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OUR NATIONAL ANTHEM
Unless you know all four stanzas of the Star Spangled
Banner you may find this most interesting. Perhaps
most of you didn't realize what Francis Scott Key's
profession was or what he was doing on a ship. This
is a good brush-up on your history.
NO REFUGE COULD SAVE BY DR. ISAAC ASIMOV
Editor's Note- Near the end of his life the great
science fiction author Isaac Asimov wrote a short
story about the four stanzas of our national anthem.
However brief, this well-circulated piece is an eye
opener from the dearly departed doctor......
I have a weakness -- I am crazy. Absolutely nuts,
about our national anthem. The words are difficult and
the tune is almost impossible, but frequently when I'm
taking a shower I sing it with as much power and
emotion as I can. It shakes me up every time.
I was once asked to speak at a luncheon. Taking my
life in my hands, I announced I was going to sing our
national anthem -- all four stanzas. This was greeted
with loud groans. One man closed the door to the
kitchen, where the noise of dishes and cutlery was
loud and distracting. "Thanks, Herb," I said.
"That's all right," he said. "It was at the request of
the kitchen staff."
I explained the background of the anthem and then sang
all four stanzas. Let me tell you, those people had
never heard it before -- or had never really listened.
I got a standing ovation. But it was not me; it was
the anthem.
More recently, while conducting a seminar, I told my
students the story of the anthem and sang all four
stanzas. Again there was a wild ovation and prolonged
applause. And again, it was the anthem and not me.
So now let me tell you how it came to be written.
****
In 1812, the United States went to war with Great
Britain, primarily over freedom of the seas. We were
in the right. For two years, we held off the British,
even though we were still a rather weak country. Great
Britain was in a life and death struggle with
Napoleon. In fact, just as the United States declared
war, Napoleon marched off to invade Russia. If he won,
as everyone expected, he would control Europe, and
Great Britain would be isolated. It was no time for
her to be involved in an American war.
At first, our seamen proved better than the British.
After we won a battle on Lake Erie in 1813, the
American commander, Oliver Hazard Perry, sent the
message, "We have met the enemy and they are ours."
However, the weight of the British navy beat down our
ships eventually. New England, hard-hit by a
tightening blockade, threatened secession.
Meanwhile, Napoleon was beaten in Russia and in 1814
was forced to abdicate. Great Britain now turned its
attention to the United States, launching a three-pronged attack.
The northern prong was to come down Lake Champlain
toward New York and seize parts of New England.
The southern prong was to go up the Mississippi, take
New Orleans and paralyze the west.
The central prong was to head for the Mid-Atlantic States
and then attack Baltimore, the greatest port south of New
York. If Baltimore was taken, the nation, which still hugged
the Atlantic coast, could be split in two. The fate of the
United States, then, rested to a large extent on the success
or failure of the central prong.
The British reached the American coast, and on August
24, 1814, took Washington, D.C. Then they moved up the
Chesapeake Bay toward Baltimore. On September 12,
they arrived and found 1,000 men in Fort McHenry, whose
guns controlled the harbor. If the British wished to take
Baltimore, they would have to take the fort.
On one of the British ships was an aged physician,
William Beanes, who had been arrested in Maryland and
brought along as a prisoner. Francis Scott Key, a lawyer
and friend of the physician, had come to the ship to
negotiate his release.
The British captain was willing, but the two Americans
would have to wait. It was now the night of September
13, and the bombardment of Fort McHenry was about to
start.
As twilight deepened, Key and Beanes saw the American
flag flying over Fort McHenry. Through the night, they
heard bombs bursting and saw the red glare of rockets.
They knew the fort was resisting and the American flag
was still flying. But toward morning the bombardment
ceased, and a dread silence fell. Either Fort McHenry
had surrendered and the British flag flew above it, or the
bombardment had failed and the American flag still flew.
As dawn began to brighten the eastern sky, Key and
Beanes stared out at the fort, trying to see which flag
flew over it. He and the physician must have asked each
other over and over, "Can you see the flag?"
After it was all finished, Key wrote a four stanza
poem telling the events of the night. Called "The
Defense of Fort McHenry," it was published in
newspapers and swept the nation. Someone noted that
the words fit an old English tune called, "To Anacreon
in Heaven" -- a difficult melody with an uncomfortably
large vocal range. For obvious reasons, Key's work
became known as "The Star Spangled Banner," and in
1931 Congress declared it the official anthem of the
United States.
Now that you know the story, here are the words.
Presumably, the old doctor is speaking. This is what
he asks Key:
Oh! Say, can you see, by the dawn's early light, what
so proudly we hailed at the twilight's last gleaming?
Whose broad stripes and bright stars, through the
perilous fight,
O'er the ramparts we watched were so gallantly streaming?
And the rocket's red glare, the bombs bursting in air,
Gave proof thro' the night that our flag was still there.
Oh! say, does that Star - Spangled Banner yet wave,
O'er the land of the free and the home of the brave?
"Ramparts," in case you don't know, are the protective
walls or other elevations that surround a fort. The first
stanza asks a question. The second gives an answer:
On the shore, dimly seen thro' the mist of the deep,
Where the foe's haughty host in dread silence reposes,
What is that which the breeze, o'er the towering steep.
As it fitfully blows, half conceals, half discloses?
Now it catches the gleam of the morning's first beam,
In full glory reflected, now shines on the stream
'Tis the star-spangled banner. Oh! long may it wave
O'er the land of the free and the home of the brave!
"The towering steep" is again, the ramparts. The
bombardment has failed, and the British can do nothing
more but sail away, their mission a failure.
In the third stanza, I feel Key allows himself to gloat
over the American triumph. In the aftermath of the
bombardment, Key probably was in no mood to act
otherwise.
During World War II, when the British were our
staunchest allies, this third stanza was not sung.
However, I know it, so here it is:
And where is that band who so vauntingly swore
that the havoc of war and the battle's confusion
a home and a country should leave us no more?
Their blood has washed out their foul footstep's pollution.
No refuge could save the hireling and slave
From the terror of flight, or the gloom of the grave,
And the star-spangled banner in triumph doth wave
O'er the land of the free and the home of the brave.
The fourth stanza, a pious hope for the future, should
be sung more slowly than the other three and with even
deeper feeling:
Oh! thus be it ever, when freemen shall stand
Between their loved homes and the war's desolation,
Blest with victory and peace, may the Heaven - rescued land
Praise the Power that hath made and preserved us a nation.
Then conquer we must, for our cause is just,
And this be our motto --"In God is our trust."
And the star-spangled banner in triumph doth wave
O'er the land of the free and the home of the brave.
I hope you will look at the national anthem with new
eyes. Listen to it, the next time you have a chance,
with new ears. Pay attention to the words. And don't
let them ever take it away .... not even one word of it.
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