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The Star Spangled Banner. Written During the Bombardment of Fort McHenry on the 12th & 13th Set. 1814.
Baltimore: Published and Sold by T. Carr, [1821]. 4to (13.125” x 10”), early three-quarters burgundy morocco. 2 pp. in larger volume of sheet music, engraved vignette picturing the bombardment of Fort McHenry. CONDITION: Very good, moderate foxing and toning; exterior of volume rubbed with some splitting to lower spine, but solid. The second Baltimore edition of the Star Spangled Banner, and the first to include an illustration of the bombardment of Fort McHenry. The first edition, known in only eleven copies, was published in Baltimore by T. Carr in 1814. There were two issues, the second of which mistakenly identifies the author as “B. Key” and gives the wrong dates for the bombardment. These mistakes are repeated here. The last copy of the first edition to appear at auction sold for $500,000 in 2010. We find no sales records for this second edition. The Star Spangled Banner was composed during a bleak phase of the War of 1812, only weeks after British forces had seized Washington and set fire to the Capitol and the White House before turning their attention to Baltimore, a center of strong pro-war feeling. Francis Scott Key, held aboard a British vessel near the entrance to Baltimore Harbor from September 7th, witnessed the bombardment of Fort McHenry on the night of September 13–14 alongside two fellow American captives. In the immediate aftermath, elated by the fort’s endurance and the failure of the British to take the city, Key began drafting verses that would become “The Star-Spangled Banner.” Over the following days, the British abandoned their assault, withdrew from the area, and prepared to depart. Released on September 16th, Key returned to Baltimore and completed the poem that same evening at his lodgings. Although the song quickly gained popularity when set to the familiar melody of Anacreon in Heaven, it was not formally adopted as the national anthem of the United States until 1932. REFERENCES: Muller 4; Filby & Howard S15; Wolfe 8348.
Item #10142
Price: $25,000.00
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