This encouraged Miss Morrison, and in 1928 she pledged her word that she had heard it so used at Lynchburg, Va., and also in Missouri.5 The Southern brethren were baffled by this, for the Confederate code of honor forbade questioning the word of a lady, so Axley had to content himself with slapping down a German professor who had stated incautiously, on what he had taken to be sound sub-Potomac evidence, that you-all was often reduced to you’ll.6 The professor, of course, was in error: the true contraction, as Axley explained, was and always has been y’all.7 At the same time Miss Elsie Lomax offered indirect testimony to the use of you-all in the singular by showing that a plural form, you-alls, prevailed in Kentucky and Tennessee. Early in 1929 a witness from Kansas testified that he was “addressed as you-all twice in the singular, in one day, at Lawrence,” the seat of the State university.1 The Southerners thus seemed to be routed, but in June, 1929, Axley returned to the battle with a polished reply to Miss Morrison, in which he argued that, even if you-all was occasionally used in the singular in the South, it was not “widespread,” and then retreated gracefully by referring unfavorably to Al Smith’s use of foist for first, to George Philip Krapp’s curious declaration that a.w.o.l. was pronounced as one word, áwol, in the Army, and to the imbecility of comic-strip bladder-writers who were trying to introduce I-all.2
In the years following various other depositions reporting you-all in the singular were printed in American Speech,3 but the Southerners stuck to their guns, and in 1944 they got sturdy support from Guy R. Vowles, a Northerner who testified that, in nineteen years in the South, he had never heard you-all used in the singular.4 Mr. Vowles added that he had often heard a second all added to you-all, as in “Y’ll all well?,” and cited support for it in the German “Geht es euch allen gut?”5 The I-all denounced by Axley is not recorded in any dictionary save Wentworth’s, where it appears only as a jocosity by a radio crooner. But Webster 1934 lists he-all, though not she-all, him-all or her-all. It also lists who-all. Wentworth lists he-all from Webster and records they-all, me-all and both we-all and we-alls, but omits the others. Oma Stanley says in “The Speech of East Texas”6 that the white freemen of that area use you-all “only as a plural,” express or understood, but that the blackamoors “may use it with singular meaning as a polite form.” Its declension in the Ozarks is thus given by Randolph:
It will be noted that us-all, which Wentworth finds in Kentucky and North Carolina, is omitted, and also he-all, she-all, her-all, him-all, his-all and them-all. In the same paradigm from which I have just quoted Randolph gives the following declension of the analogous forms in -un:
First Person
Nominative we-uns
Possessive we-uns
Objective us-uns
Second Person
Nominative you-uns
Possessive you-un’s
Objective you-uns
No singular forms and no third person forms are listed. Other observers, as Wentworth notes, have reported he-un, she-un, them-uns, this-un and that-un. Wentworth’s examples show that the use of -un is especially characteristic of Appalachian speech, though it has extended more or less into the lowlands. Some one once observed that the eastern slope of the mountains marks roughly the boundary between we-uns and you-all, and that the Potomac river similarly marks off the territory of you-all from that of the Northern yous. But such boundaries are always very vague. In 1888 L. C. Catlett, of Gloucester Court-House, Va., protested in the Century2 against the ascription of we-uns and you-uns to Tidewater Virginia speakers in some of the Civil War reminiscences then running in that magazine. He said: “I know all classes of people in Tidewater Virginia, the uneducated as well as the educated. I have never heard anyone say we-uns or you-uns. I have asked many people about these expressions. I have never yet found anyone who ever heard a Virginian use them.” But while this may have been true of Tidewater, it was certainly not true of the Virginia uplands, as a Pennsylvania soldier was soon testifying:
At the surrender of General Lee’s army, the Fifth Corps was designated by General Grant to receive the arms, flags, etc., and we were the last of the army to fall back to Petersburg, as our regiment (the 6th Pennsylvania Cavalry) was detailed to act as provost-guard in Appomattox Court-House. As we were passing one of the houses on the outskirts of the town, a woman who was standing at the gate made use of the following expression: “It is no wonder you-uns whipped we-uns. I have been yer three days, and you-uns ain’t all gone yet.”1
In the same issue of the Century Val. W. Starnes, of Augusta, Ga., reported hearing both we-uns and you-uns among “the po’ whites and pineywood tackeys” of Georgia, and also in the Cumberland Valley and in South Carolina. Wentworth gives examples from every State of the South, both east and west of the Mississippi, and Miss Jane D. Shenton, of Temple University, tells me that you-uns and you-unses are also common at Carlisle, Pa.2 Jespersen says that the pronouns in -uns are derived from a Scottish dialect.3 The DAE omits we-uns, but traces you-uns to 1810, when it was reported in Ohio by a lady traveler.4 It was new to her, and “what it means,” she said, “I don’t know.” With this solitary exception, neither you-uns nor we-uns was recorded by any observer of American speech before 1860. Socrates Hyacinth said in 18695 that he had first heard the form in the South during the Civil War, and Bartlett said in his fourth edition of 1877 that it was “developed during the war.”
