[Ads-l] An early F-word euphemism?

[Amy West]

On 9/21/24 00:03, ADS-L automatic digest system wrote:
> Date:    Fri, 20 Sep 2024 22:54:40 +0000
> From:    Bill Mullins<amcombill at HOTMAIL.COM>
> Subject: An early F-word euphemism?
>
> My son is a history buff, so while taking him from a doctor's appointment to his school today we were listening to the podcast "History That Doesn't Suck", regarding the Mexican-American war.  In preparation for what became the Battle of El Brazito, one of the officers sees a dust cloud and, fearing it is the approach of enemy troops, says "That looks forked!".  The podcaster says that in modern slang, he means that "We're totally [bleeped]" (the podcast seems to be targeted for a lay audience, and the language is no worse than PG).
>
> There's a bibliography for the podcast online, and the source is
> Woodworth, Steven E. Manifest Destinies: America’s Westward Expansion and the Road to the Civil War,
> which says "by which he meant it appeared dangerous."
>
> Woodworth's original source is a contemporary journal by one of the troops:
>
> 1847 Journal of Marcellus Ball Edwards, manuscript reprinted in Ralph P. Bieber, Marching with the Army of the West 1846-1848 (1936) 229
>
> [describing events before the Battle of El Brazito, Mexican-American War, 25 Dec 1846]
>
> So Colonel Doniphan and staff, each personifying one of the guard, sat down at a game of loo to determine who should be the owner of the horse. Some one, seeing a dust rising below, pointed it out to the colonel. He looked up and said, “That does look rather suspicious,” but threw down a card and said, “Play to that and that,” until he had finished his hand. And then [he] got up and took another look at the dust, and turning to his staff said, “By God, that looks forked! Come, mount your horses and be off to see what causes it,” and at the same time directed that the men should be formed on foot in case it should prove to be a Mexican army.
>
> https://archive.org/details/marchingwitharmy0000ralp/page/229/mode/1up?q=forked
>
> I'm inclined to believe that Col Doniphan either said "That looks f-d" and it was bowdlerized in the soldier's journal, or he said "forked" but meant it as a euphemism.

I'm disinclined to read it that way. I'm inclined to read it literally: 
He's seeing that the dust cloud has split, suggesting a group of humans 
dividing their forces instead of a herd of animals traveling together. I 
think there's less likelihood of use of a euphemism either in in-group 
speech or in a journaling context.

---Amy West

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