Flag of the United States John Paul Jones used a variety of 13-star flags on his U.S. Navy ships including the well-documented 1779 flags of the Serapis and the Alliance. The Serapis flag had three rows of eight-pointed stars with stripes that were red, white, and blue. The flag for the "Alliance", however, had five rows of eight-pointed stars with 13 red and white stripes, and the white stripes were on the outer edges. Both flags were documented by the Dutch government in October 1779, making them two of the earliest known flags of 13 stars. Francis Hopkinson of New Jersey, a naval flag designer,
Flag of the Netherlands Flag of the Netherlands The flag of the Netherlands () is a horizontal tricolor of red, white, and blue. The tricolor flag is almost identical to that of Luxembourg, except that it is shorter and its red and blue stripes are a darker shade. It originates as a variant of the older orange-white-blue "Prinsenvlag" ("Prince's Flag"), introduced in the 17th century as the "Statenvlag" ("States Flag"), the naval flag of the States-General of the Dutch Republic. Its official status as the national flag of the Kingdom of the Netherlands was formalized in 1937. The national flag of the Netherlands is