Yankee is a term used by Americans generally in reference to a native of New England and by
non-Americans, especially the British, in reference to an American of any section. The word is
most likely from the Dutch and was apparently derived either from Janke, diminutive of Jan, or
from Jankees, a combination of Jan and kees [cheese], thus signifying John Cheese. As early
as 1683, Yankey was a common nickname among the pirates of the Spanish Main; always,
however, it was borne by Dutchmen. There is no satisfactory explanation of how it came to be
applied to the English settlers of colonial America and particularly to New Englanders. By 1765
it was in use as a term of contempt or derision, but by the opening of the American Revolution,
New Englanders were proud to be called Yankees. The popularity of the marching song Yankee
Doodle probably had much to do with the term's subsequent wide usage. In the Civil War it was
applied disparagingly by the Confederates to Union soldiers and Northerners generally, and with
Southern hatred for the North rekindled by the Reconstruction period it survived long after the war
was over. In World War I, the English began calling American soldiers, both Southerners and
Northerners, Yankees. At that time too the shortened form Yank became popular in the United
States, with George M. Cohan's war song Over There; contributing largely to its increased usage.
However, Yank, too, was known in the 18th cent., as early as 1778, and the Confederates also
used that form in the Civil War. Yankee and Yank were again popular designations for the
American soldier in World War II. In Latin America the term Yanqui is applied to U.S. citizens,
often especially after the Cuba revolution with a note of hostility.
Yankee Doodle.
Yankee Doodle, for example, is full of surprises, inconsistencies, paradoxes in its career.
It is not really a song, but it is a band tune which no existing adult audience has ever sung
together. The single stanza known to everyone is not a part of the Revolutionary War ballad,
but belongs to an earlier period in its history. The music is unheroic; the title (a New England
Noodle) is derogatory to the people who adopted it in spite of its ridicule. And yet it has
become a piece of jovial defiance as stirring as The Campbells Are Coming. The melody,
as has often been the case, was generally known for several years before it was turned to
patriotic account. As early as 1764 the familiar quatrain was current in England, and by 1767
the tune was familiar enough in America to be cited in Bartons (or Colonel Forrests) comic
opera, Disappointment, or The Force of Credulity. In derision of the foolish Yankee there soon
began to multiply variants, most of which have come down by hearsay, and are very vague as
to date; but one was a broadside and attests in the title to its currency before April, 1775:
Yankee Doodle; or, (as now christened by the Saints of New England) the Lexington March.
N.B. The Words to be Sung throus the Nose, & in the West Country drawl and dialect.
The text of The Yankees Return from Camp the famous but forgotten version is attributed to
Edward Bangs, a Harvard student, and was written in 1775 or 1776. Tory derision did not
cease with its appearance, and between the accumulating stanzas in rejoinder and those in
supplement gave ground for the speech of Jonathan in Tylers The Contrast of 1787: Some
other time, when you and I are better acquainted, Isll sing the whole of it no, no, thats a fibI
canst sing but a hundred and ninety verses; our Tabitha at home can sing it all. In time, however,
the words lost interest for all but antiquarians, so that the stanza in The Songsters Museum
was literally true in 1826 as it is to-day:
Yankee Doodle is the tune
Americans delight in.
Twill do to whistle, sing or play,
And just the thing for fighting.
There are many versions of the lyrics and the song. Here are a few examples:
Yankee Doodle
Father and I went down to camp,
Along with Captain Gooding;
And there we saw the men and boys,
As thick as hasty pudding.
Yankee doodle, keep it up,
Yankee doodle dandy;
Mind the musie and the step,
And with the girls be handy.
There was Captain Washington
Upon a slapping stallion,
A-giving orders to his men,
I guess there was a million.
And then the feathers on his hat,
They looked so' tarnal fin-a,
I wanted pockily to get
To give to my Jemima.
And then we saw a swamping gun,
Large as a log of maple;
Upon a deuced little cart,
A load for father's cattle.
And every time they shoot it off,
It takes a horn of powder;
It makes a noise like father's gun,
Only a nation louder.
I went as nigh to one myself,
As' Siah's underpinning;
And father went as nigh agin,
I thought the deuce was in him.
We saw a little barrel, too,
The heads were made of leather;
They knocked upon it with little clubs,
And called the folks together.
And there they'd fife away like fun,
And play on cornstalk fiddles,
And some had ribbons red as blood,
All bound around their middles.
