Happy Independence Day
The Star Spangled Banner, like you’ve never heard it
I first discovered this oral history of the Star Spangled banner by Francis Scot Key on Jan Mickelson‘s show on 1040AM, WHO Radio. If you can listen to it with a dry eye your a damned dirty ape! 
Happy 4th!
The Happy Independence Day by Rich Griffith, unless otherwise expressly stated, is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-Noncommercial-Share Alike 3.0 United States License.
July 5th, 2009 at 3:41 AM
I outright cried when I heard this. The people who put this piece together need to be rounded up and deported to somewhere outside the US. This is just BS, and the people who wrote it need to open up a history book sometime. Hell, I learned most of this was wrong in 7th grade.
To start, The Star Spangled Banner was written during, and refers to, the Battle of Baltimore, of which the American Colonies were not a participant. The Battle of Baltimore was between the British Empire and the United States of America. It did not occur during the Revolutionary War, but during the War of 1812 (near the end, in 1814 actually).
Now British rule in the US was never a threat of the war. At best, a decisive British victory probably would’ve netted them more favorable trade agreements with the US, more control over the Atlantic Ocean, and possibly would’ve shaved some of the northern US off and added it to Canada, and meanwhile the Native Americans would’ve come out ahead.
The US actually started the war, due to what they believed were legitimate grievances. That the British had restricted trade between the US and France (due mostly to the war between Britain and France at the time), that the British were searching US ships at sea (some just outside of US ports) and taking away men they believed to be British naval deserters (some of these deserters had become US citizens, some were taken by mistake). This was due to the British not recognizing US soveirgnty and believing they had a right to both search US ships and detain any British born person on board, regardless of citizenship. Lastly the British were supporting Native American tribes west of the US which were impeading US expansion and attempting to create a Native American state there. The US, for its part, had made moves to conquer parts of Canada, but this was a strategic and temporary move to cut off British supplies to the Native American tribes and not an attempt by the US to annex Canada.
A British conquest of the US in 1812 or 1814 would’ve been absurd. The British could not hold that big of an area without consent of its citizenry, especially from that far away and while engaged in other more pressing wars. The war ended in a stalemate when neither side really had a chance at victory and there were no longer any reasons for fighting.
Now Francis Scott Key was not sent to negotiate the release of prisoners on a one for one basis. He was sent to negotiate the release of one prisoner, a friend of his, Dr William Beanes. He was not authorized to trade prisoners either. Instead he brought with him statements from injured British POWs about the high quality of treatment they had received from Beanes and the British did agree to his release. However both Beanes and Key had overheard plans of the impending battle and were not allowed to return until after it was over. They were not, however, kept on the British ship. They were sent back to a neutral ship and waited. Key did not have access to a bunch of prisoners.
Now about Fort McHenry, it wasn’t some place harboring women and children (ew, evil British), it was a major strategic military installation (granted one woman was killed during the battle, but she was actively running supplies to troops). The fort was built to protect the port of Baltimore in Chesapeak Bay, which had always been an important port which needed to be protected from a military assault, and was also harboring well, US pirates, that had been raiding British naval ships during the war.
As for the flag being held up by dead bodies, no idea where that crap came from. Despite heavy shelling, the fort sustained light damage. The ground troops were forced into holding their position and waiting for a naval victory, and a last ditch attempt by the British to divert US ground troops failed, ultimately leading to a British retreat and US victory. All together there were four US deaths and twenty four injuries. The flags managed to stay up on their own.
The idea that the British would leave if the flag simply went down is absurd. They needed the capture of that port. They were decisively winning the war at the time, and the capture of something like the Baltimore port would’ve forced an eventual US surrender. But the victory at Baltimore along with some others forced a stalemate. They had ground troops in position and part of the reason they wanted the port was because it was very busy and a lot of business was going on there, so it was a good place to loot.