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CAPTAIN WILLIAM DRIVER
by Erik K. Smith
originally published in the Salem Gazette
Like other great old cities in the United States, Salem is teeming with historic sites, statues, and other
monuments to the glorious past. Some are prominent and obvious like the statues of Hawthorne and Roger
Conant. Some of them take a little more effort to understand, and the small park at the corner of Essex and
Summer Streets is one of these. It’s a simple little park and hardly a spot for quiet contemplation, but within walking
distance of it are a few great resources for learning about the man for whom it was dedicated, Captain William Driver.
William Driver was born in Salem on March 17, 1803. He attended the Hacker School, on Flint Street, until the
age of 13, when he was apprenticed to blacksmith Abner Goodhue. He longed to go to sea, though, and his
parents finally acquiesced when he was 14. Young William became a cabin boy and made several long difficult
voyages before moving up the ranks to become a mate. When he was 21, he earned his master’s papers, which
allowed him to captain the brig Charles Doggett.
There was a tradition of presenting a captain with a flag on the eve of a departure, and Captain Driver’s mother
and other women of Salem crafted a 10 by 17 foot flag with 24 stars, the number of States at that time. Captain
Driver called the flag “Old Glory”. The nickname stuck to both the flag itself and its owner.
The Salem Gazette of Friday, January 14, 1831 reported under Ship News “Cleared – Brigs Charles Doggett,
Driver, Pacific Ocean; Rotund, Floyd, Cayenne and Surinam.” In that same issue it was reported that construction
had been completed on the new Lyceum Hall.
The Doggett immediately encountered a harsh storm and was blinded by snow and coated with ice. Six other
ships in the area sank, taking all hands with them. The Charles Doggett survived, arriving in Tahiti in July.
A party of over 60 descendents of the H.M.S Bounty mutineers had made a voyage from Pitcairn Island to Tahiti
earlier in the year. They had soured on their new home, uncomfortable with the lascivious climate. Captain Driver
agreed to provide them with transportation back to Pitcairn, over a thousand miles away. The Doggett was so
overloaded that its Captain slept on deck to allow some of his passengers to sleep in his cabin.
Some of the trade items listed in the Captain’s Log included pearls, shells, hogs, and coconuts. The flag
Mother Driver had given her son circled the globe twice and the continent of Australia once. Shortly after Captain
Driver returned home and retired from the sea, his wife Martha Silsbee Babbage Driver passed away.
In 1837 Captain Driver retired to Nashville, Tennessee with his three children. They joined his two brothers Henry
and John there. Their trading business there eventually failed, but Henry opened up a shoe store where William
worked as a salesman and business agent. In Nashville, Driver married Sarah Jane Parks and fathered eight more
children.
On Independence Day, Washington’s Birthday, and his own birthday he would drape the flag with a line (sailors
don’t say “rope”) from an attic window of his home across the street to a locust tree. In 1860 the Driver girls
updated the flag to 34 stars and a small anchor in the lower right hand corner of the blue field. It was a well known
historic artifact, but its fame threatened its very existence and that of its keeper. When tensions erupted into the
Civil War, the men of the city of Nashville pledged to destroy the hated symbol of the Union. Tennessee was a state
of mixed loyalties, with many of its citizens against its inclusion in the Confederation. Driver, a strong and outspoken
Unionist, had two sons who fought for the South. Two raids of Driver’s home by local Confederate sympathizers
failed to unearth Old Glory.
On February 25, 1862, the Ohio 6th Regiment was among the Union troops that took Nashville. They flew the
only American flag they had, a small regimental banner, from the State Capitol Building. Captain Driver, now 59
years old, went home with an escort from the 6th and tore apart the quilt into which he had asked neighbor girls to
sew Old Glory at the outbreak of Secession. He knew he couldn’t trust his own family with its fate and had kept its
hiding place secret even from them.
He brought his beloved flag to the Capitol Building in Nashville and was allowed to climb up into the spire
himself and fly it. It is said he spent the night personally keeping watch over Old Glory. In a letter to his daughter
Mary Jane he wrote “I always hoped, although against hope, that this hour would come. With my own hand, in the
presence of thousands, I hoisted that flag where it now floats, on the staff which has trembled with the fluttering of
treason’s banner.”
From 1862 to 64 William Driver was a Nashville City Councilor. He ran unsuccessfully for Mayor and the
Tennessee State Legislature. He lobbied the Federal Government to repair Nashville’s schools after they had
served as barracks for Union troops during their occupation. He also called for freed slaves to be given property,
what would eventually be known as “40 acres and a mule.”
