The young lawyer likely expected it would be an easy job, despite the somewhat complicated circumstances. Sure, his nation was at war with the global superpower that had detained his client. But he made a public point of denouncing the conflict. And it wasn’t like said client, an elderly physician, actually deserved imprisonment. The whole situation was merely a mild misunderstanding. But what should have been a simple sequence of events for the young American attorney working out of his new nation’s capital city turned complicated quickly. The British, who’d recently arrested a friend he’d come to see released, decided to detain the lawyer, the US official assigned to attend him, and the friend while their mighty Navy carried out an attack on the vital port city of Baltimore, Maryland.

Held under guard, the three Americans watched helplessly as the forces of Great Britain sought to reconquer one of the great trading centers of its former colonies. But what they saw over the next few days inspired that young lawyer to write a poem praising the resolve and heroism of the American troops who fought to defend Baltimore. He eventually put the words to music, creating a song that went down in history as another symbol of our nation: “The Star Spangled Banner.”

Who Was Francis Scott Key?

Born on August 1st, 1779, in Frederick County, Maryland, to a family of wealthy plantation owners and slaveholders, Francis Scott Key left home to begin his formal schooling at the age of ten.

A devout Episcopalian, Key considered a career in the clergy before deciding to become a lawyer. After passing the Bar in 1801, he set up a practice in the Georgetown neighborhood of Washington, D.C., where he lived with his wife, Polly, from 1805 onward.

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His role as a defense attorney in a high-profile 1807 Supreme Court Case established him as a well-known and successful member of his profession. And the course of events that cemented him in the history books sprang from his lawyerly reputation.

The War of 1812

The roots of America’s second war with its former mother country date back years before the first shots were fired. A series of conflicts sparked by the French Revolution and the rise of Napoleon Bonaparte ravaged Europe and set the British in conflict with France through the 1790s and into the early decades of the 19th century. The effects of these wars quickly spilled beyond the bounds of the continent; American shipping interests were particularly hard hit as both sides ignored the US’s declared neutrality by attacking merchant vessels.

Over time, the French backed off, but the British Navy continued not only to attack American ships but also to kidnap Sailors and force them into military service, a practice called “impressment.” Fed up with Britain’s affronts, combined with pro-French sentiments in Congress and suspicions that the British were at least partially behind recent conflicts with Native American groups along the frontier, the US decided to stand up for itself. On June 18th of 1812, President James Madison signed the formal declaration of war against Great Britain. Soon after, American troops marched north into British-controlled Canada, and the War of 1812 began in earnest.

By the latter half of 1814, the British had what looked like the upper hand. Though American forces won some important victories in the first few years of fighting, their attempts to invade Canada had failed, and British troops still occupied parts of the US. Worse, with Napoleon defeated and removed from power (though not for the last time), the suspension of major fighting in Europe freed up additional British troops to fight in America.

On August 24th, 1814, America suffered a massive defeat at the Battle of Bladensburg, after which British forces marched into Washington, D.C. and set fire to several government buildings, including the White House (which they called the Executive Mansion). Though President Madison and the rest of the federal government successfully fled, the destruction in the nation’s capital was a major blow to the American side. The British continued to press their advantage and moved to capture Baltimore, a vital port and then the country’s third largest city.

The Battle of Baltimore and the Defense of Fort McHenry

On September 10th, 1814, a fleet of Royal Navy ships began maneuvering into position at the mouth of the Patapsco River, where it runs into the Chesapeake Bay, in order to attack Baltimore. Two days later, British ground troops defeated a detachment of American defenders in the Battle of North Point, but the clash slowed down their advance into the city.

Nevertheless, the Royal Navy went forward with its plan to demolish the last major defensive bastion protecting the city: Fort McHenry, a star-shaped fortification on a point sticking out into the middle of the Patapsco manned by some 1,000 under the command of Major George Armistead. Just before 6:30 am on September 13th, the British fired their first shell at the fort. The bombardment continued for the next twenty-five to twenty-seven hours (accounts differ).

Francis Scott Key and The Star-Spangled Banner

While initially opposed to the war due to his religious faith and belief that diplomatic negotiations were preferable, Key nevertheless served his country during the conflict. After a stint in a local militia unit in 1813, he served as a volunteer aide to the general commanding American forces at Bladensburg. Shortly after that battle, he took it upon himself to negotiate for the release of his friend William Beanes, a 65-year-old doctor arrested by the British for interfering with some soldiers who tried to ransack his home. With permission from President Madison and accompanied by the US government’s official in charge of prisoner exchanges, John Skinner, Key presented himself to the British, who took him aboard their flagship in the Chesapeake, the HMS Tonnant, on September 7th, 1814.

