REBEL YELL

There are three commonly held beliefs about the Rebel Yell. It is commonly believed that the Rebel Yell was inaugurated at the Battle of First Manassas by Stonewall Jackson, when he told his men "Reserve your fire until they come within 50 yards. Then fire and give them the bayonet, and when you charge, yell like Furies!" 

The second common belief is that it was a terrifying sound on the battlefield. In the PBS Documentary The Civil War, historian Shelby Foote quotes a Union soldier as saying "If you claim you heard it and weren't scared, that means you never heard it." Ambrose Bierce, himself a Union veteran, described the Rebel Yell in these words: "It was the ugliest sound that any mortal ever heard." Collected Works of Ambrose Bierce, page 277.

The third common belief is that nobody today knows what the Rebel Yell sounded like. This third belief is wrong. We have a pretty good idea what it sounded like, and it sounded nothing like "YEEEEHAWWW!!!"

In 1892 Private J. Harvie Dew, Company H, 9th Virginia Cavalry, gave a speech in which he demonstrated the Rebel Yell, and the speech was later published in the April issue of Century Magazine. Dew not only described the Rebel Yell, he described the corresponding Yankee Yell. Because he wandered somewhat from his subject, I have excised irrelevancies from the excerpt set out below. I should have excised his description of the military maneuver which the Confederates called the "skedaddle," but it has interest in its own right, so I left it in. I also left in his analysis of why the Rebel and Yankee Yells sounded so different:

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There is a natural tendency in the minds of most men, as they move onward along the “River of Time,” to forget, or in a great measure to obliterate from their memories, unpleasant things, and, on the contrary, to recall and treasure those that have contributed to their joys, comforts, and successes. With no one is this peculiarity more marked than with the old soldier. When he talks of his war experiences, it will constantly be found that his trials, privations, discomforts, and disappointments, have been largely forgotten or overshadowed by the memory of his comrades, of social gatherings around the camp-fires, of songs that were sung and stories told, of adventures and narrow escapes, of battles lost and victories won.

Among the incidents of active service there were probably no events more thrilling and more exciting to the soldier than those of a charge, for in its dash there were displayed not only the boldness and the fury of the occasion, but, of necessity, much of the savagery of war. 

It was in the charge that the “war-whoop” was heard, the savage “yell” with which men wild in battle endeavored to send terror to the minds of their enemies.

Each foe, in every clash of arms, sought to arouse all of the military energy, the enthusiastic vigor, the martial spirit, and the determined endeavor, which could possibly impress upon its enemy the overwhelming force with which its charge or its resistance was made, and no feature added more to the accomplishment of this purpose than the enthusiasm of the yell.

I was a member of the Ninth Virginia Cavalry, a follower of Stuart and his successors, and on many a well-fought field I have seen, listened to, and participated in charge after charge. The defenders of old Virginia were not by any means successful at all times in defeating their adversaries, and not infrequently by force of circumstances were induced to take their turn in a more or less graceful “skedaddle.” Whenever I was one of the “skedaddling corps,” I found some consolation in recalling a little family incident.

My grandfather was an officer in the war of 1812. Once in his old age, while relating to a number of his grandchildren gathered around him some of his experiences in war, he told of an encounter with the British in which his troops were forced to retreat in decided haste. One of the little boys who had been listening, with his mouth agape, no doubt, in the intensity of his interest, asked, “ And, grandpop, did you run?” The old man replied, “Ah, yes, my child; and braver men than your grandfather ran that day.”

That there existed a marked difference between the yells of the opposing armies during our late war was a recognized fact, and a frequent source of comment. The notes and tones peculiar to each of them were well defined, and led to their designation as the “Yankee” and the “Rebel” yells. It is interesting to note some of the reasons why they differed so widely.

Southerners have always been recognized by those who have known them best as a people possessed of unbounded enthusiasm and ardor. They have been considered and often called a “hot-headed,” a “hot-blooded,” people. Among the rank and file, as well as among the officers, of the Confederate armies, were to be found men of Intelligence, birth, position, and distinction in the communities in which they lived; men in whose veins ran the invigorating blood of the noblest ancestry; men who were proud in peace, courageous and fearless in war.

These peculiarities of birth, character, and temperament, coupled with the fact that they were chiefly an agricultural people inhabiting a broad expanse of country but thinly settled, and confined in no large numbers (comparatively) to the narrow limits that city and town life impose, had much to do with the development of their soldierly qualities as well as of their capacity for yelling.

