Letter: True meaning of anthem will surprise you

Two things about President Donald Trump and kneeling during the anthem. First, it's a distraction method used during this last week of debate on the GOP health care mess and his son-in-law's emerging email scandal. Second, those who say there should be no kneeling during the anthem I doubt know the true history of it and that it's racist at its core.

The story says Francis Scott Key was a British prisoner during the War of 1812 and wrote the anthem while watching American troops battle the British, who were trying to invade Baltimore. What most do not know is in 1815 Key was trying to get a friend, William Beane, released from British captivity. While there, he witnessed the battle of Fort McHenry, which America lost. That was when Key wrote the anthem. There was a third stanza to it which decried former slaves working for the British army.

'And where is that band who so vauntingly swore, That the havoc of war and the battle's confusion A home and a Country should leave us no more?

'Their blood has wash'd out their foul footstep's pollution.

'No refuge could save the hireling and slave From the terror of flight or the gloom of the grave, And The Star-Spangled Banner in triumph doth wave O'er the land of the free and the home of the brave.”

In other words, the blood of the slaves will wash away British pollution. Think about that and think about why we kneel.

Chandra Jordan

Marion