The National Anthem Myth

I have once again received an email with a video link to “The Story Behind ‘The Star Spangled Banner’- Our National Anthem.” This makes possibly the sixth or seventh time I’ve gotten that message, and while it makes a nice, patriotic tale as told by the narrator, it is so flawed as to be worse in the telling than if it had not been produced at all.

We have enough problems with history being revised and embellished, that we don’t need another fairy tale telling of what was truly a great battle. Therefore, I am going to enumerate and disprove the untrue “facts” given in the above video.

For obvious reasons, I will not share the link to that terrible piece of trash, so I’ll have to trust that you have watched it at least once, or that you will soon have the opportunity to do so. My advice to future would-be-viewers is, “Don’t bother.”

I found several separate instances where the unnamed and unaccredited narrator made partly or totally false statements regarding the Battle of Fort McHenry. I’ve enclosed the true facts in parentheses. Here they are, fiction and fact:
1. The title of the song is The National Anthem. (No, the title is Star Spangled Banner, and it wasn’t made our National Anthem until 1931 anyway)
2. The battle was fought at Fort Henry. (The correct name is Fort McHenry)
3. The battle was fought between the British and the American Colonies, implying that is was a Revolutionary War battle. (This battle, part of the War of 1812, was fought 38 years after the “colonies” became The United States of America)
4. There were hundreds of prisoners on the British ship. (There was only one prisoner, Dr. William Beanes, a prominent surgeon captured at Washington, D. C. in a prior battle)
5. Lawyer Key was the “one man” sent to negotiate a prisoner exchange. (There were two lawyers, Francis Scott Key and John Stuart Skinner, and there was no “exchange”, only the release of Dr. Beanes, procured by written statements from British soldiers attesting to his medical treatment given impartially and freely)
6. There was an ultimatum given about lowering the flag as a sign of surrender. (The lowering of a flag is always understood as a sign of surrender, but there is no record of any ultimatum being given)
7. There were hundreds of British ships in the battle. (There were only 16 ships, and some were not even warships, but smaller ketches)
8. There were women and children in the fort. (There were no women or children, only a fighting force of 1,000 men under command of Major George Armistead)
9. The flag was never lowered. (Actually, the smaller storm flag, which flew during the entire bombardment was lowered after the battle and replaced with a 30 X 42 foot flag, which became the storied “Star Spangled Banner”)
10. Mr. Key reported to the prisoners throughout the night on the status of the flag. (That is patently false, since there was only one prisoner, Dr Beanes)
11. Volunteers held the flag up, died supporting it and those bodies eventually kept the flagpole upright. (Wonderful story, but there is no record of any such actions)
12. When the narrator recited the first verse of the Star Spangled Banner, he used the wrong word, “...for the land of the free.” (The correct phrase is, “Oh, say, does that Star Spangled Banner yet wave o’er the land of the free and the home of the brave?)

What the narrator missed out on entirely was the casualty count of the Battle of Fort McHenry. The Americans lost 4 killed and 24 wounded, while the British, in sea and ground action, lost 330 killed, wounded or captured. I guess that doesn’t make for as neat a story as the one he spun.

For reference, you can use your preferred search engine to point to The Battle of Baltimore, or The Battle of Fort McHenry, but I can point you to this link: http://militaryhistory.about.com/od/warof1812/p/ftmchenry.htm

Now, please stop forwarding that horrendous video. It is a lie, and we already have enough of those circulating on the Internet and email circuit.

Ordering "Regular" Coffee
December 25, 2010

I am departing from my usual custom and publishing two columns this week. The reason is that I skipped a week back in August while Judy and I were on the road. I owe you a column, and I just happen to have a topic ready.

I’m sure you’ve all seen those messages that contain a quiz on your vocabulary usage to determine from what part of the country you hail. I know I’ve seen it about a hundred times. At the end you get to see what part of the country each expression represents.

I’ve taken the quiz a couple of times, just to see if I’ve “adapted” to my present southern surroundings, but I keep coming out mostly a Yankee. I never picked up the term “sack” to replace “bag”, for instance, among other quaint expressions. Also, I pronounce “aunt” like the tiny insect, leaving the ‘U’ silent.

Well, the other day I was in my favorite McDonalds for some senior coffee, and the guy in front of me in line placed his order for coffee, “regular”. Of course the woman behind the counter looked puzzled and repeated the word “regular” with the inflection of a question. Then she politely asked if he wanted cream and sugar in his coffee. His response was, “Yes”.

Now, I understood perfectly what he was asking for, but then, I come from a far north heritage where the norm for ordering coffee with cream and sugar is “regular”. It was only after I left Buffalo for Omaha, Nebraska that I learned that the word was not at all understood in other regions of America.

What made the whole episode memorable is that the guy who was ordering his coffee “regular” looked to be a Hispanic. I wanted to ask him where he learned it, but my wife says I’m too forward and I talk too much—she’s right, you know—so I let it pass.

Some of you who are also from the Northeast will dispute my claim that people use that term to refer to coffee with everything in it. However, in my teens I worked at Decco Restaurants in Buffalo, and that was always the way people ordered it there, “regular”.

I challenge anyone to go into any restaurant in Western New York and order coffee “regular” and see what happens. Of course, if you don’t drink your coffee with both cream and sugar, you better not order it that way.