The dimensions of the Great Garrison Flag dwarfed the home that Pickersgill rented, so to have enough workspace, the women negotiated use of the nearby Claggett’s Brewery late into the evening after the day’s production had ceased. Over the course of six weeks, 37-year-old Pickersgill worked with her daughter, Caroline two teenage nieces, Eliza and Margaret Young an indentured African American apprentice, Grace Wisher, and her own mother Rebecca Young, who had taught her the art of flag making, plus additional hired seamstresses as necessary. The commission to make the banners went to a well-respected Baltimore flag maker named Mary Young Pickersgill, who had undertaken other smaller projects set by the U.S. Mary Young Pickersgill, the well-respected Baltimore flag maker who was commissioned to make the banners for Fort McHenry. Although only newly arrived from the war at the Canadian frontier, Major George Armistead was confident that the British forces would turn their might toward Baltimore and wrote to his superiors that it was “my desire to have a flag so large that the British will have no difficulty seeing it from a distance.” The preserved flag resting on an angle with protective lighting at the Smithsonian National Museum of American History in Washington, D.C.īoth flags that figure into the Battle of Baltimore were ordered by the fort’s commandant in the summer of 1813. In the terminology of the time, as national flags, both emblems would have been termed “ensigns” as an especially oversized version, the larger one was a “garrison flag.” In fact, before it received its more poetic moniker, Fort McHenry’s example was known as the “Great Garrison Flag.” Given the foul weather during the bombardment, the fort instead flew its smaller storm flag, raising the massive version when the British disengaged the following morning. Perhaps most important is this: The massive relic on display in the Smithsonian National Museum of American History is NOT the flag that flew over Fort McHenry while it was under British attack. Saved Land Browse Interactive Map View active campaignsįor as famous as it is, the so-called Star-Spangled Banner is shrouded in plenty of misconceptions.Protect Virginia Battlefields from Massive Data Centers.New Battlefield State Park Coming to Virginia.
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