Re-enactors with Proctor’s Militia always bring a Westmoreland County flag with them to events, according to Capt. Scott Henry.
It’s an important piece of local history and their family heritage, as many are descendants of men who were part of Col. John Proctor’s battalion, created in 1775 as one of the first military units formed west of the Allegheny Mountains.
On June 14, 1777, the Second Continental Congress approved the design of the original American flag. The date has been recognized since 1949 as Flag Day.
“This is way before the Betsy Ross flag,” Henry said of the Westmoreland flag in comparison to an early U.S. flag design.
Westmoreland’s bright red flag with a coiled rattlesnake ready to strike was created two years after Westmoreland County was formed from part of Bedford County.
The original county flag, made from pieces of red silk sewn together, is on display three months of the year at Fort Pitt Museum in Point State Park in Pittsburgh. According to the Heinz History Center, it is the only surviving American Revolution rattlesnake flag.
There is a Union Jack — the national flag of Britain — sewn on an upper corner and a coiled rattlesnake painted in the center, a symbol of the American colonies. Above it in script are the letters J.P., standing for Col. John Proctor, the county’s first sheriff. Then there are initials I.B.W.C.P. — the Independent Battalion of Westmoreland County, Pennsylvania, which was among the first troops west of the Alleghenies.
Underneath the rattlesnake is the phrase “Don’t Tread On Me.”
The paint used to create the flag’s design bled through the thin fabric. It was at first representative of the battalion, but later became the official county flag.
“It’s cool that it survives and it’s cool that it’s here in Western Pennsylvania,” said museum assistant director Mike Burke. “It’s really an artifact of the Revolution.”
At the time, the flag was technically a British flag.
“In 1775, independence hadn’t been declared and so when they formed up in Westmoreland County … they’re expressing their grievances and the violation of their liberties as Englishmen,” Burke said, adding that those in the colonies were mad they weren’t represented in Britain’s Parliament.
The rattlesnake is a symbol of how they felt toward the country at the time, he said.
“The ‘Don’t Tread On Me’ is seen as a warning,” Burke said.
Members of Proctor’s Militia plan to fly a county flag Saturday and Sunday at Historic Hanna’s Town — close to where it stood centuries ago, Henry said — during Frontier Court Days. There will be re-enactments of actual court cases heard there between 1773 and 1786 in addition to other demonstrations, displays and activities.
Meanwhile, the county flag is regularly witness to court and government proceedings at the Greensburg courthouse. It stood next to the Pennsylvania state flag in courtrooms where Judges Meagan Bilik-DeFazio and Scott Mears heard cases this week and welcomed visitors in the lobby of the building.
The original flag was donated to the State Library of Pennsylvania in 1914. On months when it is in storage, a replica is on display at the Pittsburgh museum.
