>>4951883 lb

I dug on the flags of the Confederacy. The tweet that Chelsea replied to showed what was originally the Naval Jack (the flag on the front or bow of a naval vessel). The national flags of the Confederacy are entirely different. Pics related.

3 Confederate National flags:

http://www.civilwar.com/resources/313-flags1/148535-confederate-flags.html

Square Army of Northern Virginia battle flag:

https://acwm.org/blog/myths-misunderstandings-confederate-flag

Naval Jack flag:

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Flags_of_the_Confederate_States_of_America#Naval_jacks_and_ensigns

John Coski, Historian, The American Civil War Museum

Coski's book:

http://www.hup.harvard.edu/catalog.php?isbn=9780674019836

10-page PDF of Essential Civil War Curriculum, John M. Coski, The Confederate Flag, October 2010:

https://www.essentialcivilwarcurriculum.com/assets/files/pdf/ECWCTOPICConfederateFlagEssay.pdf

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Excerpt from Wikipedia article that's heavily based on Coski's material:

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Flags_of_the_Confederate_States_of_America#CITEREFCoski2005

At the First Battle of Manassas, near Manassas, Virginia, the similarity between the "Stars and Bars" and the "Stars and Stripes" caused confusion and military problems. Regiments carried flags to help commanders observe and assess battles in the warfare of the era. At a distance, the two national flags were hard to tell apart.[37] In addition, Confederate regiments carried many other flags, which added to the possibility of confusion.

After the battle, General P. G. T. Beauregard wrote that he was "resolved then to have [our flag] changed if possible, or to adopt for my command a 'Battle flag', which would be Entirely different from any State or Federal flag."[19] He turned to his aide, who happened to be William Porcher Miles, the former chairman of the Confederate Congress's Committee on the Flag and Seal. Miles described his rejected national flag design to Beauregard. Miles also told the Committee on the Flag and Seal about the general's complaints and request that the national flag be changed. The committee rejected the idea by a four to one vote, after which Beauregard proposed the idea of having two flags. He described the idea in a letter to his commanding General Joseph E. Johnston: "I wrote to [Miles] that we should have 'two' flags—a 'peace' or parade flag, and a 'war' flag to be used only on the field of battle—but congress having adjourned no action will be taken on the matter—How would it do us to address the War Dept. on the subject of Regimental or badge flags made of red with two blue bars crossing each other diagonally on which shall be introduced the stars,… We would then on the field of battle know our friends from our Enemies."[19]

The flag that Miles had favored when he was chairman of the "Committee on the Flag and Seal" eventually became the battle flag and, ultimately, the most popular flag of the Confederacy. According to Museum of the Confederacy Director John Coski, Miles' design was inspired by one of the many "secessionist flags" flown at the South Carolina secession convention in Charleston of December 1860. That flag was a blue St George's Cross (an upright or Latin cross) on a red field, with 15 white stars on the cross, representing the slaveholding states,[38][39] and, on the red field, palmetto and crescent symbols. Miles received a variety of feedback on this design, including a critique from Charles Moise, a self-described "Southerner of Jewish persuasion." Moise liked the design but asked that "…the symbol of a particular religion not be made the symbol of the nation." Taking this into account, Miles changed his flag, removing the palmetto and crescent, and substituting a heraldic saltire ("X") for the upright cross. The number of stars was changed several times as well. He described these changes and his reasons for making them in early 1861. The diagonal cross was preferable, he wrote, because "it avoided the religious objection about the cross (from the Jews and many Protestant sects), because it did not stand out so conspicuously as if the cross had been placed upright thus." He also argued that the diagonal cross was "more Heraldric [sic] than Ecclesiastical, it being the 'saltire' of Heraldry, and significant of strength and progress."[40]

According to Coski, the Saint Andrew's Cross (also used on the flag of Scotland as a white saltire on a blue field) had no special place in Southern iconography at the time, and if Miles had not been eager to conciliate the Southern Jews, his flag would have used the traditional upright "Saint George's Cross" (as used on the flag of England, a red cross on a white field). A colonel named James B. Walton submitted a battle flag design essentially identical to Miles' except with an upright Saint George's cross, but Beauregard chose the diagonal cross design.[41]

[Go to part 2]

>>4956899

Part 2:

Miles' flag and all the flag designs up to that point were rectangular ("oblong") in shape. General Johnston suggested making it square to conserve material. Johnston also specified the various sizes to be used by different types of military units. Generals Beauregard and Johnston and Quartermaster General Cabell approved the design of the 12-star Confederate Battle Flag at the Ratcliffe home, which served briefly as Beauregard's headquarters, near Fairfax Court House in September 1861. The 12th star represented Missouri. President Jefferson Davis arrived by train at Fairfax Station soon after and was shown the design for the new battle flag at the Ratcliffe House. Hetty Cary and her sister and cousin made prototypes. One such 12-star flag resides in the collection of Richmond's Museum of the Confederacy and the other is in Confederate Memorial Hall in New Orleans.

