Jeff in Petticoats

DESCRIPTION: Jefferson Davis realizes he is in danger of capture by Union troops, and decides to dress in women's clothes to escape. The Union troops scorn him, saying, "Oh! Jeffy D. You 'flow'r of chivalree... Your empire's but a tinclad skirt...."
AUTHOR: Words: George Cooper / Music: Henry Tucker
EARLIEST DATE: 1865 (sheet music published by William Pond, according to Silber-SongsOfTheCivilWar)
KEYWORDS: cross-dressing disguise escape Civilwar
HISTORICAL REFERENCES:
April 2, 1865 - Robert E. Lee evacuates Richmond. The Confederate government flees
April 8, 1865 - Lee's surrender
May 10, 1865 - Capture of Jefferson Davis
FOUND IN:
REFERENCES (6 citations):
Silber-SongsOfTheCivilWar, pp. 343-345, "Jeff in Petticoats" (1 text, 1 tune)
Wolf-AmericanSongSheets, #1100, p. 75, "Jeff in Petticoats" (1 references)
Messerli-ListenToTheMockingbird, pp. 151-154, "Jeff in Petticoats" (1 text)
Gilbert-LostChords, pp. 11-12, "Jeff in Petticoats" (1 partial text)
Dime-Song-Book #16, pp. 38-39, "Jeff. in Petticoats" (1 text)
DT, JEFFPETT*
Roud #V16142
NOTES [456 words]: The notes in Silber-SongsOfTheCivilWar say the words to this are by Henry Tucker and the words by George Cooper, but the sheet music I have seen reverses that -- and Cooper was a lyricist and Tucker a composer, so I'm quite sure the sheet music is right.
This song was not a great success, as far as I can tell, but in 1869, Tucker and Cooper (who had started his career penning words for Stephen Foster, without writing anything any good) produced "Sweet Genevieve," which was a distinct success. Tucker also wrote the tune for "When This Cruel War Is Over (Weeping Sad and Lonely."
When the Civil War ended, the top Confederate generals, Robert E. Lee and Joseph E. Johnston, both surrendered and went briefly into Federal custody. But Confederare President Jefferson Davis continued to flee. Understandably, since there was a good deal of talk of hanging him, especially after Abraham Lincoln was assassintage.
According to Davis's account, he was wearing a shawl his wife had given him for warmth when he was captured by Union troops as he fled the collapse of the Confederacy. Union troops claimed he was trying to disguise himself as a woman. Although Davis's account is likely true, sarcastic Unionist propagandists could hardly leave it at that.
Harold Holzer, in Gabor S. Boritt, edit, Jefferson Davis's Generals, Oxford University Press, 1999, p. 149, writes, "As portrayed in successively exaggerated graphics, in separate sheet prints, carte-de-visit photographs, sheet music, comic pamphlets, and in cartoons in the illustrated press, the thoroughly humiliated president was shown in hoopskirts or petticoats, wearing a (sometimes feathered) bonnet, even daintily waving a far. Beneath each disguise was the easily identifiable Davis, sporting his familiar goatee, and revealed to be wearing riding boots adorned with spurs, looking almost like a man imitating a man impersonating a woman.... It should not be overlooked that Davis's 'petticoat' image also proliferated alongside -- and stood in sharp contrast to -- the postwar image of another famous Confederate, Robert E. Lee" (who was generally portrayed in dignified poses).
To make matters worse, there were few printers able to produce counter-propaganda. Everyone knows that the Confederacy lacked the ability to make shoes, railroad equipment; etc.; Holzer, on p.143 of Boritt, reports that they couldn't even make paper or proper inks, and most of their typesetters and engravers ended up in the army anyway. By the end of the war, the Confederate printing industry was in ruins, and the South apparently had no ability to make engraved images at all. So the only images of Davis were the ones printed in the north, which encouraged satirical works like this. - RBW
Last updated in version 7.1
File: Gil011

Go to the Ballad Search form
Go to the Ballad Index Song List

Go to the Ballad Index Instructions
Go to the Ballad Index Bibliography or Discography