friend, hastened to the British commander to endeavor to have him released. The enemy was about to attack Fort McHenry, so refused to allow  Mr. Key and Dr. Beanes to return until after the fort was captured.

All through the night of September 13th, the bombardment continued and in the light of the “rockets’ red glare, the bombs bursting in air” they could see the American flag still waving over the old fort. When in the first rays of dawn of September 14, he still beheld the same glorious banner waving from its accustomed place, Francis Scott Key wrote the poem, The Star Spangled Banner.”

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 watch’d, were so gallantly streaming?

And the rockets’ red glare, the bombs bursting in air, Gave proof thro’ 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 thro’ the mists of the deep, Where the foes 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 on 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!

Oh, thus be it ever when free men shall stand Between their lov’d homes and the war’s desolation!

Blest with vict’ry and peace, may the heav’n-rescued land Praise the Pow’r that hath made and preserved us a nation!

Then conquer we must, when our cause it is just, And this be our motto: “In God is our trust!”

And the Star-spangled Banner in triumph shall wave O’er the land of the free and the home of the brave!