![]() ![]() But on June 14, 1777, it took time from its schedule to pass a resolution stating that “the flag of the United States be 13 stripes, alternate red and white” and that “the union be 13 stars, white in a blue field, representing a new constellation.” The Second Continental Congress was busy drafting a constitution known as the Articles of Confederation, seeking an alliance with France and supplying the war effort. “It was sort of a compromise between the radicals who wanted to see a separate nation and the people who were more conciliatory and wanted to see some accommodation with the crown,” he says.Įither way, Washington realized soon after that it probably wasn’t a good idea to fly a flag resembling that of the enemy, Leepson says. The Continental Colors, which contained 13 alternating red and white stripes with a Union Jack in the upper left-hand corner, was only used by the navy and perhaps at forts, according to Martucci. ![]() But David Martucci, past president of the North American Vexillological Association, the world’s largest group dedicated to the study of flags, believes Washington likely raised a British Union Jack instead. Some historians claim that George Washington, the army’s commander in chief, ordered that a flag called the Continental Colors be raised the following New Year’s Day during a siege of British-occupied Boston. In June 1775, the Second Continental Congress, meeting in Philadelphia, created a united colonial fighting force known as the Continental Army. “There really wasn’t anything that was stars and stripes, red, white and blue,” says Mike Buss, a flag expert with the American Legion veterans’ organization. One flag of the time featured a picture of a coiled rattlesnake with the slogan “Don’t Tread on Me,” while another showed a pine tree with the words “An Appeal to Heaven.” Instead, they fought mainly under unit or regimental flags, according to Marc Leepson, author of the book Flag: An American Biography. When the American Revolution broke out in 1775, the colonists didn’t yet unite under a single flag.
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