The Smithsonian Incident

I spent my twenty-fifth birthday in Washington DC. Specifically, I spent it walking around The Mall, and visiting the museums there. I was on a paid-for research trip for my Ph D, but I felt I deserved to have my birthday off. So the afternoon found me in the Smithsonian Institute, a big and deservedly popular museum of American history. In the foyer there was a big display about the words of the song “The Star Spangled Banner”, which featured the actual flag from Fort M’Henry, a huge facsimile of the hand-written words and a picture of the poet Francis Scott Key, who had written them. Looking online I see that the flag is now part of a different display.

I had known a little bit about Scott Key, because he is one of the characters in Sabbatical, a novel by John Barth, an author that I was then rather fond of. In the book Scott Key is a sort of reluctant and belated convert to American patriotism, so his writing the poem “Defence of Fort M'Henry” is all the more poignant; the display does not mention the racist dimension to the lyrics, which include the words “No refuge could save the hireling and slave, From the terror of flight or the gloom of the grave, And the star-spangled banner in triumph doth wave” referring to the fact that the British forces included newly freed slaves.

And while I was musing on this a coiffured southern woman began to tell her daughter, in a loud voice, about how the sight of the still flying flag had inspired Scott Keys to write the poem. She was reading from the caption to the display, but she hadn’t twigged that Francis Scott Keys was a man. Well, the black and white engraving showed a head with long flowing locks, and Francis - or at least Frances - is a woman’s name.

And hearing this, I was transfixed - held between the need to correct her mistake and the rudeness of contradicting a parent in front of their child. It would be worse because my voice would clearly identify me as British, and the Brits were the villains of this story (and most Hollywood films). I did a little wrestle with both sides of my conscience. Imagine the daughter in the future, repeating the same stupid error, and being humiliated by it. Imagine the woman’s humiliation at being corrected in front of her daughter, and by a Brit. 

I did nothing. The moment passed, they walked away to look at something else. I’m still not sure if it was the right choice.