We assume that the colors of those stripes were alternate red and white, inasmuch as those were the colors in the first flag of the United States, and we presume no change, not absolutely necessary, was made, in altering the flag of the United Colonies to that of the United States. There is no evidence of their being of that color, except the universally received tradition that such was the case.
The colors of those stripes, alternate red and white, indicated on the part of the colonies, thus represented as united, the defiance to oppression, symbolized by the red color of the flag of the army, and red field of the flag of the continental cruisers together, with the purity implied by the white flag of the floating batteries, of which the motto was, "Appeal to Heaven."
Lest these conclusions should seem far fetched, we would again advert to the fact, that in the present Union, or national flag of the United Kingdom of Great Britain and Ireland, not only are the crosses of St. George, St. Andrew, and St. Patrick united, but the colors of the fields of the banners of St. George, of England, St. Andrew, of Scotland, and St. Patrick, of Ireland, are preserved.
In the case of the colonies, everything that tended to call to mind previous triumphs would have been studiously preserved, and the red and white flags were identified with the successes of Bunker Hill, (for tradition says the flag on that occasion was red, and that a Whig told General Gage that the motto was, "Come, if you dare,")[59] and the various successes of the siege of Boston, prior to Jan. 2, 1776.
The use of the stripes, besides indicating the union of the above flags, for the purpose before indicated, would, as a badge of distinction for the Great Union Flag of the colonies, have carried the minds of those who were marshalled under it back to the moment when the tocsin of war sounded at Lexington--called them, "generals" as well as "private men,"--in the garbs in which they were pursuing their peaceful avocations, to arms in defence of liberty. And we of the present day should regard them as hallowed, by having been employed by General Washington as the first step towards introducing subordination into the army, which achieved our independence. In those stripes we may perceive the necessity indicated of the subordination of each State to the Union, while their equality under the Union is also intimated, by there being nothing to indicate that any particular State was represented by any particular stripe. There being seven red stripes, doubtless arose from that being the color of the principal flags represented in the combination of colors, for certainly the flags of the army and cruisers must have had pre-eminence over that of the floating batteries.