Editorial: Rockville Needs to Ditch its Flag
The Montgonion is calling on the City of Rockville to retire its official flag and commission a new one. The flag contains Confederate-aligned symbolism that has no place in a municipal banner.
Rockville's flag features three wavy blue diagonal stripes, two wavy white diagonal stripes, and six red "bottony" crosses—three positioned diagonally in each white stripe. It's the red bottony crosses that are at issue.
The official flag of the City of Rockville, adopted in 1979.
If those bottony crosses look familiar, it's because they are deeply rooted in Maryland symbolism. You'll find them on the state seal, on the state flag, and on a map of Maryland from 1635.
So what's the problem?
Anywhere else in Maryland where you find bottony crosses in official symbols, you'll also find black and yellow vertical stripes of equal width, known as a "paly." The two symbols were married together—figuratively and literally—by George Calvert in the early 1600s when his clan was joined by marriage to the Crossland family, and he commissioned a new coat of arms.
The Calvert coat of arms was created by George Calvert, 1st Baron Baltimore, who died in 1632, and it was later adopted and modified by his son, Cecil Calvert, for use in Maryland.
During the U.S. Civil War, Maryland natives serving in the Confederacy used symbols drawn from the Crossland quadrants of the Calvert coat of arms—namely the cross bottony and its associated red-and-white colors—to signify their birthplace and allegiance. It was commonly seen on uniform pins and was famously used on the headquarters flag of Confederate General Bradley T. Johnson, which featured a red cross bottony on a white field. Meanwhile, Maryland's Union loyalists adopted the yellow-and-black paly stripes as their emblem.
Headquarters flag of Confederate General Bradley T. Johnson
The state of Maryland flag was adopted after the Civil War. The inclusion of both the bottony crosses and the paly stripes was deliberate and deeply symbolic. It was intended to show the reunification of a divided citizenry and to restore the two symbols to their rightful combined stature as representations of Maryland’s founding principles: tolerance and inclusion.
The Maryland flag was first used in the years just after the Civil War and officially adopted by the Maryland General Assembly in 1904.
You won't find a red bottony cross on a white field on any other municipal flag—only in Rockville. It represents subjugation, segregation and secession. It is the antithesis of the city's recently adopted official motto, "Rise Together." The City Council even rejected a new city logo version last year specifically because it contained the bottony cross.
The design on top made it to the final round of focus group recommendations but was rejected by the City Council due to its confederate imagery. The design below was selected instead.
Critics of this proposal present two arguments: first, that it's part of "cancel culture" seeking to erase controversial history from public spaces; second, that bottony crosses are Christian symbols, not Confederate, and that they predate Cecil Calvert's Maryland seal by centuries.
As to the first argument, this isn't about a historical figure or event. It's not about a statue or a street sign named after a military leader. The Rockville flag was designed and adopted in 1979—it's not even vintage, let alone historical. Ditching it doesn't cancel culture. As to the second claim, it’s true that the cross bottony predates Maryland, but that misses the point. The symbol took on a new and specific meaning in this region—one forever linked to the Confederacy. It may just be a Christian cross in Moldova, but in Maryland it’s much more.
There is a process for making the change we’re advocating. It begins with a proposal submitted through the city's bureaucratic channels. We submitted one in September during Rockville's open call for project proposals. It’s included in the agenda packet for the City Council’s November 10 meeting. The next step is funding, which is also on the agenda. We plan to attend to advocate not only for a new flag but also to urge a local, creative, and inexpensive method of designing it.
Rockville paid a Texas firm $162,967 to create its new "R" logo and tagline—a colossal waste of taxpayer money. The work could have been done by a local designer for a fraction of the cost, and the result likely would have been far better received by the public.
Our proposal for a new Rockville flag therefore comes with a caveat: Don’t do it unless it’s designed locally, the public has direct engagement and input (not just focus groups), and the budget doesn’t exceed five figures.
We should note that when Rockville adopted its flag in 1979, it also adopted an official city seal, one element of which is a shield with imagery matching the flag. But the seal also contains a second shield containing the paly stripes. Like the Maryland flag, it reintegrates these once opposing symbols. The Rockville seal, unlike the Rockville flag, has the necessary balance and does not require modification, although it may make sense for the seal to match a new flag design.
Official seal of the City of Rockville, adopted in 1979.
A flag is a statement about who we are and what we value. Rockville deserves a banner that reflects unity, progress, and civic pride, not one tied to symbols of division and oppression. Changing the flag won’t erase history; it will show that we’ve learned from it. Let’s rise together—under a flag worthy of the city’s ideals.