“The pronoun of the second person singular” – to wit, thou —, says Wright in “The English Dialect Grammar,”6 “is in use in almost all the dialects of England to express familiarity or contempt, and also in times of strong emotion; it cannot be used to a superior without conveying the idea of impertinence.… In southern Scotland it has entirely disappeared from the spoken language and is only very occasionally heard in other parts of Scotland.” In the United States it dropped out of use at a very early date, and no writer on American speech so much as mentions it. The more old-fashioned American Quakers still use the objective thee for the nominative thou, and the singular verb with it, e.g., thee is and is thee? The question as to how, when and why this confusing and irrational use of thee originated has been debated at length, but there seems to be no agreement among the authorities.1
Margaret Schlauch suggests in “The Gift of Tongues”2 that this-here, these-here, those-there, them-there, and that-there may reveal a pair of real inflections in the making. That is to say, -here and -there may become assimilated eventually to the pronouns.3 Wright says in “The English Dialect Grammar”4 that in some of the English dialects -here has begun to take on the significance of proximity, not only in space but also in time, and that -there similarly connotes the past as well as distance. Wentworth’s examples show that this-here frequently occurs as this-’ere, this-yere, this-yer, thish-yer, and this-hyar, with like forms for these-here, and that the -there of that-there, those-there and them-there changes to -ere, -ar, -thar, -air, -are and -ah. Witherspoon, in 1781, listed this-here and that-there among vulgarisms prevailing in both England and America, and noted that they were used “very freely … by some merchants, whom I could name, in the English Parliament, whose wealth and not merit raised them to that dignity.” This use, he added, exposed them “to abundance of ridicule.” Mark Twain used thish-yer in his “Jumping Frog” story, 1865, and in “Tom Sawyer,” 1876, and this h-yere in “Huckleberry Finn,” 1884. The NED traces this-here to c. 1460, but offers no example of these-here before the Nineteenth Century. It traces that-there to 1742. All these forms are constantly and copiously in use in the American common speech.1
1 In the Art of Reading and Writing English; London, 1721, Isaac Watts the hymn-writer hazarded the guess that they were used “at first perhaps owing to a silly affectation, because it makes the words longer than really they are.”
2 A Grammar of the English Language. Vol. III. Syntax; Boston, 1931, p. 528.
3 The origin of some of these -n endings is not settled, but it seems likely that the suffix may derive from own. Major William D. W
orkman, Jr., tells me that his own, as in “That is his own,” is in use in Charleston, S. C.
4 See AL4, p. 460.
5 The DAE says, in discussing everyone, that “the pronoun is often plural: the absence of a singular plural of common gender rendering this violation of grammatical concord sometimes necessary,” but under everybody it calls the sequence “incorrect.” I am indebted here to An Author Replies, by C. A. Lloyd, American Speech, Oct., 1939, p. 210.
6 A patient’s letter in the Journal of the American Medical Association, March 25, 1939. Singular nouns are followed by plural pronouns in many other situations. Here is a specimen from one of the late Will Rogers’s newspaper pieces, 1931: “This is the heyday of the shyster lawyer and they defend each other for half rates.” Also, singular pronouns are followed by plural verbs, as in the omnipresent he don’t. One of the late Woodrow Wilson’s daughters is authority for the statement that he used he don’t in the family circle. See Current English Forum, by J. B. McMillan, English Journal, Nov., 1943, pp. 519–20.
