In "old Ironside", what does Holmes want the ship to symbolize?

Question

OLD IRONSIDES

By Oliver Wendell Holmes
September 16, 1830

Ay, tear her tattered ensign down!
Long has it waved on high,
And many an eye has danced to see
That banner in the sky;
Beneath it rung the battle shout,
And burst the cannon's roar;
The meteor of the ocean air
Shall sweep the clouds no more.

Her deck, once red with heroes' blood,
Where knelt the vanquished foe,
When winds were hurrying o'er the flood,
And waves were white below,
No more shall feel the victor's tread,
Or know the conquered knee;
The harpies of the shore shall pluck
The eagle of the sea!

Oh, better that her shattered bulk
Should sink beneath the wave;
Her thunders shook the mighty deep,
And there should be her grave;
Nail to the mast her holy flag,
Set every threadbare sail,
And give her to the god of storms,
The lightning and the gale!

Answer 1

The point of the poem isn't so much to have the ship symbolize anything. It was actually written as a satire and criticism of the government's intention to scrap her. It was partly due to the popular outcry following the release of this Holmes' poem that the government decided to preserve the ship.

Answer 2

trying to figure out what something might symbolize is as open to interpretation as there are people involved......in this case ffmedic has it right.there's no real symbolism; the Navy was going to scrap her, Holmes wrote the poem in high indignation that the most famous and important USN ship would be scrapped, the public said No Way, Jose; 176 years and 3 rebuilds later, she is still afloat, still a commissioned warship of the United States Navy, the oldest such in the world, and Flagship, Commander, 1st Naval District..and on her 200th birthday sailed under her own power across the Boston harbor that was her birthplace and home for the last 150 years........

Answer 3

It was to represent the US as a nation and government

If you follow through the poem with this in mind - the poem makes a lot sense