George,

These come from heraldry. Stars usually had more points on them until we "Americanized" them with five points although having said that, some European heraldry also has five pointed stars. If you note the flag attributed to being George Washington's HQ flag (probably a unit color is the current way of thinking), it has six pointed stars. Some early US flags had them as well.

Cassidy seems to have known a bit of heraldry like William Porcher Miles did when he created what became the ANV battle flag.

Stars in heraldry are called mullets by the way.

Greg Biggs