Let me tell you a story.

Francis Scott Key was a lawyer in Baltimore.

The colonies were engaged in vicious conflict.

The mother country country Britain.

Because of this conflict in the protracted of it, they had accumulated prisoners on both sides.

The American colonies had prisoners and the British had prisoners.

And the American government initiated a move.

They went to the British and they said, let us negotiate for the release of these prisoners.

They said, we want to send a man out to discuss this with you. They were holding the American

prisoners in boats about a thousand yards offshore. And they said we want to send a man by the

name of Francis Scott Key. He will come out and negotiate to see if we can make

a mutual exchange.

On the appointed day in a rowboat he went out to this boat and he negotiated the British

officials and they reached a conclusion that men could be exchanged on a one-for-one basis.

Francis got key jubilant with the fact that he'd been successful went down below in the boats and what he found was a cargo hold full of humanity men

And he said man I've got news for you tonight. You're free

He said tonight I have negotiated successfully or returned to the colonies. He said you'll be taken out of this boat out of this filth out of your chains.

As he went back up on board to arrange for their passage to the shore, the Admiral came and he said,

we have a slight problem. He said, we will still honor our commitment to release these men, but it'll be merely academic after tonight.

It won't matter.

And Francis Scott Key said, what do you mean?

He said, well Mr Key, he said, tonight we have laid an ultimatum upon the colonies.

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