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94 chapter four Brave Bummers of the West The 1868 children’s story “‘Bummers’ in Sherman’s Army” is a typical tale of Sherman’s March. Written in the second person, the story takes readers along an expedition with a “motley” band of foragers. The soldiers were “rough and ragged from their long campaign; some in blue uniforms, some in rebel gray, and others in ministerial black broadcloth, with, perchance, a woman’s hat, in place of Uncle Sam’s somber ‘tar bucket.’” Their mounts were equally disheveled—a mixture of young colts and broken-down nags, with few proper saddles or reins. The narrator then, under the guise of warning Southerners, lays out an indictment of the bummers’ behavior that seems straight from the land of Lost Cause stereotypes: You must look well to your jewelry and watches, for bummers are none too scrupulous when gold is visible. Ostensibly, they seek eatables; but every thing that suits the eye is just as likely to be taken, whether of any possible use to a soldier or not. They will take—just as a spoiled child would with its playthings—every thing, and perchance they will, by strange caprice, take nothing. I have seen a bummer carry for two miles a huge eight-day clock, because it had a cuckoo in it which he wanted to show his ‘partner’ or chum, and then throw it away. At the very next house he will work for an hour helping the inmates save their property, which again he will regret, so far as to steal a silk dress at the next house.1 Stolen jewelry, ruined heirlooms, destruction for its own sake, unpredictability —all of these are elements of the bummer story. So too were their assaults on Southern larders: As for eatables, they may be considered as doomed, if the bummers get into the premises, for you can not say what, or how much will be taken—from the cattle running at grass in the pasture, to the meal in the sack, in the corner of the store-room. Your chickens and turkeys brave bummers of the west : 95 had best be at once entered on the debit side of the profit and loss account, for their innocent bones will be picked by many a hungry Yankee, this night, if the bummers come. A few choice hens you may save, by hiding them in a barrel with a false lid, covered with seedcorn . A few pieces of select meat from the smoke-house may also be saved, perhaps by hiding them between the mattresses of your bed. But, with this, as well as other moveable property, you can say that nothing is certainly your own.2 The story’s perspective then shifts, as the narrator describes a Union visit through the eyes of a Southern woman. Her sense of violation seems clear, as her home is ransacked, with trunks and drawers emptied, and beds tossed in the search for food and valuables. Ribbons are torn, hats are taken. Chicken and pigs are slaughtered, the dog is shot (on suspicion of being a slave-tracking dog), the hidden horses are found and stolen. The men are portrayed as filthy and smelly, though not entirely heartless: one “tries to reassure you by protesting that ‘Yankees never hurt anybody—you need not be afraid—they only want chickens and sweet potatoes to keep them alive’ (you wish the potatoes would stick in their throats), and he closes by asking you to sing some rebel songs.” The reader, in the persona of the Southern woman is astounded by “the cool impudence of this thieving before your eyes, as if it were done every day.”3 And the bummers seem to be having a wonderful time. The illustrations, though relatively crude, show the wild-haired Union men smiling and singing, taking great pleasure in their destructive impulses. They have no apparent qualms about their rampage and instead are the picture of contented savagery. Were this a story published in the Southern Illustrated News or the Atlanta Constitution, we would hardly be surprised. This would be a standard story of white Southern victimization at the hands of rapacious Yankees, perhaps used to spur on resistance to Radical Reconstruction. But it was not. Rather, “‘Bummers’ in Sherman’s Army” was the first story to appear in the first issue of The Soldiers’ and Sailors’ Half-Dime Tales of the Late Rebellion. Children who received copies would have been delighted...

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