DEFENCE OF FORT M'HENRY ["The Star-Spangled Banner"] in THE ANALECTIC MAGAZINE (November, 1814)

Philadelphia: Moses Thomas, 1814. First Edition. Hardcover. Text browned and foxed throughout; light wear to binding. Very Good. Contemporary half red morocco leather and marbled boards with a gilt-lettered spine; iv, 524 pages. Illustrated with an engraved title page and 5 engraved portraits of Lord Byron, Joel Barlow, General Winfield Scott, Capt. David Porter, and General Zebulon Pike. The first appearance of "The Star Spangled Banner," here titled "Defence of Fort McHenry," in any publication other than a few newspaper appearances. It would not become our national anthem until 1931. With the ownership signature of Leslie Combs on the front pastedown. Combs was a lawyer and politician from Kentucky who served under William Henry Harrison and Green Clay during the War of 1812 and who was captured in 1813. He later served as Speaker of the House in the Kentucky House of Representatives. His eldest son was Leslie Combs II, Lexington horse breeder and diplomat who was Minister to Guatemala, Honduras, and Peru under the administration of Theodore Roosevelt.

"The Star-Spangled Banner" was recognized for official use by the Navy in 1889 and the President in 1916, and was made the national anthem by a congressional resolution on 3 March 1931. Although the song has four stanzas, only the first is commonly sung today, with the fourth ("O! thus be it ever when free men shall stand...") added on more formal occasions. The fourth stanza includes the line "And this be our motto: In God is our Trust." The United States adopted "In God We Trust" as its national motto in 1956.