First Confederate National Flag

In an upper corner a blue box had around seven which represented the seven states which made the whole of the confederacy when it was designed. It would have 11 stars, including each for Missouri and Kentucky though those states did not get seceded from the union. Its appearance made it get branded as stars and bars. The flag was first used officially at the inauguration of the Jefferson Davis being on March 4 1861.

During the first battle, the confederate commanders were able to discover the bars and stars that bore too similar, this was a resemblance to the stripes and the stars. When furled, both could be easily confused. This kind of a situation almost made the Southern commander, Brigadier General P.G.T, to command a retreat since he mistakenly thought of arriving at a confederate reinforcements would be the union troops. With this kind of reinforcement, he was able to win the battle which he had almost got withdrawn.

The confederate battle flag

As a result of that incident, Beauregard asked the government to embrace a national flag which couldn’t be mistaken for the flag from U.S during the battlefield. When his proposal got rejected, he recommended having a separate flag for the battle. One that was chosen had a background which was red was crisscrossed with blue X that had 13 stars in white color and they were based on a proposal which was rejected for the confederacy’s national flag.

The Confederate Flag was square of 48 inches for the infantry, 30 for the Calvary and 36 inches for the artillery. It would have been produced in a rectangular shape. It was first carried in the battle in December year 1861, though it was the flag of the Northern Virginia which was commonly used in the Eastern Theater compared to the western, where the first confederate national flag was put into use in the whole year. Battle flag variations were introduced into some regimental flags which were both East and West.

Second confederate national flag

Beauregard won his argument for a new national flag. During the spring of 1863, the confederate congress approved a new design. This kind of a rectangular flag would totally be white except for a replica of the square battle flag in the left corner, going down around three quarters of the way towards the bottom. When not fully unfurled, the big area of the white gave it appearance of a flag of truce. This kind of a version of the flag draped the casket of the confederate lieutenant general Thomas Stonewall Jackson.

Third confederate national flag

The final national flag of the confederacy was adopted on March 4 year 1865, a few weeks before the war ended. To get rid of the possibility of flag being mistaken for a flag of Truce, a vertical, broad red bar was added to the front edge of the second Confederate Flag. This was as a result of the adoption when the war almost came to end; the flag flew over some buildings and southern ships before it was officially adopted.