On November 28, 1861, Confederate soldiers in General Robert E. Lee's newly reorganized Army of Northern Virginia received the new battle flags in ceremonies at Centreville and Manassas, Virginia, and carried them throughout the Civil War. Beauregard gave a speech encouraging the soldiers to treat the new flag with honor and that it must never be surrendered. Many soldiers wrote home about the ceremony and the impression the flag had upon them, the "fighting colors" boosting morale after the confusion at the Battle of First Manassas. From then on, the battle flag grew in its identification with the Confederacy and the South in general.[42] The flag's stars represented the number of states in the Confederacy. The distance between the stars decreased as the number of states increased, reaching thirteen when the secessionist factions of Kentucky and Missouri joined in late 1861.[43]

The Army of Northern Virginia battle flag assumed a prominent place post-war when it was adopted as the copyrighted emblem of the United Confederate Veterans. Its continued use by the Southern Army's post-war veterans groups, the United Confederate Veterans (U.C.V.) and the later Sons of Confederate Veterans, (S.C.V.), and elements of the design by related similar female descendants organizations of the United Daughters of the Confederacy, (U.D.C.), led to the assumption that it was, as it has been termed, the soldier's flag or the Confederate battle flag.

The square "battle flag" is also properly known as the flag of the Army of Northern Virginia. It was sometimes called Beauregard's flag or the Virginia battle flag. A Virginia Department of Historic Resources marker declaring Fairfax, Virginia as the birthplace of the Confederate battle flag was dedicated on April 12, 2008, near the intersection of Main and Oak Streets, in Fairfax, Virginia.[44][45][46]

Naval jacks and ensigns[edit]

The fledgling Confederate States Navy adopted and used several types of flags, banners, and pennants aboard all CSN ships: jacks, battle ensigns, and small boat ensigns, as well as commissioning pennants, designating flags, and signal flags.[citation needed]

The First Confederate Navy jacks, in use from 1861 to 1863, consisted of a circle of seven to fifteen five-pointed white stars against a field of "medium blue." It was flown forward aboard all Confederate warships while they were anchored in port. One seven-star jack still exists today (found aboard the captured ironclad CSS Atlanta) that is actually "dark blue" in color (see illustration below, left).[citation needed]

The Second Confederate Navy Jack was a rectangular cousin of the Confederate Army's battle flag and was in use from 1863 until 1865. It existed in a variety of dimensions and sizes, despite the CSN's detailed naval regulations. The blue color of the diagonal saltire's "Southern Cross" was much lighter than the dark blue of the battle flag.[citation needed]

The first national flag, also known as the Stars and Bars (see above), served from 1861 to 1863 as the Confederate Navy's first battle ensign. It was generally made with an aspect ratio of 2:3, but a few very wide 1:2 ratio ensigns still survive today in museums and private collections. As the Confederacy grew, so did the numbers of white stars seen on the ensign's dark blue canton: seven-, nine-, eleven-, and thirteen-star groupings were typical. Even a few fourteen- and fifteen-starred ensigns were made to include states that were expected to secede but never completely joined the Confederacy.[citation needed]

The second national flag was later adapted as a naval ensign, using a shorter 2:3 ratio than the 1:2 ratio adopted by the Confederate Congress for the national flag. This particular battle ensign was the only example taken around the world, finally becoming the last Confederate flag lowered in the Civil War; this happened aboard CSS Shenandoah in Liverpool, England on November 7, 1865.

[Go to Part 3]

>>4956919

Part 3:

Controversy[edit]

Despite never having historically represented the Confederate States of America as a country, nor having been officially recognized as one of its national flags, the rectangular Second Confederate Navy Jack and the Battle Flag of the Army of Northern Virginia are now flag types commonly referred to as the Confederate Flag. Both have become a widely recognized symbol of the Southern United States.[47] It is also known as the rebel flag, Dixie flag, and Southern cross[48] and is often incorrectly referred to as the Stars and Bars.[49] The actual "Stars and Bars" is the first national flag, which used an entirely different design, and was in use by the Confederacy until mid-1863.

As of the early 21st century, the "rebel flag" has become a highly divisive symbol in the United States.[50]

Right-wing political activists in the European Union, many of whom have separatist inclinations, have been known to use the Confederate flag. This is especially true in Germany, where displaying the Nazi flag in public is outlawed.[51]