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“Sorrowfully Amusing”: The Popular Comedy of the Civil War

“Sorrowfully Amusing”: The Popular Comedy of the Civil War jon gr i nspa n “Sorrowfully Amusing” The Popular Comedy of the Civil War Petroleum Vesuvius Nasby was the funniest character of the Civil War. Comedian David Ross Locke dreamt up Nasby to mock Confederate sympathizers in the North, and readers devoured his published letters throughout the confl ict. In them Locke caricatured Nasby as an igno- rant pontifi cator, a virulent racist, and a drunken, thieving hypocrite. He bragged: “No man hez drunk more whiskey than I have for the party” and swore he never learned to read to avoid becoming an abolitionist. He argued that he could not be drafted into the Union army because of his dandruff . Eventually, his character deserted into the Confederacy but returned to the Union, unhappy with the rebel uniform of “holes with rags around ’em.” Locke frequently used Nasby to mock the opportunistic rac- ism of many Democrats. When asked how to prepare for the 1864 presi- dential campaign, Nasby responded simply: “Lern to spell and pronownce Missenegenegenashun.” Eliza Frances Andrews, a young woman in Georgia, also found frag- ments of humor mixed in with the brutal Civil War. Andrews and her sister shared “good laughs at the makeshifts we http://www.deepdyve.com/assets/images/DeepDyve-Logo-lg.png The Journal of the Civil War Era University of North Carolina Press

“Sorrowfully Amusing”: The Popular Comedy of the Civil War

Grinspan, Jon.
The Journal of the Civil War Era , Volume 1 (3) – Aug 12, 2011
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Publisher
University of North Carolina Press
Copyright
Copyright @ The University of North Carolina Press
ISSN
2159-9807

Abstract

jon gr i nspa n “Sorrowfully Amusing” The Popular Comedy of the Civil War Petroleum Vesuvius Nasby was the funniest character of the Civil War. Comedian David Ross Locke dreamt up Nasby to mock Confederate sympathizers in the North, and readers devoured his published letters throughout the confl ict. In them Locke caricatured Nasby as an igno- rant pontifi cator, a virulent racist, and a drunken, thieving hypocrite. He bragged: “No man hez drunk more whiskey than I have for the party” and swore he never learned to read to avoid becoming an abolitionist. He argued that he could not be drafted into the Union army because of his dandruff . Eventually, his character deserted into the Confederacy but returned to the Union, unhappy with the rebel uniform of “holes with rags around ’em.” Locke frequently used Nasby to mock the opportunistic rac- ism of many Democrats. When asked how to prepare for the 1864 presi- dential campaign, Nasby responded simply: “Lern to spell and pronownce Missenegenegenashun.” Eliza Frances Andrews, a young woman in Georgia, also found frag- ments of humor mixed in with the brutal Civil War. Andrews and her sister shared “good laughs at the makeshifts we

Journal

The Journal of the Civil War Era – University of North Carolina Press

Published: Aug 12, 2011

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