Francis Scott Key

Francis Scott Key was born on August 1, 1779, at Terra Rubra, the family estate in western MarylandMarylandMaryland is a Middle Atlantic state of the United States, deeply indented by Chesapeake Bay and bordered by Pennsylvania, Delaware, Virginia, the District of Columbia and West Virginia; its capital is Annapolis and its largest city is Baltimore. One of the original 13 states, it ratified the U.S. Constitution on April 28, 1788, as the seventh state to do so, and had a population of 6,177,224 in the 2020 census (April 1, 2020).Open the full entry, then in Frederick County and now in Carroll County. His parents were John Ross Key (1754–1821) and Ann Phoebe Charlton, and the family was wealthy.⁠[1][2]

At about ten Key was sent to school in Annapolis, Maryland; he attended St. John’s College from 1789 to 1796 and graduated in 1796. Deeply religious, he considered entering the Episcopal ministry but chose the law.⁠[1][3][2]

Key read law with Judge Jeremiah Townley Chase and also studied under his uncle Philip Barton Key; he was admitted to the bar in 1801 and began practicing in Frederick, Maryland. On January 19, 1802, he married Mary Tayloe Lloyd, daughter of Edward Lloyd. In 1805 the couple moved to Georgetown, where he ran a private practice from his home until his death.⁠[3][1]

In his first decade of practice Key appeared several times before the Supreme Court of the United States, including in 1807, when he defended two associates of Aaron BurrAaron BurrAaron Burr (1756–1836) was an American lawyer and politician who drove the founding of the Manhattan Company, and he served as the third Vice President of the United States (1801–1805). In 1799, he used the surplus-capital clause in a water company’s charter to start a banking business; the bank later became one of the historical predecessors of JPMorgan Chase. In 1804, he fought a duel with Alexander Hamilton in which Hamilton was mortally wounded and died the next day; in 1807, he was acquitted in a treason trial.Open the full entry against treason charges.⁠[3]

Key opposed the War of 1812, mainly on religious grounds, but served briefly in a Georgetown field artillery unit in 1813 and was present at the Battle of Bladensburg in August 1814. From 1814 to 1826 he was a delegate to the Episcopal Church General Conference.⁠[3][1]

On September 5, 1814, Key and John Stuart Skinner sailed into Baltimore Harbor under a flag of truce to negotiate with the British fleet for the release of Dr. William Beanes, whom the British had captured. The British agreed to free Beanes but held the Americans aboard ship until after the attack because they had learned of British plans.⁠[4][2]

On September 13–14, 1814, the British bombarded Fort McHenry at Baltimore for about 25 hours, and Key watched from about eight miles away. After the British withdrew, he saw the American flag still flying over the fort.⁠[5][2][3]

On September 14, 1814, Key began the poem, and after his release he completed its four stanzas at the Indian Queen hotel in Baltimore under the title “Defence of Fort M’Henry,” setting it to “To Anacreon in Heaven,” an 18th-century English club song.⁠[3][6][7]

By September 17, 1814, printed copies had been handed out to the fort’s defenders and the citizens of Baltimore; on September 20 the Baltimore Patriot printed the poem anonymously. Within weeks it appeared as “The Star Spangled Banner” in seventeen newspapers. On October 19, 1814, a Mr. Harding gave the first formal stage performance of the song at the Holliday Street Theatre in Baltimore.⁠[7][3]

In 1816 Key helped found the American Colonization Society and worked to recruit members, raise funds and lobby legislators for it. The society sent free African Americans to a colony in West Africa that later became Liberia, and it was criticized by abolitionists and by many free Black Americans.⁠[3]

He was an active lay leader in the Episcopal Church, serving Christ Church, St. John’s Church and Trinity Church, and in 1823 he helped found what became the Virginia Theological Seminary.⁠[3]

Key strongly supported Andrew JacksonAndrew JacksonAndrew Jackson (1767–1845) was an American soldier and politician who served as President of the United States from 1829 to 1837, after leading U.S. forces to victory at the Battle of New Orleans in the War of 1812.Open the full entry in the 1828 presidential election and advised him early in his presidency as part of Jackson’s informal “kitchen cabinet.” In 1833 he negotiated with the Creek Indians on behalf of the United States, and that year he was appointed U.S. attorney for the District of Columbia, serving until 1841.⁠[3][1]

