Your class was introduced to the Reconstruction of the South on Mon., 10/4, and Tues., 10/5. Please click on the YouTube link below to listen to a song written by a former Confederate Army officer after the Civil War:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=yooAFCUqe0o
Lyrics:
Oh, I’m a good old rebel, now that’s just what I am.
And for this Yankee nation I do not give a damn.
I’m glad I fought agin’ her, I only wish we’d won,
And I ain’t asked any pardon for anything I’ve done.
I hates the Yankee nation, and everything they do;
I hates the Declaration of Independence, too.
I hates the glorious Union, ‘tis dripping with our blood;
And I hates the striped banner – I fit [fought] it all I could.
I rode with Robert E. Lee for three years nearabout,
Got wounded in four places and I starved at Point Lookout.
I cotch [caught] the rheumatism a-campin’ in the snow,
But I killed a chance of Yankees, and I’d like to kill some mo’.
Three hundred thousand Yankees is stiff in Southern dust;
We got three hundred thousand before they conquered us.
They died of Southern fever, and Southern steel and shot;
And I wish they were three million instead of what we got.
I can’t take up my musket and fight ‘em now no more,
But I ain’t gonna love ‘em, now that is certain sure.
And I don’t want no pardon for what I was and am,
And I won’t be reconstructed and I do not give a damn.
Oh, I’m a good old rebel, now that’s just what I am.
And for this Yankee nation I do not give a damn.
I’m glad I fought agin’ [against] her, I only wish we’d won,
And I ain’t asked any pardon for anything I’ve done.
•“The Good Old Rebel” was very popular among former Confederate soldiers who disliked the Reconstruction policies of the federal government.
•Many of these former rebels headed west to Texas and Mexico to avoid Reconstruction.
•This song exemplifies the resistance and anger that many Southerners felt toward the policies of Reconstruction.
•Your task in the next few days is to determine why Reconstruction was so opposed in the South.
Questions
•What were three words or phrases that showed the attitude of the rebels in “The Good Old Rebel?”
•Identify three items that the song seems to dislike.
•Identify any events that seem to be significant to the song’s narrator
Lyrics:
Oh, I’m a good old rebel, now that’s just what I am.
And for this Yankee nation I do not give a damn.
I’m glad I fought agin’ her, I only wish we’d won,
And I ain’t asked any pardon for anything I’ve done.
I hates the Yankee nation, and everything they do;
I hates the Declaration of Independence, too.
I hates the glorious Union, ‘tis dripping with our blood;
And I hates the striped banner – I fit [fought] it all I could.
I rode with Robert E. Lee for three years nearabout,
Got wounded in four places and I starved at Point Lookout.
I cotch [caught] the rheumatism a-campin’ in the snow,
But I killed a chance of Yankees, and I’d like to kill some mo’.
Three hundred thousand Yankees is stiff in Southern dust;
We got three hundred thousand before they conquered us.
They died of Southern fever, and Southern steel and shot;
And I wish they were three million instead of what we got.
I can’t take up my musket and fight ‘em now no more,
But I ain’t gonna love ‘em, now that is certain sure.
And I don’t want no pardon for what I was and am,
And I won’t be reconstructed and I do not give a damn.
Oh, I’m a good old rebel, now that’s just what I am.
And for this Yankee nation I do not give a damn.
I’m glad I fought agin’ [against] her, I only wish we’d won,
And I ain’t asked any pardon for anything I’ve done.
•“The Good Old Rebel” was very popular among former Confederate soldiers who disliked the Reconstruction policies of the federal government.
•Many of these former rebels headed west to Texas and Mexico to avoid Reconstruction.
•This song exemplifies the resistance and anger that many Southerners felt toward the policies of Reconstruction.
•Your task in the next few days is to determine why Reconstruction was so opposed in the South.
Questions
•What were three words or phrases that showed the attitude of the rebels in “The Good Old Rebel?”
•Identify three items that the song seems to dislike.
•Identify any events that seem to be significant to the song’s narrator