Murky Motifs

As I write this, Independence Day is just around the corner. A little less than a week ago, the country observed the 250th anniversary of the founding of the Continental Army. With that in mind, I spent some time surfing the Internet and came upon the website for the Museum of the American Revolution. One of the museum’s current exhibits includes 16 original battle standards from the Revolutionary War, one of which caught my eye.

The 2nd New Hampshire Regiment Flag

The flag in question was sewn in 1777 by Boston seamstress Fanny Johonnot Williams and painted by artist Daniel Rea Jr. The British captured it in Vermont, and it only survives today because it was sent to England as a trophy of war. Described in the catalog as “one of two 2nd New Hampshire Regiment flags in the exhibition, this flag is painted with the ‘Chain of States’ and the motto ‘We Are One’ to represent unity among the states.” 

Students of U.S. numismatics will immediately recognize the Chain of States motif as the same one used on the so-called Continental dollars; the Fugio cents; the back of the February 17, 1776, Continental Currency fractional notes; and eventually, in a much-simplified form, on the 1793 Chain cent.

Benjamin Franklin and the Chain of States Design

The earliest identifiable version of this design is found in a pair of sketches drawn on the back of a draft trade resolution Benjamin Franklin wrote sometime in July 1775. The first of these sketches shows a series of 13 interlocking rings, surrounding a central circle in a glory of rays, as found on the Continental bills of exchange. The second sketch shows a slightly different outer chain, with the inner circle emblazoned with AMERICAN CONGRESS—WE ARE ONE in copperplate script that bears a resemblance to the script found on other drawings attributed to Franklin. Between the location of the sketches and the similarity of the script, historians have understandably credited Franklin with the Chain of States design and can confidently date the sketches to sometime between Franklin’s authorship of the draft resolution in July 1775 and the issuance of the fractional notes in the first half of 1776. 

However, it is reported that Colonel Enoch Poor, the first commander of the 2nd New Hampshire Regiment, first raised a flag bearing this design in 1775.

Attributing the Design

However, it is reported that Colonel Enoch Poor, the first commander of the 2nd New Hampshire Regiment, first raised a flag bearing this design in 1775. This would have taken place sometime after the regiment’s creation following the Battle of Lexington in April, and before the regiment’s arrival at Bunker Hill on June 25, 1775, which suggests that Franklin based his design on Poor’s regimental flag. 

Franklin’s use of designs that he found elsewhere is well documented: the seals used on the $1, $2, $4, $5, $6, and $30 Continental bills of credit were close copies of seals found in Joachim Camerarius’s book Symbolorum ac Emblematus Ethico-Politicorum, which was Franklin’s preferred reference on symbolism. His personal copy is currently in the holdings of the Library Company of Philadelphia.

Interestingly, every 18th-century use of the Chain of States motif that I’ve been able to locate shows New Hampshire emblazoned on the chain’s uppermost link, lending some credence to the theory that the design may have originated with the New Hampshire 2nd Regiment’s flag. Based upon the available data, it is impossible to say which came first, and unless better evidence appears, the design’s authorship will remain a mystery.