Life in the country, especially in our Southern country, where people lived far apart and were employed oftentimes at a considerable distance from one another, and from the houses or homes in which they ate and slept, tended, by exercise in communicating with one another, to strengthen and improve their voices for high and prolonged notes. A wider range to the vocal sounds was constantly afforded and frequently required.

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The Federal, or “Yankee,” yell, compared with that of the Confederate, lacked in vocal breadth, pitch, and resonance. This was unquestionably attributable to the fact that the soldiery of the North was drawn and recruited chiefly from large cities and towns, from factory districts, and from the more densely settled portions of the country.

Their surroundings, their circumstances of life and employment, had the effect of molding the character and temperament of the people, and at the same time of restraining their vocal development. People living and working in close proximity to one another have no absolute need for loud or strained vocal efforts, and any screaming or prolonged calling becomes seriously annoying to neighbors. Consequently, all such liberties or inconsiderate indulgences in cities, towns, etc., have long ago been discouraged by common consent.

It is safe to say that there are thousands upon thousands of men in the large cities, and in other densely populated portions of the North, who have not elevated their vocal tones to within anything like their full capacity since the days of their boyhood, and many not even then.

To afford some idea of the differences between these “yells,” I will relate an incident which occurred in battle on the plains at Brandy Station, Virginia, in the fall of 1863. Our command was in full pursuit of a portion of Kilpatrick’s cavalry. We soon approached their reserves (ours some distance behind), and found ourselves facing a battery of artillery with a regiment of cavalry drawn up on each side. A point of woods projected to the left of their position. We were ordered to move by the right flank till the woods protected us from the battery, and then, in open field, within a few hundred yards of the enemy, we were ordered to halt and right dress.

In a moment more one of the Federal regiments was ordered to charge, and down they came upon us in a body two or three times outnumbering ours. Then was heard their peculiar characteristic yell — “Hoo-ray! Hoo-ray! Hoo-ray!” etc. (This yell was called by the Federals a “cheer,” and was intended for the word “hurrah,” but that pronunciation I never heard in a charge. The sound was as though the first syllable, if heard at all, was “ hoo,” uttered with an exceedingly short, low, and indistinct tone, and the second was “ ray,” yelled with a long and high tone slightly deflecting at its termination. In many instances the yell seemed to be the simple interjection “heigh,” rendered with the same tone which was given to “ray.”)

Our command was alone in the field, and it seemed impossible for us to withstand the coming shock; but our commander, as brave an officer as ever drew a saber, frequently repeated, as the charging column approached us, his precautionary orders, to “Keep steady, boys! Keep steady!” and so we remained till the Federals were within a hundred yards of us. Then, waving his sword in air, he gave the final order, loud enough to be heard the field over: “ Now is your time, boys! Give them the saber! Charge them, men! Charge!”

In an instant every voice with one accord vigorously shouted that “Rebel yell,” which was so often heard on the field of battle. “ Woh-who — ey! who — ey! who — ey! Woh-who — ey! who-ey! “ etc. (The best illustration of this “true yell” which can be given the reader is by spelling it as above, with direction to sound the first syllable “woh” short and low, and the second “who” with a very high and prolonged  note deflecting upon the third syllable “ey.”)

A moment or two later the Federal column wavered and broke. In pursuit we chased them to within twenty feet of their battery, which had already begun to retreat. The second regiment to the right and rear of the battery then charged upon us, and for a moment we were forced back; but by that time our reserves were up, and we swept the field.

In conclusion, let us rejoice in the fact that war and its incidental accompaniments are with us only in memory, and let us hope for our loved country, and for ourselves, that peace, happiness, and prosperity will dwell with us and our children’s children now and evermore.

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We need not be content to read about the Rebel Yell, we can actually hear it given by aging Confederate veterans. Here is a YouTube video of octogenarian Confederate veterans doing their best to re-create the Rebel Yell. As one of the veterans said before the demonstration, "We don't have much left, but we'll give it what we've got."

Imagine yourself confronted by a sea grey-clad teenagers armed with muskets, bayonets fixed, charging down upon you as fast as they could run, each one of them giving a youthful version of the Rebel Yell. I think you might agree with Ambrose Bierce that it was the ugliest sound any mortal ever heard. It's certainly more likely to make you want to "skedaddle" than "Hurrah!"