slum

[Wilson Gray]

Wasn't three hundred smackeroos the usual fee paid for an enlistment?

-Wilson

On 7/7/07, Douglas G. Wilson <douglas at nb.net> wrote:
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> Sender:       American Dialect Society <ADS-L at LISTSERV.UGA.EDU>
> Poster:       "Douglas G. Wilson" <douglas at NB.NET>
> Subject:      Re: slum
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>
> >Here it transparently means "a dollar."  But why?  I don't believe
> >I've seen this sense before.
> >
> >   1863 _Hooley's Opera House Songster_ (N.Y.: Dick & FitzGerald)
> > 32: "So I‭'‭ll go and jump a bounty, / And have a
> > little spree." / Joe went and put his name down,/  And got three
> > hundred " slums," / And then skedaddled and ran away.
>
> I don't find any such word right away. What is the evidence for
> "slum" = "dollar"? From the above limited context, I suppose maybe
> the reference is to an army enlistment bonus or something like that.
> Possibly the "slums" were not really dollars per se, even if they
> were called "dollars" elsewhere in the text; perhaps they were "slum
> dollars" meaning dollar-denominated commissary tokens, or some sort
> of scrip dollars of doubtful value, or Confederate paper dollars, or
> something like that (with "slum" = "cheap"/"bogus" as in some other
> contexts). Just woolgathering.
>
> -- Doug Wilson
>
>
>
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