HE British attack on Baltimore of September i2th, i3th and i4th, i8I4, is best remembered now as the stage setting for the poem by Francis Scott Key set to the music of To Anacreon in Heaven, which eventually became the National Anthem. However, the inspiration of the awesome deliverance of the city from the fate of Washington was not confined to the much admired NEW SONG, written by a gentleman of Maryland, in commemoration of the GALLANT defense of FORT McHENRY, called THE STAR SPANGLED BANNER.' Even before the first public performance of the song, a colored copper plate engraving of the first phase of the battle was offered to the public, and a few years later a colored aquatint of the ultimate bombardment of the fort was available. Other commemorative art and sculpture were produced then and later, but these two pictures are both the first and most important prints of the famous action. The British plan of attack included an overland assault on the eastern defenses of the city in conjunction with a naval attempt to force the harbor fortifications. The first phase of the battle began when the powerful British landing force marching westward from North Point on the Patapsco Neck towards the city met with a strong American reconnaissance party at Boulden's Farm. Just before the action was joined, an American scout shot and killed the British commander, Major General Robert Ross, but the British advanced and after a sharp fight the American troops retired in fair order towards the main city defenses with the enemy following slowly. This was the Battle of North Point, or as it was sometimes called, the Battle of Patapsco Neck. It was a small battle and yet it was great indeed to the people of Baltimore. The troops engaged were almost entirely city militia; they faced some of the finest battle-hardened British regulars; they fought stubbornly and twenty-four of them died on the field. As it happened, the death of General Ross was probably the decisive factor which saved the Balti-