1 AL4, p. 134, n. 4.
2 The New American Language, Forum, May, p. 754.
3 French on – English one, by George L. Trager, Romanic Review, 1931, pp. 311–17.
4 AL4, p. 203, and Supplement I, p. 425.
5 See? Liverpool Echo, Sept. 21, 1938. I am indebted here to Mr. P. E. Cleator.
1 The Post Impressionist, Aug. 20, 1935.
2 My Particular Aversions, American Bookman, Winter, 1944, p. 39. Many other holes in the English vocabulary have been noted by the ingenious. See Needed Words, by Logan Pearsall Smith, S.P.E. Tract No. XXXI, 1928, pp. 313–29; Words Wanted in Connection With Art, the same, pp. 330–32; The New American Language, Forum, May, 1927, pp. 752–56; Verbal Novelties, American Speech, Oct., 1938, p. 240 (broster is proposed for brother and sister) and Needed Words, by H. L. Mencken, Chicago Herald-Examiner (and other papers), Sept, 10, 1934. See also AL4, p. 175.
3 I am indebted here to Mr. P. A. Browne, of the English Board of Education.
4 Dec., 1926, p. 163.
5 Who’s There? – Me, Oct., 1933, pp. 58–63. The Saturday Review of Literature, then edited by Henry S. Canby, jumped aboard the C.E.E.B. band-wagon on Aug. 14, 1926, p. 33.
1 Conservatism in American Speech, Oct., 1925, pp. 1–17.
2 Chapters on English; London, 1918, pp. 99–114. Reprinted from Progress in Language; London, 1894; second edition, 1909.
3 Macbeth, V.
4 Modern English in the Making, by George H. McKnight; New York, 1928, p. 195.
5 Who’s There? – Me, above cited, p. 62. Any American politician who proposed to change the name of the Why-Not-Me? Club, the trades union of the fraternity, to the Why-Not-I? Club would go down to instant ignominy and oblivion.
6 Affected and Effeminate Words, American Speech, Feb., 1938, pp. 13–18.
7 Vol. III, Part 2, Map 603.
1 The Way You Say It, by Doris Greenberg, Times Magazine, April 7.
2 This is Me, Time, April 1, 1946. There is a legend at Princeton (Princeton Alumni Weekly, Feb. 4, 1927, p. 521) that when James McCosh was president there (1868–88) he one night knocked on a student’s door, and on being greeted with “Who’s there?,” answered “It’s me, Mr. McCosh.” The student, unable to imagine the president of the college using “so un-grammatical an expression,” bade him go to the devil. But that was a long while ago.
3 It is Me, Saturday Review of Literature. The date, unhappily not determined, was after Aug. 14, 1926.
4 The Irregularities of English, S.P.E. Tract No. XLVIII, 1937, pp. 286–91.
5 p. 332.
6 The Language of Pepys’s Diary, Queen’s Quarterly, Vol. LIII, No. 1, 1946. Other examples are in The Sullen Lovers, by Thomas Shad-well, I, 1668, and The Relapse, by John Vanbrugh, V, 1698.
7 Hypercorrect English, American Speech, Oct., 1937, pp. 176 and 177.
1 Silva Says Killing Prompted by Insults at He and Buddy, Los Angeles Examiner, June 25, 1925, p. 2.
2 For example, in a letter from New York to the Alta Californian (San Francisco), May 18, 1867.
3 Horrible examples from Liberty, the Red Book, Common Sense, the Commonweal and an Associated Press dispatch are assembled by Dwight L. Bolinger in Whoming, Words, Sept., 1941, p. 70.
4 Affected and Effeminate Words, already cited.
5 Conservatism in American Speech, American Speech, Oct., 1925, p. 14
1 On Who and Whom, American Speech, Feb., 1930, pp. 25–55.
2 Troublesome Relatives, American Speech, June, 1931, pp. 341–46.
3 Piccalilli on the Vernacular, Saturday Review of Literature, Jan. 27, 1945, p. 14.
4 South-western Slang, by Socrates Hyacinth, Overland Monthly, Aug., 1869, p. 131.
1 Smith was a North Carolinian, born in 1864, and took his Ph.D. in English at the Johns Hopkins in 1893. After leaving the University of North Carolina in 1909 he became professor of English at the University of Virginia. In 1917 he moved to the Naval Academy as head of the English department, and there he remained until his death in 1924. He was the author of New Words Self-Defined, 1919, and many other books.
