“Unraveling the Mystery: Why Uncle Sam Really Calls Americans ‘Yankees’—The Surprising History You Never Knew!”
The original sheet music for this noted that the song should be sung “through the nose, & in the West Country drawl & dialect.” In other words, it was meant to not only be mocking in lyrics, but tone. As for “Brother Ephraim,” this is thought to refer to Colonel Ephraim Williams of the Massachusetts militia, who ultimately was killed at the Battle of Lake George during the French and Indian War.
Upon completing the lyrics, purportedly Dr. Shuckburg gave it over to the Continental marching band who played “amid shouts of laughter in the English ranks.”
Whoever really wrote it, by 1768, the Boston Journal of the Times noted that the British were playing “that ‘Yankee Doodle’ song,” though the Times didn’t elaborate on what the lyrics were to this version. At this point, the song was constantly being remixed with slightly different lyrics, tunes and meanings, as was common for pretty much all popular songs at the time.
What united many of the earliest versions of this song was the not-so-subtle mocking of colonists as nothing more than moronic, unsophisticated, country yokels. For instance, after George Washington was made commander of the rebel armies, some unknown individual wrote the following lyrics,
Then Congress sent great Washington,
All clothed in power and breeches,
To meet old Britain’s warlike sons
And make some rebel speeches
Yet another version included the lines,
Yankee Doodle came to town,
For to buy a firelock, (a musket)
We will tar and feather him,
And so we will John Hancock.
