[Ads-l] Antedating of Skedaddle (1859)

[Jonathan Lighter]

The *noun* (HDAS 1861) was almost certainly introduced during the Civil
War, presumably in relation to the Battle of Bull Run.

Here's another pre-war ex. of the verb. The nuance here is "hurry along"
rather than "run away":

1861 _Freedom's Champion_ (Atchison, Kans.) (Jan. 19) [unp.]: I woz a
whistlen & a kuttin a pine shingil with ma bran new jack-nife, as I
skedaddled along mi wa.

Moreover, and also from Kansas:

1861_White Cloud Kansas Chief_ (Feb. 28) 2:  Thurlow Weed..."skedaddled"
for home as soon as he read the report of Lincoln's speech at Indianapolis.

JL

On Mon, Apr 18, 2016 at 12:09 AM, Peter Reitan <pjreitan at hotmail.com> wrote:

> I included the story in an update to my Skedaddle piece last month:
>
>
> http://esnpc.blogspot.com/2015/02/the-blue-gray-and-runway-history-and.html?m=1
> ________________________________
> From: Ben Zimmer<mailto:bgzimmer at GMAIL.COM>
> Sent: ‎4/‎17/‎2016 19:56
> To: ADS-L at LISTSERV.UGA.EDU<mailto:ADS-L at LISTSERV.UGA.EDU>
> Subject: Re: Antedating of Skedaddle (1859)
>
> ---------------------- Information from the mail header
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> Sender:       American Dialect Society <ADS-L at LISTSERV.UGA.EDU>
> Poster:       Ben Zimmer <bgzimmer at GMAIL.COM>
> Subject:      Re: Antedating of Skedaddle (1859)
>
> -------------------------------------------------------------------------------
>
> Dave Wilton found the very same line in the Jan. 12, 1860 issue of The
> (Wellsboro, Penn.) Agitator, which evidently just reprinted the story
> from the previous month's Pittsburgh Post.
>
> http://listserv.linguistlist.org/pipermail/ads-l/2007-March/068364.html
> http://www.wordorigins.org/index.php/site/skedaddle/
>
> On Sun, Apr 17, 2016 at 10:11 PM, Baker, John <JBAKER at stradley.com> wrote:
> >
> > "Skedaddle" became popular with and is strongly associated with the
> Civil War;
> > the OED says it is "Orig. U.S. military slang, introduced during the
> Civil War of
> > 1861-5."  The earliest OED example is from 1861, although M-W says it
> dates
> > from 1860.  Here is an example from the Pittsburgh Daily Post, Dec. 12,
> 1859
> > (Newspapers.com),
> https://www.newspapers.com/clip/4516920/pittsburgh_daily_post/,
> > in which a Hoosier relates a story in which several men at a bar have
> > embarrassed themselves; the story ends with the line, "You'd oughter seen
> > that gang skedaddle."
>
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