Regarding What’s the origin of the 21-gun salute? - The Straight Dope, surely, the 17 gun salute adopted in 1810 was related to the number of states in the Union (Thirteen plus Vermont, Kentucky, Tenesee, and Ohio) that year. Does anyone have better information?
Very quickly cause I’m eating a burrito…
Number of guns Recipients
21
The President of the United States, former Presidents and Presidents-elect.
Chiefs of state, heads of government and reigning monarchs.
19 Vice President of the United States, Speaker of the House of Representatives, President pro tempore of the Senate, Chief Justice of the United States, Cabinet officers. Governors of a U.S. state, the Deputy Secretary of Defense, the Director of Defense Research and Engineering, a Prime Minister or Premier, the Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, the Chief of Staff, U.S. Army, the Chief of Staff, U.S. Air Force, the Chief of Naval Operations, the Commandant of the Marine Corps, a Fleet Admiral, General of the Army or General of the Air Force and Ambassadors, High Commissioners, and others whose credentials are at least equivalent to those of an ambassador.
17 Governor General or Governor of a Territory, Commonwealth, or Possession of the United States or an area under U.S. administration, Committee of Congress, Assistant Secretaries of Defense, General Counsel of the Department of Defense, Under Secretaries of the Army, Navy, or Air Force. Admiral, General.
15 Envoy Extraordinary and Minister Plenipotentiary. Vice Admiral, Lieutenant General.
13 Minister Resident; Rear Admiral, Major General
11 Chargé d’Affaires, Consul general, Consul, or Vice Consul when in charge of a consulate-general. Brigadier general; Rear Admiral (lower half)
7 Consuls accredited to the U.S. Vice-consuls when in charge of consulate.
5 Vice-consuls and consular agents.
Well, possibly. But the British already had an elaborate hierarchy of gun-salutes which they observed in various parts of the empire, but most notably in British India, with a hierarchy of 21 guns for the Nizam of Hyderabad, the Maharaja of Mysore and the Maharaja of Baroda, and then 19 guns, 17 guns, and so forth for a slew of lesser of princely states (depending on size, wealth and friendliness to British interests and ambitions). Officials of the East India Company also had salutes, with 17 guns for the Governors of the Bombay, Madras and Bengal Presidencies, and lesser numbers for Lieutenant-Governors, Residents, Political Agents and other civil and military officials of various grades. “17 guns” was the senior non-royal salute , and it’s possible that it’s selection in the US was motivated an austere republican desire for (relative) simplicity and lack of flummery, while at the same time not claiming a lesser status than British political institutions.
Of course, it doesn’t have to be either/or. The fact that 17 was the highest non-monarchical salute on the British scale, and also the number of states in the American union, might have seemed like happy synchronicity.
I have no idea whether in colonial times in the US, colonial governors or other civil or military officials received gun salutes or, if so, how many, but it might be worth exploring.
The Queen-Empress/King-Emperor received a 31 Gun salute.
A 101-gun salute, I think (on the rare occasions that he/she came to India. I can only think of one.) The Viceroy got a 31-gun salute.
But I don’t think there was a King-Emperor or a Viceroy in 1810, when the US adopted the 17-gun salute. There was just the East India Company and its officials, of whom the senior (in India) were the Governors of the Madras, Bengal and Calcutta Presidencies. The full panoply of the British Raj dates from a much later period.