In 1873 he gave Old Glory, his most prized possession, to his daughter, Mary Jane Driver Roland, who took it
with her when she moved with her husband to Nevada. They proudly displayed it on special occasions both there
and in California where they later moved. Mary Jane sewed the flag to a bed sheet to try and keep it from
deteriorating any further. She presented the flag to President Warren G. Harding in 1922, and it was stored away in
the Smithsonian Institute.
Old Glory was far too fragile to be put on display so it remained protected in storage until 1982, when the
Tennessee Society of the Daughters of the American Revolution and several Tennessee American Legion Posts
raised funds to restore it and construct a glass covered display with temperature and light controls. It is featured in
the Museum of American History along with The Star Spangled Banner flown over Fort McHenry in the War of 1812
and the inspiration for Francis Scott Key’s poem that became our National Anthem.
In 2006, from March to November, the Tennessee State Museum featured an exhibit on Old Glory, both the flag
and the man. The flag was lent to them by the Smithsonian in what they have declared was the final time it will leave
the museum in Washington. On display are also a number of Captain William Driver artifacts which are housed in
the Tennessee Archives, including a log book, letters, and his personal diary.
Captain William Driver died in 1886 in Nashville, where he is buried. He designed his own tombstone, an
anchor propped against a vine covered tree. Congress passed a resolution allowing the American Flag to be flown
over his grave 24 hours a day, just as they did for the grave of Francis Scott Key.
In 1968 Captain Henry C. Nichols gave a series of lectures to the schoolchildren of Salem on Patriotism and the
American Flag. The children were inspired to donate their dimes and quarters for a monument to Captain William
Driver. At the corner of Summer and Essex a stone with Captain Driver’s name on a bronze plaque became the
centerpiece of a nicely landscaped little park. The brick and granite of the walkway echo the building materials used
all over Salem.
The flagpole itself is dedicated in memory of Park Commissioners John J. Manning, Roland F. Brophy, Emilio J.
Belleau and Captain Henry C. Nichols, whose words of patriotism stirred children in the waning days of the socially
turbulent 1960’s to band together and pay tribute to a man known best for his love of the American Flag. We share
that love every time we use Captain William Driver’s term “Old Glory.”
by Erik K. Smith
originally published in the Salem Gazette
Like other great old cities in the United States, Salem is teeming with historic sites, statues, and other
monuments to the glorious past. Some are prominent and obvious like the statues of Hawthorne and Roger
Conant. Some of them take a little more effort to understand, and the small park at the corner of Essex and
Summer Streets is one of these. It’s a simple little park and hardly a spot for quiet contemplation, but within walking
distance of it are a few great resources for learning about the man for whom it was dedicated, Captain William Driver.
William Driver was born in Salem on March 17, 1803. He attended the Hacker School, on Flint Street, until the
age of 13, when he was apprenticed to blacksmith Abner Goodhue. He longed to go to sea, though, and his
parents finally acquiesced when he was 14. Young William became a cabin boy and made several long difficult
voyages before moving up the ranks to become a mate. When he was 21, he earned his master’s papers, which
allowed him to captain the brig Charles Doggett.
There was a tradition of presenting a captain with a flag on the eve of a departure, and Captain Driver’s mother
and other women of Salem crafted a 10 by 17 foot flag with 24 stars, the number of States at that time. Captain
Driver called the flag “Old Glory”. The nickname stuck to both the flag itself and its owner.
The Salem Gazette of Friday, January 14, 1831 reported under Ship News “Cleared – Brigs Charles Doggett,
Driver, Pacific Ocean; Rotund, Floyd, Cayenne and Surinam.” In that same issue it was reported that construction
had been completed on the new Lyceum Hall.
The Doggett immediately encountered a harsh storm and was blinded by snow and coated with ice. Six other
ships in the area sank, taking all hands with them. The Charles Doggett survived, arriving in Tahiti in July.
A party of over 60 descendents of the H.M.S Bounty mutineers had made a voyage from Pitcairn Island to Tahiti
earlier in the year. They had soured on their new home, uncomfortable with the lascivious climate. Captain Driver
agreed to provide them with transportation back to Pitcairn, over a thousand miles away. The Doggett was so
overloaded that its Captain slept on deck to allow some of his passengers to sleep in his cabin.
Some of the trade items listed in the Captain’s Log included pearls, shells, hogs, and coconuts. The flag
Mother Driver had given her son circled the globe twice and the continent of Australia once. Shortly after Captain
Driver returned home and retired from the sea, his wife Martha Silsbee Babbage Driver passed away.
