Fort Sumter Flag Fort Sumter Flag The Fort Sumter Flag is a historic United States flag with a distinctive, diamond-shaped pattern of 33 stars. When the main flagpole was felled by shot during the bombardment of Fort Sumter by confederate forces, Second Lieutenant Norman Hall rushed to retrieve the flag and remount it on a makeshift pole. The flag was lowered by Major Robert Anderson on April 14, 1861 when he surrendered Fort Sumter, in the harbor of Charleston, South Carolina, at the outset of the American Civil War. Anderson brought the flag to New York City for an April 20, 1861 patriotic
Battle of Fort Sumter in the so-called Iron Battery, protected by a wooden shield faced with iron bars. About 6,000 men were available to man the artillery and to assault the fort, if necessary, including the local militia, young boys and older men. On March 4, 1861, Abraham Lincoln was inaugurated as president. He was almost immediately confronted with the surprise information that Major Anderson was reporting that only six weeks of rations remained at Fort Sumter. A crisis similar to the one at Fort Sumter had emerged at Pensacola, Florida, where Confederates threatened another U.S. fortification—Fort Pickens. Lincoln and his new cabinet struggled