After dining with the commander of the British fleet, Admiral Alexander Cochrane, Key and Skinner succeeded in negotiating Beanes' release. But with the attack against Baltimore imminent and his officers discussing it openly, Cochrane decided to detain the three Americans until after the battle lest they pass on any vital information to the city’s defenders. He allowed them to return to the small ship they’d travelled on, but left them in the temporary custody of a contingent of Royal Marines. It was from this vessel, loaded with enemy troops and anchored a few miles from the site of the coming battle, that Key, Skinner, and Beanes watched the bombardment of Fort McHenry.

All through the day and night of September 13th, Francis Scott Key and his shipmates looked on as the British fleet threw everything it had at Major Armistead and his fellow defenders. With the fall of darkness, the bright red streaks of flame caused by recently invented Congreve rockets made the sky look to Key like “a seething sea of flame.” Through it all, the American flag flying over McHenry (a 17-by-25-foot “storm flag” for use when heavy weather made it unwise to fly the garrison’s larger) standard flag remained raised. When the sun rose on the 14th, and the shelling died down, Key watched as the defenders lowered the battered ensign.

Only to run up their full-sized, 30-by-42-foot American flag. Sewn under the direction of local seamstress Mary Pickersgill specifically for Armistead to fly at Fort McHenry, this 50-pound star-spangled banner showed Key, his fellows, the British, and all of Baltimore that the bombardment had failed. Fort McHenry still stood.

Inspired by the sight of it, Key began writing a poem about the battle on the back of a letter that very morning. The following day, now released from custody along with Skinner and Beanes, he completed a four-stanza draft of a poem he titled “Defence of Fort M’Henry.” Newspapers, first in Baltimore and then throughout the country, began publishing it alongside instructions that the words be sung to the tune of an old British drinking song, “Anacreon in Heaven.” Later that year, it was published as a piece of music for the first time, albeit with a new title: “The Star-Spangled Banner.”

The Aftermath of Fort McHenry and the War of 1812’s End

The Royal Navy’s failure to take or destroy Fort McHenry forced them to abandon their attempt to capture Baltimore, but the War of 1812 wasn’t quite over yet. The British reset their sites on attacking New Orleans. It was there that, on January 8th of 1815, future-President Andrew Jackson led American forces to a sweeping victory at the Battle of New Orleans. It was an incredible win for the United States, albeit an unnecessary one: the warring governments had negotiated an end to the War of 1812 with the signing of the Treaty of Ghent on Christmas Eve, 1814.

As for Francis Scott Key, after the war’s end, he continued his career as a lawyer and later served as a close confidant to President Jackson, albeit one without an official government position. He also became deeply involved in the controversial cause of “colonization:” a movement aimed at ending slavery by sending all African-Americans, both free and enslaved, to Africa.

Key’s relationship with slavery was complex and heavily tied to his background. Born to a family of wealthy plantation owners, Key owned at least six enslaved individuals himself. Through his work with the ACS, he helped facilitate the relocation of more than 10,000 free Black Americans to the colony of Liberia over several decades.

His legal record was equally contradictory: as the U.S. Attorney for Washington, D.C., he strictly prosecuted abolitionists (most notably in the case of Reuben Crandall), while simultaneously using his private practice to occasionally represent enslaved individuals suing for their freedom in court.

Francis Scott Key passed away at age 63 on January 11th, 1843, in Baltimore, the very city whose salvation inspired him.

The Creation of America’s National Anthem

Despite its popularity as a patriotic ditty from the start, it would take over a century for “The Star-Spangled Banner” to become the United States’ national anthem. Americans continued to sing it through the 19th century, by the end of which the military had begun using it for ceremonial purposes.

The Army and the Navy took steps to codify it as an official song of some sort in 1917 with approval from then-President Woodrow Wilson. And in 1931, Congress passed a bill to formally adopt it as America’s national anthem, which then-President Herbert Hoover signed into law on March 3rd.

From that day on, the words of a young lawyer from Maryland have served as the tune that represents the United States: “the land of the free and the home of the brave.”

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