First Navy Jack
History
Historically probable first naval jack.
In late 1775, as the first ships of the Continental Navy readied in the Delaware River, Commodore Esek Hopkins issued, in a set of fleet signals, an instruction directing his vessels to fly a “striped” jack and ensign. The exact design of these flags is unknown. The ensign was likely to have been the Grand Union Flag, and the jack a simplified version of the ensign: a field of 13 horizontal red and white stripes. However, the jack has traditionally been depicted as consisting of thirteen red and white stripes charged with an uncoiled rattlesnake and the motto “Dont [sic] Tread on Me”; this tradition dates at least back to 1880, when this design appeared in a color plate in Admiral George Henry Preble’s influential History of the Flag of the United States. Recent scholarship, however, has demonstrated that this inferred design never actually existed but “was a 19th-century mistake based on an erroneous 1776 engraving”.
In 1778, John Adams and Benjamin Franklin wrote a letter to the Ambassador of Naples, thanking him for allowing entry of American ships into Sicilian ports. The letter describes the American flag according to the 1777 Flag Resolution, but also describes a flag of “South Carolina, a rattlesnake, in the middle of the thirteen stripes.”
The rattlesnake had long been a symbol of resistance to the British in Colonial America. The phrase “Don’t tread on me” was coined during the American Revolutionary War, a variant perhaps of the snake severed in segments labelled with the names of the colonies and the legend “Join, or Die” which had appeared first in Benjamin Franklin’s Pennsylvania Gazette in 1754, as a political cartoon reflecting on the Albany Congress.
The rattlesnake (specifically, the Timber Rattlesnake) is especially significant and symbolic to the American Revolution. The rattle has thirteen layers, signifying the original Thirteen Colonies. And, the snake does not strike until provoked, a quality echoed by the phrase “Don’t tread on me.” For more on the origin of the rattlesnake emblem, see the Gadsden flag.
Modern use
Raising of the avy Jack for the first time at morning colors, on September 11, 2002, aboard the guided missile cruiser Thomas S. Gates in honor of those killed in the September 11, 2001 attacks.
The First Navy Jack was first used in recent history during the Bicentennial year, 1976, when all commissioned naval vessels were directed to fly it for the entire year, in lieu of the standard fifty-star jack.
In 1980, Edward Hidalgo, the Secretary of the Navy, directed that the ship with the longest active status shall display the First Navy Jack until decommissioned or transferred to inactive service[citation needed]. Then the flag will be passed to the next ship in line. This honor was conferred on the following U.S. Navy vessels:
19811982: Destroyer tender USSDixie(AD-14), commissioned 1940
19821993: Destroyer tender USSPrairie(AD-15), commissioned 1940
19931993: Submarine tender USSOrion(AS-18), commissioned 1943
19931995: Repair Ship USSJason(AR-8), commissioned 1944
19951995: Ammunition ship USSMauna Kea(AE-22), commissioned 1957
19951998: Aircraft carrier USSIndependence(CV-62), commissioned 1959
19982009: Aircraft carrier USSKitty Hawk(CV-63), commissioned in 1961
2009-present: Aircraft carrier USSEnterprise(CVN-65), commissioned 1961
Following a post-9/11 suggestion from retired Captain Brayton Harris (who in 1975-76 had been Special Assistant to the Secretary of the Navy for the Bicentennial), the Secretary of the Navy issued Instruction 10520.6, dated 31 May 2002, directing all Navy ships to fly the First Naval Jack as a “temporary substitution” for the Jack of the United States “during the Global War on Terrorism”. Most vessels made the switch on September 11, 2002, the first anniversary of the terrorist attacks.
This flag, along with the Serapis flag, is also featured on the crest of the USSJohn Paul Jones(DDG-53).
Other
Like other snake flags, the Navy Jack has been used as a sign of protest. Opponents to a smoking ban in Franklin, Indiana fly Navy Jacks outside their homes and businesses.
References
^ Ansoff, Peter. (2004). The First Navy Jack. Raven: A Journal of Vexillology, 11, ISSN 1071-0043, LCCN94-220.
^ The Revolutionary Diplomatic Correspondence of the United States, Volume 2 Available
^ http://doni.daps.dla.mil/Directives/10000%20General%20Material%20and%20Equipment%20Support/10-500%20Support%20and%20Maintain%20Navigational%20%20Mooring%20Aids/10520.6.pdf
^ See the patch and description on the official website at http://www.john-paul-jones.navy.mil/
^ theindychannel.com
See also
United States Navy portal
Ensign of the United States
Jack of the United States
External links
Wikisource has original text related to this article:
SECNAV Instruction 10520.6
US Naval Historical Center’s First Jack article
CDR Michel T. Poirier, “A Brief History of the U.S. Navy Jack”, in Undersea Warfare
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Categories: Continental Navy | United States Navy | Military flags of the United States | Flags of the American Revolution | Traditions and history of the United States NavyHidden categories: All articles with unsourced statements | Articles with unsourced statements from February 2010
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