In 1837 Captain Driver retired to Nashville, Tennessee with his three children. They joined his two brothers Henry
and John there. Their trading business there eventually failed, but Henry opened up a shoe store where William
worked as a salesman and business agent. In Nashville, Driver married Sarah Jane Parks and fathered eight more
children.
On Independence Day, Washington’s Birthday, and his own birthday he would drape the flag with a line (sailors
don’t say “rope”) from an attic window of his home across the street to a locust tree. In 1860 the Driver girls
updated the flag to 34 stars and a small anchor in the lower right hand corner of the blue field. It was a well known
historic artifact, but its fame threatened its very existence and that of its keeper. When tensions erupted into the
Civil War, the men of the city of Nashville pledged to destroy the hated symbol of the Union. Tennessee was a state
of mixed loyalties, with many of its citizens against its inclusion in the Confederation. Driver, a strong and outspoken
Unionist, had two sons who fought for the South. Two raids of Driver’s home by local Confederate sympathizers
failed to unearth Old Glory.
On February 25, 1862, the Ohio 6th Regiment was among the Union troops that took Nashville. They flew the
only American flag they had, a small regimental banner, from the State Capitol Building. Captain Driver, now 59
years old, went home with an escort from the 6th and tore apart the quilt into which he had asked neighbor girls to
sew Old Glory at the outbreak of Secession. He knew he couldn’t trust his own family with its fate and had kept its
hiding place secret even from them.
He brought his beloved flag to the Capitol Building in Nashville and was allowed to climb up into the spire
himself and fly it. It is said he spent the night personally keeping watch over Old Glory. In a letter to his daughter
Mary Jane he wrote “I always hoped, although against hope, that this hour would come. With my own hand, in the
presence of thousands, I hoisted that flag where it now floats, on the staff which has trembled with the fluttering of
treason’s banner.”
From 1862 to 64 William Driver was a Nashville City Councilor. He ran unsuccessfully for Mayor and the
Tennessee State Legislature. He lobbied the Federal Government to repair Nashville’s schools after they had
served as barracks for Union troops during their occupation. He also called for freed slaves to be given property,
what would eventually be known as “40 acres and a mule.”
In 1873 he gave Old Glory, his most prized possession, to his daughter, Mary Jane Driver Roland, who took it
with her when she moved with her husband to Nevada. They proudly displayed it on special occasions both there
and in California where they later moved. Mary Jane sewed the flag to a bed sheet to try and keep it from
deteriorating any further. She presented the flag to President Warren G. Harding in 1922, and it was stored away in
the Smithsonian Institute.
Old Glory was far too fragile to be put on display so it remained protected in storage until 1982, when the
Tennessee Society of the Daughters of the American Revolution and several Tennessee American Legion Posts
raised funds to restore it and construct a glass covered display with temperature and light controls. It is featured in
the Museum of American History along with The Star Spangled Banner flown over Fort McHenry in the War of 1812
and the inspiration for Francis Scott Key’s poem that became our National Anthem.
In 2006, from March to November, the Tennessee State Museum featured an exhibit on Old Glory, both the flag
and the man. The flag was lent to them by the Smithsonian in what they have declared was the final time it will leave
the museum in Washington. On display are also a number of Captain William Driver artifacts which are housed in
the Tennessee Archives, including a log book, letters, and his personal diary.
Captain William Driver died in 1886 in Nashville, where he is buried. He designed his own tombstone, an
anchor propped against a vine covered tree. Congress passed a resolution allowing the American Flag to be flown
over his grave 24 hours a day, just as they did for the grave of Francis Scott Key.
In 1968 Captain Henry C. Nichols gave a series of lectures to the schoolchildren of Salem on Patriotism and the
American Flag. The children were inspired to donate their dimes and quarters for a monument to Captain William
Driver. At the corner of Summer and Essex a stone with Captain Driver’s name on a bronze plaque became the
centerpiece of a nicely landscaped little park. The brick and granite of the walkway echo the building materials used
all over Salem.
The flagpole itself is dedicated in memory of Park Commissioners John J. Manning, Roland F. Brophy, Emilio J.
Belleau and Captain Henry C. Nichols, whose words of patriotism stirred children in the waning days of the socially
turbulent 1960’s to band together and pay tribute to a man known best for his love of the American Flag. We share
that love every time we use Captain William Driver’s term “Old Glory.”
| Copyright 2006 Erik K. Smith |