A War That Forged a Nation

July 4. A day filled with picnics, fireworks, and politics. Many of you will spend some time enjoying the outdoors this weekend, and some of you will probably go to some kind of parade in your town, where you will see a large number of candidates riding through the streets along with people in 1700s attire of various forms, and probably quite a few military uniforms.

It truly is a great day to celebrate America in all of her greatness.

You’ll probably hear Stars and Stripes Forever and Star Spangled Banner played quite frequently. Both are truly great songs. In all honesty, Stars and Stripes Forever is my favorite “classical” song of all time.

But Stars Spangled Banner has a history behind it, which you may or may not know and may or may not hear about, so I wanted to take you back to when it was written.

The year is 1812. The United States of America are involved in a brutal war against the British on three different fronts on their own soil – again, barely 30 years after the last war. The Americans have been defeated in battle after battle after battle on their own soil. Their new capital, with its Presidential Palace, has been burned to the ground and their President has been forced to flee the city.

The Americans are crushed. Britannia is poised to once again rule the American continent.

All the British have to do is capture Baltimore, on the shores of Chesapeake Bay, and their victory is all but assured. Their Navy – by FAR the best in the world, whose dominance is little challenged in this hemisphere – is blockading the bay into Baltimore. Meanwhile, the British Army is advancing to Baltimore on foot.

There is little hope left.

On the bay where the British have their blockade is the American Fort McHenry. Its cannons are all that are keeping the British ships away. Its commander orders a massive American flag made and raises it from the ramparts. The citizens of Baltimore are told to watch that flag. If it falls, run for the hills because the British are coming.

On a British medical ship behind the blockade, a doctor from Baltimore is tending to a sick man.

Around dusk, the battle begins. The British gunships begin their barrage into Fort McHenry, and Fort McHenry begins to battle back. All through the night, shells shoot back and forth, some of them bursting in midair. The doctor watches, trying to catch a glimpse of that flag over Fort McHenry – his signal of whether or not the British win the field.

The battle is intense. The British are fighting for national pride. The Americans, for survival.

Dawn rises.

That massive American flag over Fort McHenry still stands.

The man is inspired to write a poem:

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 thru 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!

And where is that band who so vauntingly swore
That the havoc of war and the battle’s confusion,
A home and a country should leave us no more!
Their blood has washed out their foul footsteps’ pollution.
No refuge could save the hireling and slave
From the terror of flight, or the gloom of the grave:
And the star-spangled banner in triumph doth wave
O’er the land of the free and the home of the brave!

Oh! thus be it ever, when freemen shall stand
Between their loved home and the war’s desolation!
Blest with victory and peace, may the heav’n rescued land
Praise the Power 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!

Before the War of 1812, aka the Second American Revolution, the American nation was referred to as these United States – a collection of individual States with little in common and with little cohesive identity. After the War of 1812, the American nation became known as the United States. The War had forged a nation.

It was a bond that would be tested some 50 years later, and it is a bond that some threaten on this July 4th, nearly 200 years later. We must never forget the sacrifice of BOTH American Revolutions, nor of the many generations of Americans who have lived in ONE Nation ever since.

May their sacrifice never be forgotten.

For more information on the War of 1812, I highly recommend 1812: The War That Forged a Nation by Walter Borneman. For full disclosure, the two paragraphs after the Star Spangled Banner lyrics are not quite a direct quote from the end of this book, but close enough that I feel that it warrants at least acknowledging this book as the source of the sentiment.