Lot 607: 1861 Civil War Personal Flag

The following is a commentary and analysis of this flag by Civil War Flag expert and historian Greg Biggs, along with background on the young woman who originally owned it. A full copy of his report including genealogical information about the Ewing family, is available on request.

The Confederate First National flag was adopted on March 4, 1861, while the newly formed Provisional Confederate government met in Montgomery, Alabama. Designed by the flag committee that was chaired by William Porcher Miles, the first example was hoisted above the Alabama state capitol building that afternoon. This date was important to the Confederate States for on the same day, Abraham Lincoln was sworn in as President of the United States.

The First National flag would see service as a political banner flying over government buildings until May 1863 when it was replaced by the Second National flag. The flag was also the first battle flag used by the Confederate Army, in use from 1861 until the end of the war in 1865 despite it being replaced by numerous other distinctive battle flag patterns. It also served the warships of the Confederate Navy traveling across the world’s oceans and along the new nation’s shores and rivers. However, a little documented use of the flag was for patriotic and personal purposes.

Patriotic banners were typically made of cotton where early war battle flags were silk, and then later imported English wool bunting. Cotton was an abundant cloth for flag-making for people to fly at home either outdoors or hanging inside. These flags tended to be close in size to unit colors. Personal flags, however, were smaller and broke down into two categories: Bible flags and personal use flags. The former were designed to be placed inside the Bible or other books. Most of the surviving flags of this nature are silk and they vary from somewhat crude to quite exquisite in manufacture and virtually all were homemade. Personal use flags were larger, also homemade and were often sent to troops in the field by their family or sweetheart/wife back home. These were flown from tents or retained in the backpack of the soldier and brought out at times of lengthy camping while off campaign. These flags were sometimes silk but were also made of cotton.

The flag of Jonnie Ewing fits this latter category. The flag is made from cotton in the canton and the three bars. The twelve stars are also made of cotton and due to their size do not have turned-under outer edges. The flag is constructed using the typical flat fell seam method, attaching the three bars together in this manner as well as the canton to the bars. The flag is lettered “Jeff. Davis.,” who was a fellow Kentuckian (born Fairview, KY, 1801) and was the Confederate president as of February 1861. Below this is “Miss Jonnie Ewing.” Both are done with black paint on the reverse side of the flag. These bleed through to the obverse side. The lettering had to have been done by a professional sign painter who typically marked the lettering in pencil before painting them. There is no evidence that a stencil was used as those have some bleed off; most of the lettering on Confederate flags was done by sign painters during the war for slogans, unit designations and battle honors.

The flag bears twelve stars. Typically, the star count on a First National flag helps historians in dating when it was made. While not exact (as people of the early 1860s were still very Jacksonian in nature and did what they wanted in terms of interpreting things like flags including adding stars for states that had not yet seceded), this does help get close to when it was made. Tennessee’s secession on June 8, 1861 gave the flag its eleventh star. Missouri’s secession was recognized by the Confederate government on November 28, 1861, becoming the twelfth star on the Confederate flag, while Kentucky added the thirteenth star on December 10, 1861. Thus, this flag possibly dates between November and later in December 1861. While not exact, and lacking solid provenance, this is a best guess scenario.

The flag’s details are as follows (hoist = width and fly = length): 28″ on the fly by 12 3/4″ on the hoist. Lower red bar: 28″ on the fly by 4 1/4″ on the hoist. Upper red bar: 19″ on the fly by 4 1/8″ on the hoist. White bar: 19 1/4″ on the hoist by 4 1/4″ on the hoist. Canton: 8 1/4″ on the hoist by 8 1/2″ on the fly. Stars: each measures 1 1/4″ across the points. Lettering: “Jeff Davis” is 10 3/4″ long by 1″ tall. “Miss Jonnie Ewing” is 5 3/4″ long by 1/8″ tall. The stars are not appliqued to the obverse side of the canton but the stitching for each can be easily seen.

The flag was probably made by Jonnie and her mother Nannie. Sewing was a very common skill used by women (and many men of the era) and was taught to young daughters by their mothers. The professional nature of the lettering tells us that a professional sign painter added this to the flag. Adairville, KY in 1860 only had 148 people so that was much too small to have one. A perusal of 1861 newspapers in Clarksville, TN, Russellville, KY and Bowling Green, KY, do not yield the name of a sign painter who could have done the lettering. Clarksville had a dealer who sold paint and painting supplies so that could be a source, but this is inconclusive. Clarksville had 5000 residents in 1860; Russellville a little over 1000 and Bowling Green had about 4000 (1860 Census figures are missing for the city – Warren County had just under 12,000 white residents). All three cities were connected by the Memphis, Clarksville & Louisville Railroad, a spur of the Louisville & Nashville Railroad, so transportation between them was fast and easy. A stage line ran between Russellville and Hopkinsville to the west so that town is also a possible source for a sign painter. Sadly, Civil War era newspapers are missing today although those for the pre-war and post-war era exist. In an 1859 issue there are advertisements for two portrait and miniature painters, so they are a possibility for lettering the flag. Lacking a positive account this remains speculation.

