时间:2019-01-07 作者:英语课 分类:2006年VOA标准英语(六月)


英语课

By Kane Farabaugh
New York City
16 June 2006
 
watch Flag Auction 1 report


 



Original flag  
  


For more than 225 years, a series of four flags hung on the walls of a family home in southern England.  As they passed through generations, so did the story of what the flags were, whom they belonged to, and how they came to hang on the walls.  But, as VOA's Kane Farabaugh reports, the descendants of one of Britain's most celebrated 2 and feared military officers are returning the oldest known examples of the Stars and Stripes back to the land they were taken from more than two centuries ago.


---------------------------------------------


 
Captain Christopher Tarleton Fagan
  


Flag Day this year was a bittersweet occasion for Captain Christopher Tarleton Fagan. "My wife was wondering if it might not be a good idea that I come, but I said, 'No, come on, we've got to see it through.'"


What he's seeing through is the sale of his family's historic heirlooms at Sotheby's auction house --- a set of four American Revolutionary War battle flags that has been in the family for more than 225 years.


Captain Fagan recalls, "Right from the day that I was born I would have seen them, and obviously we often talked about them, and we talked about the fact that one of the flags had stripes on them and another had stars and that they represented the 13 colonies before those two stars and stripes were amalgamated 3 to make America's national flag."


Captain Fagan is a descendant of Banastre Tarleton, the British officer who captured the flags around the year 1780 in New York and South Carolina.


Only through his decision to sell the flags did he come to learn their true significance. 


They are the only Revolutionary War flags that exist, and two of the flags are the earliest known examples of the Stars and Stripes. 


Another flag carries a bloodstain, most likely from the American standard bearer who died trying to keep the colors at the Battle of Waxhaws in South Carolina in 1780.


Fagan says he has one regret. "One of the regrets is I didn't know as much as I know now while we had them… because I would have loved them even more."


Banastre Tarleton was here at Sotheby's for the auction… both spiritually and physically 4.  Captain Fagan proudly displayed a set of cufflinks he wore for the occasion, which contains a piece of Tarleton's hair.


In the end, the four flags sold for more than $17 million, more money than the United States government paid to fight the war in which they were captured.


"I personally rather hope that they will go to private hands, and that those private hands will love them and respect them as much as we have, and that they will allow them then to be seen in museum so they can be exhibited and so that they can see them."


The flags went to an anonymous 5 bidder 6.  At the close of the auction Captain Fagan didn't know if he would have the chance to meet the flags' new owner.  He was also coming to grips with the fact that he would soon say goodbye to four pieces of cloth and silk that had become such large pieces of his family history.


Fagan remains 7 hopeful. "I am afraid to say that it might be today… so I shall say goodbye to them and tell them I hope to see them again."



n.拍卖;拍卖会;vt.拍卖
  • They've put the contents of their house up for auction.他们把房子里的东西全都拿去拍卖了。
  • They bought a new minibus with the proceeds from the auction.他们用拍卖得来的钱买了一辆新面包车。
adj.有名的,声誉卓著的
  • He was soon one of the most celebrated young painters in England.不久他就成了英格兰最负盛名的年轻画家之一。
  • The celebrated violinist was mobbed by the audience.观众团团围住了这位著名的小提琴演奏家。
v.(使)(金属)汞齐化( amalgamate的过去式和过去分词 );(使)合并;联合;结合
  • The company has now amalgamated with another local firm. 这家公司现在已与当地一家公司合并了。
  • Those two organizations have been amalgamated into single one. 那两个组织已合并为一个组织。 来自《现代汉英综合大词典》
adj.物质上,体格上,身体上,按自然规律
  • He was out of sorts physically,as well as disordered mentally.他浑身不舒服,心绪也很乱。
  • Every time I think about it I feel physically sick.一想起那件事我就感到极恶心。
adj.无名的;匿名的;无特色的
  • Sending anonymous letters is a cowardly act.寄匿名信是懦夫的行为。
  • The author wishes to remain anonymous.作者希望姓名不公开。
n.(拍卖时的)出价人,报价人,投标人
  • TV franchises will be auctioned to the highest bidder.电视特许经营权将拍卖给出价最高的投标人。
  • The bidder withdrew his bid after submission of his bid.投标者在投标之后撤销了投标书。
n.剩余物,残留物;遗体,遗迹
  • He ate the remains of food hungrily.他狼吞虎咽地吃剩余的食物。
  • The remains of the meal were fed to the dog.残羹剩饭喂狗了。
学英语单词
accessory nucleus
adaptive cruise control
akouophone
altitude low temperature test
Amygdalus mongolica
analogue storage expander
azoanisol
beta-Fergusonite
burn cd-rom
busy indicating circuit
cam gearing
charge weitght
chloronium
chromel/alumel thermocouple
chronic apical periodontitis
chronic granuloma of rectum
circumference
cliff swallows
climatic disaster
darabont
data vetting program
delicatessens
displacer level meter
eccentric pivot
electro-optic scattering effect
electronic computer
farm slack season
foscarnets
free-locatable program
gee string
gelatin culture-medium
gigaelectron volt
glazed earthenware
glylene
gun-ownership
hetero epitaxy
high frequency shale shaker
high pressure gas drive
index of average land values
information-semantic
insulinasc
introgressed
isurus glaucuss
keratosis follicularis
lateral incisor
laurie
lay (saxon)
Lime-method
maccheroni
medard
Mercurea
metster
middle-elevation
Mijoux
millirad/hour
Modified pass-throughs
monitor concept
Monte León
mr. clean
Naphthoxetol
needle wax crystals
Nelaton's tumor
neusner
nickoloff
nonvalatile
noyful
open centrifugal pump
ordering of entries
ossa intermaxillare
over hard
phenocamphor
policy scope
preferential ballot
prohibitionistic
projection conduit
put the skids under sb
PWD (pulse width discriminator)
quality time
radio-frequency squid
reckoning for
S-completion
salicylic acid 1-naphthyl ester
sargentiae
scharffenberger
screwing me over
Sheldon Springs
sigmoscopy
silicon solid photographic sensor
small white turkey
splash pocket
square check irrigation
steel plate girder
terminal-oriented network
Tyrode's soiutions
unacknowledged information transfer service
underground water course
unneod
Vilene
Wendlandia laxa
xalogen
xiphophorus maculatus
zygomaticomaxillary suture