The Guilford Courthouse Flag was a variation of the Stars And Strips flag. The field originally consisted of fifteen alternating blue and red stripes, with a blue stripe at the top and at the bottom. The two bottommost stripes were removed at some time, whether intentionally or not. The canton consisted of a white background with thirteen blue six-point stars arranged in a 4 / 3 / 4 pattern plus 2 offset on the side opposite the flagstaff. The remnant that exists today, and maintained by the Guilford Courthouse Museum, shows evidence that the edge along the flagstaff might have held an additional two stars, making a total of fifteen stars.
The local tradition states that the Guilford Courthouse Flag was flown over the North Carolina court house in the Spring of 1781, when on 15 March, the American Patriots under General Nathaniel Greene brought the British advance through the Carolinas to a halt. The battle that surrounded the court house was one of the bloodiest of the American Revolutionary War ~ especially for the British, who lost at least one quarter of their number.
Recent studies of the flag have indicated that this Guilford Courthouse Flag might not have been an American Revolutionary War flag, but rather a flag from the War of 1812.
