Before the departure of the United States Navy’s first mission in 1775, Continental Colonel Christopher Gadsden from South Carolina presented the newly appointed commander with a yellow rattlesnake flag to serve as a standard for his flagship. The rattlesnake symbol caught on and became a part of several other Revolutionary War flags. Each section represented a colony and was warning of the dangers of disunity. It was of a snake cut into eight sections with the words “Join, or Die” below. The Pennsylvania Gazette published an article in 1751 bitterly protesting the British practice of sending convicts to America where the author suggested that the colonists should return the favor by shipping them “a cargo of rattlesnakes.” Three years later the same newspaper published what is believed to be one of the first political cartoons in America. The rattlesnake, the Gadsden flag’s central feature, had been an emblem of Americans even before the Revolution. The bright yellow Gadsden flag, long a symbol of support for civil liberties and disagreement with government, has its beginning deeply rooted in the days of the American Revolution.
History of The Gadsden Flag – Don’t Tread on Me FlagDon’t Tread on Me