In 1835, amid unrest in Washington following an incident involving Arthur Bowen, an enslaved 18-year-old, Reuben Crandall, a ConnecticutConnecticutConnecticut is a U.S. state in the New England region. Its capital is Hartford and its largest city is Bridgeport (2010 census). It entered the Union on January 9, 1788, as the 5th state, and had a population of 3,605,944 in the 2020 census (April 1, 2020).Open the full entry-born physician, was arrested for possessing abolitionist literature and charged with seditious libel. As U.S. attorney, Key led the prosecution; defense lawyers Joseph H. Bradley and Richard S. Coxe pointed out that Key’s own anti-slavery statements resembled the materials used against Crandall. The jury found Crandall not guilty. Denied bail, Crandall had been held for about eight months before trial; he contracted tuberculosis in jail and died in early February 1838.⁠[8]

Key died of pleurisy on January 11, 1843, while visiting his daughter in Baltimore, aged 63. He was first interred in the Howard family vault at St. Paul’s Cemetery in Baltimore and in 1866 was reinterred at Mount Olivet Cemetery in Frederick, Maryland, where a monument was dedicated on August 9, 1898.⁠[1][3][2]

In 1889 the U.S. Navy made “The Star-Spangled Banner” an official part of its flag ceremonies, and during World War I Woodrow WilsonWoodrow WilsonWoodrow Wilson (1856–1924) was an American scholar and politician who served as president of Princeton University and governor of New Jersey and was the 28th president of the United States from 1913 to 1921, leading the country through World War I and proposing the League of Nations.Open the full entry ordered it played at military ceremonies. In April 1918 Representative Louis T. McFadden introduced the first joint resolution on it, and five more bills followed over some 13 years.⁠[7][5]

After H.R. 14, sponsored by Representative John Linthicum of Maryland, passed both houses, Herbert HooverHerbert HooverHerbert Hoover (1874–1964) was an American mining engineer, humanitarian and politician who led food relief for Europe during and after World War I, served as U.S. secretary of commerce from 1921 to 1928 and was the 31st president of the United States from 1929 to 1933, a term dominated by the Great Depression.Open the full entry signed it into law on March 3, 1931, making “The Star-Spangled Banner” the national anthem of the United States.⁠[5][7]

Key and Mary Tayloe Lloyd had eleven children, six sons and five daughters, including Daniel Key (died 1836) and Philip Barton Key (1818–1859).⁠[1]

Key came from a slaveholding family and himself owned enslaved people, several of whom he freed during his lifetime. He opposed the slave trade and gave free legal advice in Washington to enslaved people and freedmen, including those seeking their freedom.⁠[3]

After the war Key remained an amateur poet, writing mostly religious verse, including several hymns; most of his poems were published 14 years after his death. In 1836 he spoke publicly about the origins of the song.⁠[2][3][7]

Key’s handwritten “Defence of Fort M’Henry,” the earliest surviving version of the poem, is on display at the Maryland Center for History and Culture. The Fort McHenry garrison flag that inspired him was sewn in 1813 by the Baltimore flag maker Mary Pickersgill and originally measured 30 by 42 feet; the Armistead family kept it for about ninety years, and after 1907 George Armistead’s grandson Eben Appleton lent and then gave it to the Smithsonian InstitutionSmithsonian InstitutionThe Smithsonian Institution is a museum, education and research institution created by the U.S. Congress in 1846 with the bequest of the English scientist James Smithson. Based in Washington, D.C., it runs museums such as the National Air and Space Museum and the National Museum of Natural History, as well as the National Zoo.Open the full entry. It is now in the National Museum of American History.⁠[6][7][9]

Rembrandt Peale painted Key around 1796, shortly after his graduation from St. John’s College; the original is in the National Portrait Gallery, and a 1902 copy by DeWitt Clinton Peters is held by the Maryland Center for History and Culture.⁠[10]

Star-Spangled Banner National Historic Trail: Official website: https://www.nps.gov/stsp/ (opens in a new window).⁠[7]

Maryland Center for History and Culture: Official website: https://mdhistory.org/ (opens in a new window).⁠[6]