How many stars and stripes did the large flag flying over Fort McHenry have when Francis Scott Key saw it in 1814?

The large flag flying over Fort McHenry had 15 stars and 15 stripes when Francis Scott Key saw it in 1814.

Mary Pickersgill and her assistants made the enormous flag in Baltimore in 1813 for Fort McHenry. Its fifteen stars and fifteen stripes represented the fifteen states then in the Union, including Vermont and Kentucky, which had joined after the original thirteen states.

Key saw the flag after the British bombardment during the Battle of Baltimore in September 1814. Its survival inspired his poem “Defence of Fort M’Henry,” whose words later became the lyrics of “The Star-Spangled Banner.”

Congress later decided that new states should add stars but that the flag should return to thirteen stripes. The 1818 Flag Act established that principle, which remains the basis of the modern design.