48 Star U.S. Ensign from U.S.S. Decatur (DD-936) commissioned on 1954.
This wool ensign was from the Decatur Grouping of flags and was mistaken at auction as an indentified WWI US ensign. However further inquiry has uncovered that it is, in fact, the US ensign from the 1950s which was used at the christening of the US Decatur in 1955, where Mrs. Alice Armsden served as one of the ship's sponsors.
This marked ensign and these flags were part of a of historical cache of artifacts descended from various branches of the Lear-Storer-Decatur family and included items from Sir William Pepperrell Baronet and John Storer (who were both part of the 1745 expedition to Nova Scotia to capture Ft. Louisburg), Colonel Tobias Lear (General Washington's Aide de Camp and personal friend), from Benjamin Lincoln Lear (son of Tobias Lear), Commodore Stephen Decatur (nephew of his famous namesake Commodore Stephen Decatur, 1779-1820), Rear Admiral George Washington Storer (nephew of Tobias Lear, 1789-1864), Ichabod Goodwin ( Governor of New Hampshire), and Admiral of the Navy George Dewey.

The collection was "rediscovered" in the mid 20th Century when the family as a whole decided to sell a barn at Kittery Point, Maine, the spiritual ecumene of the extended family. The barn had served as a repository for a vast amount of historical material that had been passed down through the generations. When inventoried the barn was found to contain a significant archive of papers, memorabilia, photographs, books, artifacts and twenty historic flags. The historic trove was divided up amongst the three branches of the family.

The share which had gone to Mrs. Alice Armsden nee Decatur, contained Decatur flags, and was kept intact until her and her spouse's estates were settled in 2009. In these estates were flags from some of America's most illustrious naval families - Decatur, Storer and Dewey.
The USS Decatur (DD-936) the fourth ship to bear the name, was a Forrest-Sherman class destroyer launched on 15 December 1955, and served in both the Atlantic and Pacific fleets from 1956 until she was struck from the roles of commissioned ships in 1988.

Provenance:Acquired at auction, 2-Day Winter Antiques & Fine Art Auction, 4-5 February 2010, James D. Julia, Fairfield, ME.

ZFC Significant Flag

Sources:



USS Decatur (DD-936), Wikipedia, 18 October 2011, from: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/USS_Decatur_%28DDG-31%29

USS Decatur (DD-936), US Navy Ships, Naval History & Heritage Command, 18 October 22011, from: http://www.history.navy.mil/danfs/d/decatur.htm

2-Day Winter Antiques & Fine Art Auction, Artfact, 10 October 2011, from: http://www.artfact.com/auction-catalog/2-day-winter-antiques-fine-art-auction,-day-2-kbmiwmy646

Smith, David, A Million-Dollar Map At Julia's Americana, Antiques and the Arts Online, 10 October 2011, from: http://antiquesandthearts.com/Antiques/AuctionWatch/2010-03-02__14-22-30.html