Entered according to Act of Congress in the year 1872, By Geo. H. PREBLE, In the office of the Librarian of Congress at Washington. 1 17 "Not to the living, but to the dead.” THIS BOOK IS DEDICATED TO THE MEMORY OF THOSE GALLANT SPIRITS WHO, BY LAND OR SEA HAVE FOUGHT AND CONQUERED, OR Fallen in Defence OF THE BANNER IT COMMEMORATES. 544680 "This is a maxim which I have received by hereditary tradition, not only from my father, but also from my grandfather and his ancestors, that after what I owe to God, nothing should be more dear or sacred than the love and respect I owe to my country."-DETнOU. "Land of my birth! thy glorious stars Float over shore and sea, Made sacred by a thousand scars They were not born to flee; Oh may that flag forever wave Till all the earth be free: Yet still the shrine be here as now Where freeman, pilgrim like, shall bow." "There is the national flag! He must be cold, indeed, who can look upon its folds rippling in the breeze without pride of country. If he be in a foreign land the flag is companionship, and country itself with all its endearments. Who as he sees it can think of a state merely? Whose eye once fastened upon its radiant trophies can fail to recognize the image of the whole nation? It has been called a floating piece of poetry;' and yet I know not if it have any intrinsic beauty beyond other ensigns. Its highest beauty is in what it symbolizes. It is because it represents all that all gaze at it with delight and reverence. It is a piece of bunting lifted in the air; but it speaks sublimely and every part has a voice. Its stripes of alternate red and white proclaim the original union of thirteen states to maintain the declaration of independence. Its stars, white on a field of blue, proclaim that union of states constituting our national constellation which receives a new star with every new state. The two together signify union, past and present. The very colors have a language which was officially recognized by our fathers. White is for purity; red for valor; blue, for justice; and all together, bunting, stripes, stars and colors, blazing in the sky, make the flag of our country, to be cherished by all our hearts, to be upheld by all our hands."-CHARLES SUMNER. PREFACE. Proudhon the French socialist had a peculiar manner of proceeding in the composition of a work which is thus stated. "When an idea struck him, he would write it out at length, generally in the shape of a newspaper article; then he would put it in an envelope and whenever a new idea occurred to him, or he obtained additional information, he would write it on a piece of paper, and add it to the envelope. When a sufficient quantity of material was assembled he would write an article for some review or magazine. This article he would place in a larger envelope, and add thoughts and information until, at last, the article became a book; and the day after the publication of his book, he would place it in a pasteboard box, and add thoughts and additional information as he came into possession of them." Very much in the same way have these memoirs grown to the size of this volume. More than twenty years since their compiler became interested in tracing out the first display of Our Starry Flag on foreign seas, and the notes he then gathered resulted in the preparation of an article entitled "The First Appearance of the Flag of the Free," which was published in the Portland Daily Advertiser, and thence extensively copied into other journals. Around that article from time to time became concreted numerous additional facts which were embodied in another and longer newspaper article on the same topic. His interest in the subject grew with the increase of knowledge. New facts were accumulated and sought for wherever to be obtained. The war of the rebellion added a fresh impulse to his inquiries, and new and interesting incidents. The result is the present volume of memoirs which, if not rendered interesting by the graces of a practised authorship, can claim to be a faithful record of facts. Following the idea of Proudhon, the writer would say, he will be glad to receive from his readers any added facts and incidents, or corrections that will enable him to complete his memorial of our grand old flag, and help to perpetuate it as the chosen emblem of Liberty and Union. Collected as these memoirs were chiefly for his own amusement and instruction, in committing them to the public, the compiler hopes they may interest and amuse others as much as the collecting them has himself. If they serve to revive and preserve in the smallest degree, a patriotic sentiment for our starry banner, his ambition will be accomplished, his end attained. Among the many books examined, and to which due credit should be given for many facts, have been the volumes of the Historical Magazine, 1st and 2d series, 18 vols.; the Massachusetts Hist. Coll.; Sparks's Life and Writings of Washington and Franklin; the N. E. |