"The Star Spangled Banner" (Sep. 1814)
(aka "The Anacreontic Song", 1779)
Words by Frances Scott Key, 1780-1843
Music by John Stafford Smith, 1750-1836
Arranged by Thomas Carr, 1814
Arranged by Collin Coe, 1884

[Sources: facsimile reprinted on p. 231 of "America's Musical Life";
pp. 106-108 of "Our National War Songs" (1884);
Boston: S. Brainard's Songs, Plate No. 15800-3.]

1. O say can you see by the dawn's early light,
What so proudly we hail'd at the twilight's last gleaming?
Whose broad stripes and bright stars thro' the perilous fight,
O'er the ramparts we watch'd were so gallantly streaming?
And the rockets red glare, the bombs bursting in air,
Gave proof through the night that our flag was still there.

CHORUS [repeated two times in the original version, after each VERSE]
Oh say, does that star spangled banner yet wave,
O'er the land of the free and the home of the brave?

2. On the shore dimly seen thro' the mist of the deep,
Where the foe's haughty host in dread silence reposes,
What is that which the breeze, o'er the towering steep
As it fitfully blows, half conceals, half discloses?
Now it catches the gleam of the morning's first beam,
In full glory reflected now shines in the stream.

3. And where is that band who so vauntingly swore,
That the havoc of war and the battle's confusion,
A home and a country shall leave us no more?
Their blood has wash'd out their foul footsteps' pollution.
No refuge could save the hirelings and slave
From the terror of flight or the gloom of the grave.

4. O thus be it ever, when freemen shall stand
Between their lov'd home, and the war's desolation;
Blest with vict'ry and peace, may the heav'n rescued land,
Praise the Power that hath made and preserv'd us a nation.
Then conquer we must, when our cause it is just,
And this be our motto, "In God is our trust."

[Additional verse by Dr. Oliver Wendell Holmes:]
5. When our land is illumed with liberty's smile,
If a foe from within strike a blow at her glory,
Down, down with the traitor, that dares to defile
The flag of her stars and the page of her story!
By the millions unchained, who our birth-right have pair'd,
We will keep her bright blazen forever unstained!
And the star-spangled banner in triumph shall wave,
While the land of the free is the home of the brave!