Provenance: This flag came from the estate of Sally Flowers Moody of Russellville, Kentucky. Sally was the daughter of Eugene Flowers, a Kentucky Agriculture Commissioner and Mamie Flowers who was a nationally known antiques dealer. After high school, Sally attended Western Kentucky State Teachers College (now Western Kentucky University) in Bowling Green and after graduation became a teacher at Russellville High School. She also performed in summer stock theater in Massachusetts and hosted a radio program on WLBJ radio in Bowling Green. She later became a Deputy County Clerk in Logan County while running a farm south of town. Following in her mother’s footsteps, Sally became engaged in antiques, engaging in the preservation of and sale of museum-quality items over the years. Her home, built in 1810, was filled with many historic artifacts she had collected and is maintained as a historic house museum today. As she was an educator, Sally believed in a quality education for future students of the county and established the Sally Moody Flowers Education Trust to help Logan county high school students attend either the University of Kentucky of Western Kentucky University. This was funded by a grant and sales of antiques from her store. Each year, a number of students were and still are awarded these scholarships. Sally Flowers passed away in Russellville on April 4, 2003. The trustee of the Flowers Trust does not know exactly where the flag came from but perhaps the source was from some of the many purchases Sally made during the time running her business. With Adairville being only thirteen miles from Russellville, probably some of the Ewing family items were purchased for sale over time including this wonderful flag.

Jonnie Ewing was the granddaughter of Revolutionary War General Robert Ewing, a Virginia native who moved to Tennessee while it was still part of North Carolina and served in the state legislature. He was a member of the Kentucky Constitution Convention in 1799. Her father, George Washington Ewing, was born in 1808 and educated in Kentucky. After graduation he studied law at Princeton College, passed the KY state bar and became an attorney of note. He owned a farm of 400 acres and in 1850 he owned five slaves to work the land.

G.W. Ewing was serving in the Kentucky legislature in 1860 as the Union began to unravel. Seven Southern states seceded between December, 1860 and February, 1861 with four more leaving between April and June after the firing on Fort Sumter. Kentucky Governor Beriah Magoffin refused President Abraham Lincoln’s order for troops in its aftermath stating he would never help subdue sister Southern states.

Kentucky declared itself neutral in May 1861. In August 1861, the voters of the state elected a new legislature with Ewing winning re-election as one of twenty-four pro-South legislators versus seventy-six pro-Union members. Ewing, who represented a part of the state with heavy Southern leanings, further played his hand in the pro-secession column, attending a Southern Rights barbecue in September just before Confederate troops from Tennessee advanced north and took Bowling Green.

On December 21st, Ewing and seven other members were expelled from the House and two from the state Senate. The impetus to this was the Russellville Secession Convention held in that town beginning on November 18, 1861. The convention featured 115 delegates from 68 counties and after several days wrote articles of secession, elected a new governor, and voted to send emissaries to the Confederate capitol in Richmond to gain admission to the Confederate States of America. Ewing was at the convention but was not one of the three delegates from Logan County.

After acceptance into the Confederacy, Kentucky being the thirteenth star added to the CSA flag (Missouri was the twelfth, shortly before), the “Confederate state capitol” was moved to Bowling Green. Ewing was selected to be a member of the Provisional Confederate Congress. He would serve in the permanent Congress from 1862 into 1865 when the war ended. He made his way to North Carolina and allegedly paid $1000 for a Federal pardon, whereupon he returned to Adairville. Politics seemingly out of his blood, Ewing remained on his farm until his death in May 1888.

Ewing’s personal life found him marrying twice, first in 1836 with Susan Moss who was eighteen while George was twenty-eight. In November 1837, their son, Henry Clay Ewing, was born. Tragedy struck when Susan died in November 1841 at age twenty-three. However, in 1846, George again found love and married Nannie Williams. Two years later, their daughter, Johnie Anna was born on April 30th. (NOTE – her name has been listed in various sources as Anna – on the 1860 U.S. Census -, Johanna, Johnnie and Jonnie). Jonnie (the name used on the flag) was, like her father’s first wife, destined to die young and she would marry three times. At age 17 she married her first husband, James Fetter, in 1865. She bore two children in this union- son James, and a daughter, Blossom, who would only live for a year.

This marriage did not last for reasons unknown for in 1870 Jonnie married Thomas Jefferson Townsend. It is with him and her father that she was listed on the 1870 U.S. Census living in Adairville. She bore Thomas a son named Claude in 1871. Her marriage to Thomas also broke apart for unknown reasons for she married Lee Brawner at some point before her own death at age thirty-one in 1879. Jonnie and her father along with other Ewing Family members are buried in Adairville, KY.

This flag, from a prominent Kentucky family active during the Civil War era, is a wonderful and important example of personal flags made during the war for patriotic purposes. There is little doubt that George Ewing loved his daughter Jonnie enough to have the flag made and then lettered by a professional. No doubt she retained this relic until her passing in 1879 and it probably remained with her family afterwards.