September 14, 1814 – Francis Scott Key Writes The Star Spangled Banner

Francis Scott Key, born in 1779, is best remembered for having written the lyrics for the American national anthem “The Star-Spangled Banner.”

Key observed the British bombardment of Fort McHenry in 1814 during the War of 1812. The British had begun the bombing on September 13.

According to Smithsonian Magazine,

For much of the onslaught, shells and rockets fell on the fort at the rate of almost one a minute. American major George Armistead, commander of FortMcHenry, estimated that ‘from fifteen to eighteen hundred shells’ were fired during the attack.”

At the time, Francis Scott Key, a 35-year-old Washington lawyer and writer of occasional verse, found himself detained on a British ship from which he could see the fort.

He was inspired upon seeing the American flag still flying over the fort at dawn and wrote the poem “Defence of Fort M’Henry.” Key’s brother-in-law Joseph Nicholson, a commander of a militia at Fort McHenry, had the poem printed for distribution to the public. It was published within a week with the suggested tune of the popular song “To Anacreon in Heaven.” The song with Key’s lyrics became known as “The Star-Spangled Banner” and slowly gained in popularity as an unofficial anthem, finally achieving official status on March 3, 1931.

A different article in the Smithsonian Magazine by Christopher Wilson observes that because Key owned slaves, abolitionists ridiculed Key’s words during his lifetime, sneering that America was more like the “Land of the Free and Home of the Oppressed.”

Francis Scott Key circa 1825