Savannah morning news., 1885-12-10
ORIGIN oFYANKEE DOODLE.
MIR. Moore Tells the Historical Society
what he Knows About It.

. W
"Yankee Doodle" was the theme OF an
interesting paper read by Mr.. George h.
Moore, LII. D., before the New York His
torical Society last night. An audience
completely filing the hall listened to the
reading with unabated interest.
THE subject" said MIR. Moore. ''natur-
ally divides itself into two parts; nrst, as
TO the origin of Yankee, and, second, con-
cerning the time with which the word is
lndssOlubly linked. Gordon, writing IN
/ 40, says Yankee was the favorite word
OF one Jonathan Hastings, living IN cam
bridge in NIB. and used as term OF eX-
cellence. The students at Harvard thus
/ became acquainted with it, and, linking
II with Hastings, from whom they hlred
! horses, it became a by-Word ana was
scattered over the country. There is little
or no authority to rest this statement of
the origin upon. The first registered
Yankee was one William Marr, slavein
the Carolinas, who in advertisement in
small English paper in lI25 Is thus
called"
Mr.. Moore then passed over in rapid
succession the various supposed Indian
derivatives OF the word, including that in
Irving's History of New York; and the
hitherto accepted authority Of the Mora
Wan missionary In Pennsylvania that 1t
was corruption of Yengeese, the Indian
phonetic spelling of English, and con-
tinued
1.-The word is not Indian or Greek, but is
pure Dutch, expressive of contempt and
probably the most so in the vocabulary of
the early New York Dutch. 'Nankin'
meant in that dialect to grumble, ,snarl, or
yelp, and its derlVatiYe noun Ianker
meant a bowling cur. 1t was not in use
save among the lower classes, for rea-
sons which now shut out slang from use
by educated people, but il was we'll
known word. In the collisions between
the New Englanders and the New York
Dutch bad blood was aroused, land
the New Englanders despised the Dutch,
while the latter abOmnated the former,
and both very fervidly. Hence the use Of
the word TO indicate the contempt which
existed. Every circumstance points to its
| birth in the collisions between the Dutch
and the colnnists. To this day the Yam
KEGS are looked upon with distrust by the
remnants of the real Dutchmen now out
side New England.
''The word was well known before the
tune" continued MIR. Moore, "but the lat
ter unquestionably came from England,
despite the assertions that it is well
known Netherland peasant song, or that
kossuth, when here, recognized it as a
Hungarian dance, or that it is known as
the ancient sword dance of the Biscay-
ans. The words and tune were undOubt-
edly first welded together by DIR. Richard
Shuckberg, who was connected with the
British army when the colonial troops
from New England marched into a camp
at Albany to JOIN the British regulars on
the way to fight the French. The doctor
knew of the tune as Fishers Jig of
which verse ran:
"'Lucy Locket lost her pocket,
Lydia Fisher found it, ETC."
The appearance of the troops called
| down the derision of the British officers,
| and soon the hit of the doctor became
| known throughout the army as method
\ Of showing the contempt for the cOlOnials,
| and this continued until after Lexington,
/ the British troops leaving in 1875, when
| they tarred and feathered one Thomas
! DitsOn in Boston, marching to the tune, as
| the best known way of heaping contempt
on the Yankees. This was changed at
Lexington, when the British commander
was asked how he liked the tune and an
swered: "HOw they did make us dance
to itV' Doodle, Mr.. Moore said, always
meant a trifier, and is thus referred to IN
the Lancashire hornpipe, written in 1922.
He closed his paper by relating the in
cident at the surrender of CORVALLIS
when the British, not wishing to surren-
der to the despised colonials, turned to the
! French contingent and prepared to ground
their arms. Seeing this Lafayette or
dered the French bands to play ''Yankee
Doodle" and to this tune the arms were
laid down and the Revolution ended.