The troopers, too, would gallop up
And fire right in our faces;
It scared me almost to death
To see them run such races.
Uncle Sam came there to change
Some pancakes and some onions,
For' lasses cake to carry home
To give his wife and young ones.
But I can't tell half I see
They kept up such a smother;
So I took my hat off, made a bow,
And scampered home to mother.
Cousin Simon grew so bold,
I thought he would have cocked it;
It scared me so I streaked it off,
And hung by father's pocket.
And there I saw a pumpkin shell,
As big as mother's basin;
And every time they touched it off,
They scampered like the nation.
Yankee doodle, keep it up,
Yankee doodle dandy;
Mind the music and the step,
And with the girls be handy
Today's version
Yankee Doodle
Why did yankee doodle stick a feather in his hat and call it macaroni?
Back in Pre-Revolutionary America when the song "Yankee Doodle" was first popular,
the singer was not referring to the pasta "macaroni" in the line that reads "stuck a feather
in his hat and called it macaroni". "Macaroni" was a fancy ("dandy") style of Italian dress
widely imitated in England at the time. So by just sticking a feather in his cap and calling
himself a "Macaroni" (a "dandy"), Yankee Doodle was proudly proclaiming himself to be a
country bumpkin, because that was how the English regarded most colonials at that time.
But times have long since changed, and it is important to reflect on the fact that despite the
turbulent early relationship between England and the American colonists, our two countries
are strongly united.
Yankee Doodle went to town
A-riding on a pony
Stuck a feather in his hat
And called it macaroni.
Yankee Doodle, keep it up
Yankee Doodle dandy
Mind the music and the step
And with the girls be handy.
Father and I went down to camp
Along with Captain Gooding
And there we saw the men and boys
As thick as hasty pudding.
Yankee Doodle, keep it up
Yankee Doodle dandy
Mind the music and the step
And with the girls be handy
There was Captain Washington
Upon a slapping stallion
A-giving orders to his men
I guess there was a million.
Yankee Doodle, keep it up
Yankee Doodle dandy
Mind the music and the step
And with the girls be handy
"Yankee version"
1. Father and I went down to camp,
Along with Captain Gooding;
And there we saw the men and boys,
As thick as hasty pudding.
Yankee doodle, keep it up,
Yankee doodle dandy;
Mind the music and the step,
And with the girls be handy.
2. There was Captain Washington
Upon a slapping stallion,
A-giving orders to his men,
I guess there was a million.
3. And then the feathers on his hat,
They looked so' tarnal fin-a,
I wanted pockily to get
To give to my Jemima.
4. And then we saw a swamping gun,
Large as a log of maple;
Upon a deuced little cart,
A load for father's cattle.
5. And every time they shoot it off,
It takes a horn of powder;
It makes a noise like father's gun,
Only a nation louder.
6. I went as nigh to one myself,
As' Siah's underpinning;
And father went as nigh agin,
I thought the deuce was in him.
7. We saw a little barrel, too,
The heads were made of leather;
They knocked upon it with little clubs,
And called the folks together.
8. And there they'd fife away like fun,
And play on cornstalk fiddles,
And some had ribbons red as blood,
All bound around their middles.
9. The troopers, too, would gallop up
And fire right in our faces;
It scared me almost to death
To see them run such races.
10. Uncle Sam came there to change
Some pancakes and some onions,
For' lasses cake to carry home
To give his wife and young ones.
11. But I can't tell half I see
They kept up such a smother;
So I took my hat off, made a bow,
And scampered home to mother.
12. Cousin Simon grew so bold,
I thought he would have cocked it;
It scared me so I streaked it off,
And hung by father's pocket.
13. And there I saw a pumpkin shell,
As big as mother's basin;
And every time they touched it off,
They scampered like the nation.
Yankee doodle, keep it up,
Yankee doodle dandy;
Mind the music and the step,
And with the girls be handy.
Confederate Parody
1. Yankee Doodle had a mind
To whip the Southern "traitors,"
Because they didn't choose to live
On codfish and potaters.
Yankee Doodle, doodle-doo,
Yankee Doodle dandy,
And so to keep his courage up
He took a drink of brandy.
2. Yankee Doodle said he found
By all the census figures,
That he could starve the Rebels out
If he could steal their niggers.
Yankee Doodle, doodle-doo,
Yankee Doodle dandy,
And then he took another drink
Of gunpowder and brandy.
