Francis Orray Ticknor
Now bring me out my buckskin suit!
My pouch and powder, too!
We’ll see if seventy-six can shoot
As sixteen used to do.
Old Bess! we’ve kept our barrels bright!
Our trigger quick and true!
As far, if not as _fine_ a sight,
As long ago we drew!
And pick me out a trusty flint!
A real white and blue,
Perhaps ’twill win the _other_ tint
Before the hunt is through!
Give boys your brass percussion caps!
Old “shut-pan” suits as well!
There’s something in the _sparks:_ perhaps
There’s something in the smell!
We’ve seen the red-coat Briton bleed!
The red-skin Indian, too!
We’ve never thought to draw a bead
On Yanke-doodle-doo!
But, Bessie! bless your dear old heart!
Those days are mostly done;
And now we must revive the art
Of shooting on the run!
If Doodle must be meddling, why,
There’s only this to do–
Select the black spot in his eye,
And let the daylight through!
And if he doesn’t like the way
That Bess presents the view,
He’ll maybe change his mind, and stay
Where the good Doodles do!
Where Lincoln lives. The man, you know,
Who kissed the Testament;
To keep the Constitution? No!
_To keep the Government!_
We’ll hunt for Lincoln, Bess! old tool,
And take him half and half;
We’ll aim to _hit_ him, if a fool,
And _miss_ him, if a calf!
We’ll teach these shot-gun boys the tricks
By which a war is won;
Especially how Seventy-six
Took Tories on the run.
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Analysis (AI Assisted)
This poem takes the voice of an older generation calling itself back into action, using humor, memory, and bravado to turn the past into a weapon for the present. It frames the coming conflict as a revival rather than a rupture. The speaker does not imagine learning something new, only dusting off old skills and old tools. The buckskin suit, the powder horn, and “Old Bess” are not just equipment but symbols of legitimacy. If the weapons of 1776 worked once, the poem argues, they can work again.
The tone is deliberately playful, even mocking. There is a lot of wit packed into the lines, especially in the teasing contrasts between flintlocks and percussion caps, old men and boys, tradition and modern methods. This humor lowers the emotional cost of what is being proposed. Violence is wrapped in jokes, puns, and folksy confidence. The poem wants killing to feel like craft, sport, or inherited skill rather than something grim or destabilizing.
History is the poem’s main authority. References to British redcoats, Native Americans, and Tories are used to build a sense of long-earned toughness. The speaker claims experience across generations of conflict, suggesting that fighting is almost habitual, a cultural reflex. This move sidesteps the moral uniqueness of the present war. By treating it as just another chapter in a familiar pattern, the poem flattens distinctions between revolution, frontier violence, and civil war.
The language aimed at the enemy is casual and dismissive. “Yanke-doodle-doo” and “Doodle” reduce the opponent to a caricature, someone unserious and deserving of correction. This kind of naming strips the enemy of individuality and complexity. It also allows the speaker to frame the conflict as reluctantly forced rather than chosen. The poem insists, more than once, that this is not what the speaker wanted, but something he must now do because the other side is “meddling.”
The most striking shift comes when the poem names Lincoln. At that point, the humor sharpens into something more pointed and personal. Lincoln is not treated as a distant symbol but as a target of ridicule and threat. The poem contrasts the Constitution and the government to argue that authority has been misplaced, that power has become self-serving rather than principled. This distinction is central to the poem’s justification for resistance. It presents violence not as rebellion, but as correction.
Even so, the poem cannot fully escape contradiction. It leans heavily on the memory of 1776, but that memory is simplified. The Revolution becomes a story of marksmanship and resolve, not politics, compromise, or uncertainty. By turning history into a set of shooting lessons, the poem reduces complex events into a usable myth. That myth is effective for motivation, but it is thin as understanding.
As war poetry, the piece functions best as morale-building propaganda for those who already agree with its assumptions. It reassures older readers that they still matter, that their experience is relevant, and that the past is on their side. It also reassures younger fighters that they are inheriting something proven. What it avoids, deliberately, is any recognition that fighting former countrymen is fundamentally different from fighting foreign enemies or distant figures from memory.
The poem’s energy comes from confidence, not reflection. It does not ask whether the old tools still fit the new world, only whether the hands holding them are steady. In doing so, it captures a mindset common at the outbreak of civil conflict: the belief that history can be replayed, that skill and righteousness will be enough, and that the consequences will look like the stories already told.