Betsy Ross Could Never: Another Flag Project

Washington’s Standard Part 1: The Request

In mid-July, the Museum of the American Revolution asked me if I would be interested in making a half-scale replica of the Commander-in-Chief’s flag as a planned gift for the outgoing Board chair. Also known as Washington’s Headquarters flag, the flag’s six-pointed stars are part of the Museum’s iconic branding, supposedly superseded by Betsy Ross’s easier-to-cut five-pointed stars.

I can’t speak to the veracity of any claims about Betsy (you can read my feelings about her here), and I didn’t try the five-versus-six-point comparison. I doubt five points are much less fiddly to stitch than six, but I suppose one less starfish arm is a good thing when you need to stitch fast or starve. 

The road to finishing this was rough. The first conversation happened while I had a fever and ear infection, so I actually asked, “How many stars?” Take a moment. Recall that I am a graduate student in history, working on eighteenth-century Philadelphia. Ask yourself whether or not I should be allowed out on my own. Thankfully, Tyler possesses near-infinite patience, and answered, “Thirteen.” At which point I recovered myself and made a note to drink more water.  Much later in the process, I spent several days in the hospital, unrelated to this ear-infection-fever-induced question. All in all, a bumpy summer.

This project raised a lot of interesting material-culture questions about the original flag, which now spends most of its life in a glass frame in a flat file drawer, and about what “replica” means.

The original flag has solid provenance:

Cousins Fannie B. Lovell and Ellen Lovell Crosby, descendants of Betty Washington Lewis (George Washington’s sister), donated this silk flag to Reverend W. Herbert Burk’s museum of American history at Valley Forge in 1910. Two of Lewis’s sons served as private secretaries for Washington, and a third served as an officer in Washington’s “Life Guard” during the Revolutionary War. According to family tradition, this flag marked the presence of General Washington throughout much of the war. Also known as a standard due to its modest size, it is believed to be the earliest surviving 13-star American flag. Reverend Burk’s Valley Forge Historical Society, the predecessor organization of the Museum of the American Revolution, served as the longtime steward of Washington’s standard.”

You can’t do better than that, though Reverend Burk would have done better to keep the poor flag indoors. He made a habit of flying the flag (!) outside his home, and the UV light damage has been considerable. Not only has the blue faded, but the silk itself is shattering, with the white stars pulling away from the blue ground. Excellent conservation work has stabilized the fabric in a sandwich of two layers of silk crepeline, but it can only be displayed very rarely. I was very pleased to get a chance to see the flag in person. (I am extremely lucky to have good relationships with both the collections and education staff.)

Is it sad to look down on this flag, to consider its history and where it has ended up? Does it resonate with some notion of the faded and fragile democracy we live in now? Maybe. Does it suggest that with attention and care, the ideas that Washington and his men fought for can be sustained? Maybe. Does it also raise material culture questions that can never now be answered? Absolutely.

We will now never know the original color of the flag; the silk is too fragile to pull away from the plainweave linen hoist (which has been trimmed), and unstitching and pulling the fabric away is bad practice anyway. We can never see the backside (or front side) of the flag again. It is mounted to a backing board for support. Removing the flag in its silk crepeline envelope and turning it over, or even sliding it over a mirror and lifting it to see the reflection, is too dangerous and damaging. It exists in one plane, and one plane only.