2 You All as Used in the South, July. This paper was reprinted in the Kit-Kat (Cincinnati), Jan., 1920.
3 Jan. 2, 1904.
4 M. F. H., Jan. 16, 1904. Both communications were printed in the Times Saturday Review of Books.
5 See also You-all in English and American Literature, by H. P. Johnson, Alumni Bulletin (University of Virginia), Jan., 1924, pp. 28–33; Shakespeare and Southern You-all, by Edwin F. Shewmake, American Speech, Oct., 1938, pp. 163–68; The Southerners’ You-all, by E. Hudson Long, Southern Literary Messenger, Oct., 1939. pp. 652–55, and You-all in the Bible, by Darwin F. Boock, American Mercury, Feb., 1933, p. 246.
1 In Dixie is Different, Printer’s Ink, Sept. 28, 1945, p. 23, D. C. Schnabel, of Shreveport, La., thus advised Northern advertisement writers: “And don’t – don’t – don’t have your copy character in the South saying you-all to one person. (Hollywood please copy.) It sounds as incongruous in the South as to say they is.”
1 Vol. I, Part X, 1896, p. 411.
2 You All and We All, American Speech, Dec., 1926, p. 133.
3 You-all, American Speech, Aug., 1927, p. 476.
4 The Grammar of the Ozark Dialect, American Speech, Oct., 1927, p. 5.
5 You-all Again, American Speech, Oct., 1928, pp. 54–55.
6 The professor was Walther Fischer, of Giessen: You-all, American Speech, Sept., 1927, p. 496.
7 Y’all, American Speech, Dec., 1928, p. 103.
1 More Testimony, American Speech, April, 1929, p. 328.
2 For more about I-all see Mr. Axley and You-all, by Herbert B. Bernstein, American Speech, Dec., 1929, p. 173.
3 For example, in You-all Again, by T. W. Perkins, April, 1931, p. 304 (in Arkansas), and More You-all Testimony, by Thomas C. Blaisdell, June, 1931, pp. 390–91 (North Carolina).
4 A Few Observations on Southern You-all, American Speech, April, 1944, pp. 146–47.
5 Further discussions are in The Truth About You-all, by Bertram H. Brown, American Mercury, May, 1933, p. 116; You-all Again, New York Times (editorial), Jan. 15, 1945; As It is Spoken, Journal of the American Medical Association (Tonics and Sedatives), May 20, 1944, and You-all, by H. L. Mencken, New York American (and other papers), July 16, 1934. See also Bartlett’s Familiar Quotations; eleventh edition; New York, 1937, p. 952.
6 pp. 98–99.
1 The Grammar of the Ozark Dialect, American Speech, Oct., 1927, p. 6.
2 Aug., pp. 477–78.
1 Notes on We-uns and You-uns, by George S. Scypes, Century, Oct., 1888, p. 799. There is a similar story in Americanisms: The English of the New World, by M. Schele de Vere; New York, 1872, p. 569. A Confederate soldier captured by Sheridan in the charge through Rockfish Gap is credited with “We didn’t know you-uns was around us all, and we-uns reckoned we was all safe, till you-uns came ridin’ down like mad through the gap and scooped up
we-uns jest like so many herrin’.”
2 Private communication, July 14, 1937.
3 A Modern English Grammar; Heidelberg, 1922, Part II, Vol. I, p. 262.
4 A Journey to Ohio in 1810, by Margaret V. (Dwight) Bell; not published until 1920.
5 South-western Slang, Overland Monthly, Aug., p. 131.
6 p. 272.
1 The Speech of Plain Friends, by Kate Watkins Tibbals, American Speech, Jan., 1926, pp. 193–209; Quaker Thee and Its History, by Ezra Kempton Maxfield, American Speech, Sept., 1926, pp. 638–44; Quaker Thou and Thee, by the same, American Speech, June, 1929, pp. 359–61; Nominative Thou and Thee in Quaker English, by Atcheson L. Hench, American Speech, June, 1929, pp. 361–63; Some Peculiarities of Quaker Speech, by Anne Wistar Comfort, American Speech, Feb., 1933, pp. 12–14; and Thee and Thou, by William Platt, and The Quakers, by Isabel Wyatt, both in the London Observer, March 6, 1938.
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