On this day 250 years on the Delaware River at Philadelphia the Gadsden Flag was flown for the first time aboard the USS Alfred.

The flag was designed by Christopher Gadsden, a member of the Continental Congress from South Carolina Gadsden gave the flag to Commodore Esek Hopkins to fly on the main mast of Hopkins’s flagship, the USS Alfred.

The Gadsden flag features a coiled rattlesnake against a yellow background, above the slogan “Don’t Tread on Me.” The rattlesnake had a long history as a symbol of the unity of the Thirteen Colonies and Benjamin Franklin had used it for his “Join or Die”  woodcut in 1754.

[On a personal and political note, the Gadsden Flag has been one of my favorite symbols of the ideals of the Revolution since the Bicentennial in my youth. So it has disheartened me in recent years to see it appropriated by Tea Party and MAGA adherents whose understanding of the lessons of the Revolution differ completely from my own. But I was heartened to see protesters at the recent “No Kings” rally here in D.C. carrying signs with the rattlesnake symbol and slogans warning our current President not to tread on our rights. I applauded them for helping to reclaim the Gadsden Flag.]

Sources: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gadsden_flag#cite_note-19; https://www.newsweek.com/gadsden-flag-meaning-explained-1823467