Yankee Doodle

A 19th-century painting of the siege of Yorktown, with the Marquis de Lafayette depicted to the right of George Washington (center, right). A popular story suggests that Lafayette ordered the Continental fife and drum corps to play “Yankee Doodle” as the defeated British soldiers marched out to surrender after the battle. Public domain via Wikimedia Commons In the fall of 1781, American soldiers clashed with the British during a three-week battle in Yorktown, Virginia. Aided by French allies, the Continental Army outnumbered and outfought the British troops. As the British marched out to surrender after this final battle of the American Revolution, they reportedly refused to look at the Continental soldiers, instead facing only the French. According to legend , the famous French general the Marquis de Lafayette wouldn’t stand for this insubordination. He ordered the Continental fife and drum corps to play “Yankee Doodle ,” a song that the British had originally used to mock American colonists. That day, the tune took on new resonance as both an act of defiance and a display of victory against the patriots’ adversaries. The British soldiers solemnly acknowledged the Continental Army, admitting to their defeat—or so the (possibly apocryphal ) story goes. Written in 1940, Woody Guthrie ’s “This Land Is Your Land ” argues that all Americans have a right to share in the bounty of the United States’ land and resources. (More recently, Native American activists have pointed out that this view ignores their ancestors’ presence in North America prior to European colonization.) Another popular protest song, “We Shall Overcome ,” emerged as an anthem of the civil rights movement in the 1960s. Traditional lore suggests that Richard Shuckburgh , a British Army physician, penned the lyrics to “Yankee Doodle” as early as 1755, during the French and Indian War . Hildebrand believes otherwise. He argues that the memorable lines “Yankee Doodle went to town, / Riding on a pony” date to the mid-19th century. The earliest known mention of the words “pony,” “feather” and “macaroni” in a rendition of “Yankee Doodle” appears in English writer James Orchard Halliwell-Phillipps’ The Nursery Rhymes of England , published in 1842. “It’s a folk song by definition,” says Hildebrand, “meaning it just sort of came from the people somewhere.” Over the centuries, historians have proposed no fewer than 16 explanations for the creation of “Yankee Doodle.” These theories range from the Shuckburgh story to the suggestion that the song originated as a ditty poking fun at Oliver Cromwell , England’s lord protector during the 1650s. Other accounts trace “Yankee Doodle” to Hungary, Ireland or the Netherlands. When librarian and musicologist Oscar Sonneck set out to examine these theories in the 1970s, however, he found that none held up under scrutiny. While the early history of “Yankee Doodle” is obscure, the song was indisputably in circulation by the 1760s. The composition’s catchy and upbeat melody, as well as its quick rhythmic pattern and repetition, made it easily recognizable—an ideal quality in a protest song. The composition’s status as a protest song continued over the centuries. Confederate soldiers sang variations of it during the Civil War to make fun of Union soldiers, and vice versa. “Yankee Doodle” was also prevalent during the War of 1812 . It eventually became an enduring symbol of patriotism, and American playwright George M. Cohan revived the tune as “The Yankee Doodle Boy ” in his 1904 Broadway show, Little Johnny Jones. The song’s catchy melody made it convenient for printers to publish new, often political, lyrics to accompany the music. “If you already know a melody, it’s much easier to write new words to it,” Hildebrand says. He adds that these lyrics often comprised “low-class words designed to insult, tease and berate.” The many surviving versions of “Yankee Doodle ” are distinct. But the melody’s best-known lyrics likely didn’t c