Keepin’ Jeff in the Whale’s Belly

Gen. Lew Wallace (between 1861 and 1865; LOC: LC-DIG-cwpbh-00934)

Lew Wallace - flamboyant toast

From the Richmond Daily Dispatch November 19, 1861:

Black Republican Decency.

–We clip the following from the Evansville (Ia.) [In.?] Journal of the 6th, and give it as a specimen:

A Rick Town. [?]–Lew, Wallace, after the reception of his commission as Brigadier-General, gave a Notification to the gallant 11th regiment. Among the standing toasts drank on that occasion was the following toast in boner [honor?] to Jeff. Davis:

May he be set afloat in an open boat without rudder or compass; may that boat and contents be swallowed by a shark, and the shark swallowed by a whale, that whale in the devil’s belly, and the devil in hell, the door locked and key lost — and further — may he be chained in the southwest corner of hell, a northeast wind blow ashes in his eyes to all eternity, G — d d– him.

The Eleventh Indiana Regiment of Zouaves... (Harper's Weekly, 1861 July 20; LOC: LC-USZ62-55174)

Colonel Wallace had the 11th Indiana dancing together in camp

Lew Wallace was a lawyer and state senator in his home state of Indiana:

At the start of the American Civil War, Wallace was appointed state adjutant general and helped raise troops in Indiana. On April 25, 1861, he was appointed Colonel of the 11th Indiana Infantry. After brief service in western Virginia, he was promoted to brigadier general of volunteers on September 3 and given the command of a brigade.

To the extent that this is a factual story, it seems that Wallace is making sure there is no redemption for Jefferson Davis a la the biblical Jonah … or for that matter, like a theme in Ben-Hur: A Tale of the Christ, Wallace’s 1880 book.

Illustrated Civil War "Union Envelopes": The Traitor's Doom, or Jeff. Davis "Alone" (between 1861 and 1865; LOC: LC-USZ62-53599)

Jeff Davis on wartime Union envelope

The Southern Confederacy a fact!!! Acknowledged by a might prince and faithful ally (Philada. : L. Hough Publ., 1861; LOC: LC-USZ62-89624)

Soulmates

Wallace_Ben-Hur_cover

Published in 1880

Ben Hur-1925 movie

1925 flick

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