Note: This was originally posted in the Stickneys of Texas newsletter June 2013.

Wondering where to go on vacation this summer? May I suggest Baltimore, Maryland. Begun in 2012 and continuing through 2014, Baltimore is celebrating the bicentennial of the War of 1812 and the Battle of Baltimore. After the British attacked and burned Washington D.C. on August 4, 1814, they turned their attention to Baltimore. To take the city they had to get past Fort McHenry. On September 13, 1814, nineteen British ships attacked the fort, blasting it throughout that day and night with more than 1500 cannonballs and mortars. The fort under the command of Major George Armistead, suffered little damage, but could not inflict any either because the British ships stayed just beyond the range of their cannons. After twenty-five hours of shelling the English finally gave up early on the morning of the 14th. Major Armistead had the 32 X 40-foot flag he had commissioned and made by Mary Pickersgill the year before sent up the flagpole. As the English sailed away, he wanted to make sure they could see the flag. Francis Scott Key was amazed as he gazed on that “Star-Spangled Banner” he could see by “dawn’s early light” and wrote the poem which was originally titled “In Defence of Fort McHenry” and that would one day become our national anthem.

So how is the Stickney family connected to the Battle of Baltimore (I hear you asking)? The flag maker, Mary (Young) Pickersgill was Edward Lawrence Stickney’s great aunt! His maternal grandmother, Hannah (Young) Wells Fearson was her sister. Hannah’s husband, Capt. Jesse Fearson is thought to have sold her the wool and cotton material for the flag, since he had a dry goods store in Baltimore, according to an article by Michael Kernan, Saving the Nation’s Flag, written in 1998 about the restoration work to be done by the Smithsonian, where the Star-Spangled Banner now hangs.

The Maryland Historical Society is recreating the 30 X 42-foot Star-Spangled Banner flag. They want to accomplish this in the same six-week time period in which Mary and her helpers had sewn the original, 200 years ago. So, this summer they will begin sewing this replica on July 4 and they have two public days where people may participate.

Not only did one of our ancestors make the flag that flew over Ft. McHenry, but Henry Stickney, E. Lawrence’s father may have been at the fort manning a cannon¹. Henry Stickney was in a Maryland Militia unit, known as the Baltimore Fencibles, commanded by Judge Joseph H. Nicholson. His was the 1st Regiment, Maryland Artillery which were brought in to serve with Captain Evans’ Regular Corp of Artillery at Fort McHenry because a large number of Evans’ men were ill. It is reported that some of the Fencibles were working one of the 24-pounders on the southwest bastion at the time it received a direct hit and two of their men were killed. The Baltimore Fencibles were made up of prominent citizens, merchants, and business owners and many of them were involved with privateering.

I have found one record where Henry and his eldest brother John Stickney are listed along with twenty-two others as owners of a 55-ton, 59-foot schooner called Wasp, commissioned a privateer on February 23, 1813. It only had one gun but carried 40 men so it could man other ships if lucky enough to catch a prize. No prizes were listed for this vessel so they apparently did not make any money from their investment, but since there were twenty-four owners, it would not have been a big loss. Henry and the other owners were banking on the previous year’s take when the Wasp, captured four prizes.

So if you decide to visit Baltimore, I suggest staying in the new revitalized Fells Point area which is within walking distance to the Flag House Museum and you’ll want to tour the US Sloop-of-War Constellation and try to imagine what it was like to sail as a privateer. But the most important place you will want to visit is Fort McHenry and maybe you will see the newly recreated Star- Spangled Banner flying overhead and have the same feeling Francis Scott Key felt two hundred years ago. Mary and Hannah’s mother, Rebecca (Flower) Young, was a flag maker herself and contemporary of Betsy Ross. Rebecca is mentioned in a recent book Betsy Ross and the Making of America, by Maria R. Miller, where it is suggested she too made a flag for George Washington. I hope to bring you more stories about this exciting family.

1. Henry was indeed in Fort McHenry during the bombardment as documented by his wife Lydia Wells (Fearson) Stickney’s War of 1812 pension file.