Bombay Dyeing Chairman Nusli Wadia belongs to Wadia shipbuilding family.
Almost all Americans know that their National Anthem “The Star-Spangled Banner” was written by the 35-year-old amateur poet Francis Scott Key onboard a British ship as the Royal Navy bombarded the Baltimore Harbor during the War of 1812. But only a very few know that the American anthem was written inside a Made in India enemy ship.
Key accompanied the British Prisoner Exchange Agent Colonel John Stuart Skinner onboard the HMS Minden, a ship built by Jamshedji Bomanji Wadia, who belonged to The Wadia (‘shipbuilder’) family of Surat.
According to The Quint, Jamshedji Wadia’s father Lovji Nusserwanji Wadia was a reputed shipbuilder, known for building durable ships using teak wood. The British East India Company had already established India as its colony and gave Lovji contracts to build docks and ships in Bombay in 1736.
The HMS Minden was the handy work of Jamshedji who received the contract from the company in 1801. It took him ten years to complete the construction of the ship which set off for the maiden sail on 8 February 1811.
A year after her maiden sail, the War of 1812 broke off between the United States of America and the United Kingdom over issues ranging from trade restrictions, forceful induction of 10,000 American merchant sailors into the Royal Navy and British assistance to Native Americans to fight the settlers etc.
Georgetown-based Francis Scott Key who was a lawyer by profession and an amateur poet was asked to accompany the British Prisoner Exchange Agent Colonel John Stuart Skinner onboard the HMS Minden to negotiate the release of prisoners, this after the infamous burning of Washington. The negotiation was a failure but they were not allowed to leave the ship as they knew about the British intention to attack Baltimore.
Prisoner Francis Scott Key penned #US anthem Star Spangled Banner on board Royal Navy ship #HMSMinden in 19thc pic.twitter.com/SCCpUNMQUC
— Neeraj Rajput (@neeraj_rajput) April 11, 2016
Key was inspired to write a poem aboard the enemy ship after he saw the storm flag in the fort replaced by large American flag – the Star-Spangled Banner – flying triumphantly, representing the American victory after the overnight bombardment.
This patriotic poem was adopted as the American national anthemlson in 1916 more than a century after it was first published.