Existing comment:
Star-Spangled Banner National Historic Trail
Destroying the Library
The original Library of Congress occupied a room in the US Capitol. When British troops burned the Capitol in 1814, the collection was destroyed. After the war Thomas Jefferson helped re-establish the library by selling to Congress at a discount some 5,500 of his own books. President James Madison appointed local editor and writer George Watterston as the first full-time Librarian of Congress.
A Returned Souvenir:
In 1940 a collector sent the Library of Congress a book titled, RECTs & EXPENDs [receipts and expenditures] U.S. FOR 1810. It survived the British burning of the library in 1814 because British Rear Admiral Cockburn took it for a souvenir. He inscribed it, "Taken in President's room in the Capitol of Washington 24th August 1814." |