"hudags" in an 1861 Civil War letter

[Douglas G. Wilson]

>    Yesterday a colleague mentioned the word "hudags" in a Civil War
>letter (Nov. 26, 1861) and today e-mailed me the letter as he
>transcribed it.  I don't find "hudags" in OED or HDAS, and the letter
>has many misspellings. Might "hudags" be a misspelling of some
>everyday word that I'm somehow overlooking?

Looks to me like "hodag". This appears in DARE (from 1910) denoting a
mythical animal known from the Great Lakes states. The word is also used
for something like a miner's pickaxe. Here is a citation from MoA
(Michigan) from 1870:

----------

Dillenback & Leavitt, _History and Directory of Kent County, Michigan_
(1870), p. 28:

<<There is a portable detached steam saw mill on the west side of section
eleven, on the Little Cedar, erected in June, 1869, by McClure & Kidder.
This mill cuts 10,000 feet of lumber, or 15,000 shingles per day. It will
be better known as the "Hodag" mill.
      This name was given it, from the fact that an unknown and mysterious
animal was heard, seen, and even fired at, in the woods near here, some
years ago, and as no other name could be found for it, it was called
"Hodag," and when the mill was built, this was the name given to it by the
people of Burchville.>>

----------

The etymology of "hodag" is not known with certainty AFAIK, but the beast
usually has horns and it is sometimes said to live in caves. One might
speculate that this was originally a nonsense word like "doodad"; if so,
"hudag" could be virtually the same word, something like "critter".

But maybe it's just coincidence.

-- Doug Wilson