3. Yankee Doodle made a speech
'Twas very full of feeling:
I fear, says he, I cannot fight,
But I am good at stealing.
Yankee Doodle, doodle-doo,
Yankee Doodle dandy,
Hurrah for Lincoln, he's the boy
To take a drop of brandy.
4. Yankee Doodle drew his sword,
And practiced all the passes;
Come boys, we'll take another drink
When we get to Manassas.
Yankee Doodle, doodle-doo,
Yankee Doodle dandy,
They never reached Manassas plain,
And never got the brandy.
5. Yankee Doodle soon found out
That Bull Run was no trifle;
For if the North knew how to steal,
The South knew how to rifle.
Yankee Doodle, doodle-doo,
Yankee Doodle dandy,
'Tis very clear I took too much
Of that infernal brandy.
6. Yankee Doodle wheeled about,
And scampered off at full run,
And such a race was never seen
As that he made at Bull Run.
Yankee Doodle, doodle-doo,
Yankee Doodle dandy,
I haven't time to stop just now
To take a drop of brandy.
7. Yankee Doodle, Oh! For shame,
You're always intermeddling;
Let guns alone, they're dangerous things;
You'd better stick to peddling.
Yankee Doodle, doodle-doo,
Yankee Doodle dandy,
When next I go to Bully Run
I'll throw away the brandy!
8. Yankee Doodle, you had ought
To be a little smarter;
Instead of catching wooly heads
I vow you've caught a tartar.
Yankee Doodle, doodle-doo,
Yankee Doodle dandy,
Go to hum, you've had enough
Of Rebels and of brandy!
Information Lyrics
Tradition has it that Yankee Doodle had its origins in the French and Indian War when
New England troops joined Braddock's forces at Niagara. In contrast to the spit and polish
of the British army, the colonials were a motley crew, some wearing buckskins and furs.
Dr. Richard Schuckburg, a British Army surgeon reportedly wrote the tune ridiculing the
Americans in the early 1750s. Some scholars believe it is a variant of the nursery rhyme
Lucy Locket.
Despite the fact it began as ridicule, the colonials took the song for their own.
Countless versions and parodies evolved, many of which made fun of their officers,
including George Washington. These verses are included at the end of the tune. When
Cornwallis surrendered at Yorktown it is said while the British played The World Turned
Upside Down, the Americans played Yankee Doodle.
There are said to be as many as 190 verses of Yankee Doodle.
Father and I went down to camp
Along with Captain Gooding
And there we saw the men and boys
As thick as hasty pudding.
Chorus
Yankee doodle, keep it up
Yankee doodle dandy
Mind the music and the step
And with the girls be handy.
There was Captain Washington
Upon a slapping stallion
A-giving orders to his men
I guess there was a million.
Chorus
And then the feathers on his hat
They looked so' tarnal fin-a
I wanted pockily to get
To give to my Jemima.
Chorus
And then we saw a swamping gun
Large as a log of maple
Upon a deuced little cart
A load for father's cattle.
Chorus
And every time they shoot it off
It takes a horn of powder
It makes a noise like father's gun
Only a nation louder.
Chorus
I went as nigh to one myself
As' Siah's underpinning
And father went as nigh agin
I thought the deuce was in him.
We saw a little barrel, too
The heads were made of leather
They knocked upon it with little clubs
And called the folks together.
Chorus
And there they'd fife away like fun
And play on cornstalk fiddles
And some had ribbons red as blood
All bound around their middles.
The troopers, too, would gallop up
And fire right in our faces
It scared me almost to death
To see them run such races.
Chorus
Uncle Sam came there to change
Some pancakes and some onions
For' lasses cake to carry home
To give his wife and young ones.
Chorus
But I can't tell half I see
They kept up such a smother
So I took my hat off, made a bow
And scampered home to mother.
Chorus
Cousin Simon grew so bold
I thought he would have cocked it
It scared me so I streaked it off
And hung by father's pocket.
Chorus
And there I saw a pumpkin shell
As big as mother's basin
And every time they touched it off
They scampered like the nation.
Other Verses:
And there was Captain Washington,
With gentlefolks about him,
They say he's gown so 'tarnal proud
He will not ride without them.
Chorus
There came Gen'ral Washington
Upon a snow-white charger
He looked as big as all outdoors
And thought that he was larger.