The Confederate Flag.
We have been very much interested, and doubt not that our readers will be, in the following extracts which give the main facts in reference to the origin of the Confederate flag and the several changes which were made in it until in February, 1865, the last flag of the Confederacy was adopted. We have been promised, by a competent hand, a detailed sketch of the history of the flag; but these extracts are worth preserving:
[Editorial in the Southern Illustrated News of March 12th, 1863.]
The question of a Confederate flag and seal has again begun to excite attention. It might perhaps be thought that while matters of absolutely vital importance to the Confederacy were forcing themselves upon the notice of Congress, the adoption of a flag and seal should be deferred until there was time for the indulgence of an asthetical taste. The currency, the life-blood of the country, is disordered; food, the staff of life of the people, is scarce, and until some remedy for the financial malady can be supplied, and some means for obtaining a larger supply of provisions can be hit upon, it might seem idle to be troubling ourselves with heraldic studies and the beauty of a banner. Still the Secretary of State must have a seal, and our people are tired of looking at the poor imitation of the stars and stripes which floats from our public buildings and military posts. We may call it "stars and bars," but the "union" is the same with that of the United States flag, and the bars are only wider stripes of the same color, and the whole thing is suggestive of the detested Federal Government and its oppressions.
We have always thought that General Joseph E. Johnston settled the question of a national flag when he selected the blue spangled saltier upon a red field as his battle ensign. It may be recollected that this choice was made in consequence of the difficulty that had been seriously felt in the first battle of Manassas in distinguishing between the Yankee colors and our own, and at a time when the two hostile armies were confronting each other on the plains of Fairfax, with the prospect of a renewal of the bloody fight at any moment. Haste was necessary in the preparation of the flags, and secresy was also desirable lest the enemy should discover our change of colors and provide themselves with counterfeits to be basely used for our destruction. General Johnston's pattern was thereupon sent to Richmond, and seventy-five ladies from each one of four or five churches were set to work making the battleflags. Their fair fingers rapidly wrought silk and bunting into the prescribed shape and arrangement of colors; but despite the injunction of inviolable confidence, the device was known the subsequent day all over the Capitol. How could General Johnston
