Surrender the Dawn
Page 36
Major Armistead, commander of the fort, would later estimate that in the next twenty-five hours, the British would hurl between 1,500 and 1,800 exploding shells at them. A few never hit their mark, but most exploded directly over the fort, showering destruction on the defenders. One bomb exploded on the southwest bastion, destroying a twenty-four-pounder, killing Lieutenant Levi Claggett, and wounding several men. Soon after, another shell crashed through the roof of the gunpowder magazine. By the grace of God, it did not ignite. Major Armistead soon ordered the barrels of powder removed and stored elsewhere.
While the British land invasion was failing due to the courage and preparation of Baltimore’s militia, the bombardment of Fort McHenry continued throughout the long night. Finally at 7:00 a.m. on September 14, the shelling ceased, and the British fleet withdrew. Major Armistead immediately brought down the dripping storm flag that flew over the fort and hoisted in its place the forty-two-by-thirty-foot flag sewn by Mary Pickersgill, the action accompanied by the fort’s band playing “Yankee Doodle.”
Eight miles away, aboard an American truce ship, Sir Francis Scott Key, overcome with emotion at the sight of the flag, penned what would become our national anthem, “The Star-Spangled Banner.” Miraculously, Baltimore successfully defended itself against an attack by the greatest military and naval power on earth. The humiliating defeat suffered by the British changed the course of the war, and three months later, on Christmas Eve, Britain made peace with the United States at Ghent. In Baltimore, the Niles Weekly Register announced the news with the headline: “Long live the Republic! All hail! Last asylum of oppressed humanity!”
May it ever be so!
“The Star-Spangled Banner” Lyrics
By Francis Scott Key 1814
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 through the perilous fight,
O’er the ramparts we watched were so gallantly streaming?
And the rockets’ 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!
Dexter
Other books by MaryLu Tyndall
SURRENDER TO DESTINY SERIES
Surrender the Heart
Surrender the Night
CHARLES TOWNE BELLES
The Red Siren
The Blue Enchantress
The Raven Saint
THE LEGACY OF THE KING’S PIRATES
The Redemption
The Reliance
The Restitution
The Falcon and the Sparrow