Trivia 8-31-16 Slang

[57th Indiana Infantry]

Noncombatants

Besides the fighting population of our camps there is a population constitutionally opposed to warfare—cooks, ambulance nurses, stretcher-bearers, shirks, and sometimes surgeons, who all come under the class technically called bummers. These are treated by the fighting men with a sort of cool contempt, no matter whether necessity or inclination keeps them to the rear, and they have a hard time. Frequently the rear of the army is a much more dangerous location than the front line, for the missiles passing over the front line must fall somewhere, and often demoralize whole hosts of "bummers," who build up miniature fortifications to live in and collect together in crowds ; for misery loves company. Any favorable ravine thus peopled immediately becomes denominated "Bummer's Roost." Here they spend their days in cooking for their nurses, if they are cooks, or attending to their own business, if their object be to escape duty and danger.

 

[Montana Territory]

The Ambulance Corps - "Bummer" was used to describe a person opposed to warfare or a person who was safely to the rear of the army or otherwise away from combat. Surgeons, doctors, ambulance nurses, and stretcher-bearers all came under the class technically called bummers.

Additionally, "bummer's roost" was slang for a place behind the line where these and other noncombatants such as chaplains, quartermasters, and cooks stayed, and the phrase "hospital bummer" referred to a soldier who faked an injury or overstated one so he could avoid combat and relax in a military hospital.


http://www.usa-civil-war.com/Civil_War/definitions.html
http://alt.politics.liberal.narkive...ries-your-high-school-teacher-didn-t-tell-you
https://books.google.com/books?
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/ U.S. Ambulance Corps
https://books.google.com/books?id=w2UlAQAAMAAJ&pg=PA190&dq=hospital+corps+surgeon+bummer+civil+war&hl=en&sa=X&ved=0ahUKEwiHzbXZl-3OAhXBKCYKHQg3DvIQ6AEIMjAE#v=onepage&q=hospital corps surgeon bummer civil war&f=false
https://books.google.com/books?id=3aEJZRIxjDAC&pg=PA150&dq=hospital+bummer+civil+war&hl=en&sa=X&ved=0ahUKEwjgh-LIku3OAhVLySYKHcVsDckQ6AEIIzAB#v=onepage&q=hospital bummer civil war&f=false
https://books.google.com/books?id=m-XpP_pdANcC&pg=PA143&dq=hospital+bummer+civil+war&hl=en&sa=X&ved=0ahUKEwjgh-LIku3OAhVLySYKHcVsDckQ6AEIHjAA#v=onepage&q=hospital bummer civil war&f=false

 

[chellers]

Sailors with the inland US Navy used the term "bummers" for the mortar schooners and their crews. Also called Mortar Boats, these small flat-type boats carried a huge artillery and mortar that were essentially floating explosive devices. They could be floated on the river and used as needed for battle.

https://books.google.com/books?id=M...q=civil war navy mortar boats bummers&f=false

 

[adisciu9]

Best I could find was forage hats also being called bummers. No CW unit but one in Vietnam 99th Bummers (USAF).

 

[ErnieMac]

I have a source (see below) that shows the term used Commissary and Quartermaster officers on the "front lines" in Washington, DC:

Bummer. An idle, worthless fellow without any visible means of support. A word much used by our soldiers during the late civil war. The "New York Herald," May 2, 1876, thus describes the individual: The army bummer is usually a "General" who has been in the Quartermaster's or Commissary Department, and whose rank represents influence about the War Office, and days and nights of hard duty about Willard's and the Arlington. Since the war, he has been very "loyal." He has "sustained" the Union, and "supported the government. Unable to earn an honest living, without brains for any position higher than that of a car conductor, he lives by lobbying.He knows the inside of every office, the favorite wine of a secretary, and the kind of dinner fancied by this statesman or the other. So, in time, he finds himself in the enjoyment of a good income, for which he does nothing but eat and drink and talk. He is a disgrace to the army, whose uniform he wears for his own gain.
​

or to describe cooks, runners, stretcher bearers, etc. who generally remain behind the front lines during battle.

Besides the fighting population of our camps there is a population constitutionally opposed to warfare—cooks, ambulance nurses, stretcher-bearers, shirks, and sometimes surgeons, who all come under the class technically called bummers. These are treated by the fighting men with a sort of cool contempt, no matter whether necessity or inclination keeps them to the rear, and they have a hard time. Frequently the rear of the army is a much more dangerous location than the front line, for the missiles passing over the front line must fall somewhere, and often demoralize whole hosts of "bummers," who build up miniature fortifications to live in and collect together in crowds ; for misery loves company. Any favorable ravine thus peopled immediately becomes denominated "Bummer's Roost." Here they spend their days in cooking for their nurses, if they are cooks, or attending to their own business, if their object be to escape duty and danger.
​

In general the term seemed to be used by fighting troops to describe support personnel.
http://english.stackexchange.com/qu...quial-term-bum-meaning-a-homeless-person/1760

 

[sarladaise]

"Bummers" was a slang term in the Union Navy for a Mortar Boat

 

[hoosier]

The term was attributed to the medical corps and described soldiers who feigned illness to get out of duty.

Edit - I should have checked on the definition of "branch of service" before giving this answer.

Hoosier

 

[GELongstreet]

Am not sure If I completely understand the question. You probably mean hospital bummer, describing soldiers who fake or overstate injuries to get and stay in hospitals. However in that case it would make little sense with the service branch question as, while it attributes to hospitals and therefore to the Medical Department, the respective bummers were no part of said departement.

As said I´m not sure ... or I could simply be wrong.

 

[ami]

Answer: Attributed to the U.S. Navy and it described mortar boats, mortar schooners, mortar fleet or the sailors who manned them.

Sources:
"Mortars mounted on more seaworthy schooners would also play a key role in the capture of the first major Southern city: New Orleans. Under command of the legendary Admiral David Farragut, the Union Navy bombarded, reduced, and captured two key bastions, Forts Jackson and St. Philip, some 70 miles downstream of New Orleans. Twenty miles upstream from the Head of the Passes, the two forts were the keys to capturing the city, and Farragut used his own touches to do the job. Under the command of his stepbrother, Commodore David Dixon Porter, the mortar schooners (called 'bummers' by their crews) were brought into position and began to bombard the two forts on April 18, 1862."
Civil War Artillery

"The active part he took in the reduction of the forts below New Orleans will make his name forever memorable in connection with the mortar fleet, or 'bummers,' as the sailors term them."
David D. Porter

"Bummers" is a term frequently used pejoratively to denote malingerers, men who hang behind in order to scavenge. For sailors of the inland navy, however, "bummers" was a slang term for the mortar schooners and their crews, presumably a variant on "bombers."
Two Civil Wars: The Curious Shared Journal of a Baton Rouge Schoolgirl and a Union Sailor on the USS Essex, edited by Katherine Bentley Jeffrey

Edit - Players came us with a lot of different definitions for "bummer" and as far as I can tell, they were correct in stating that the term was used in the ways they described. However, I am only going to accept the official answer as being correct for this question.

The key to the question is the fact that, after mentioning the fact that the term "bummer" was used to describe marauding or foraging soldiers of Sherman's army, the question then made it clear that the desired response should relate to the use of that term in connection with another branch of service - i.e., a branch of service other than the Army.

That essentially rules out all the answers that described "bummers" as being associated with the Army. Note that neither the medical corps nor hospital corps nor ambulance corps are considered to be a separate branch of service - they are part of the Army or Navy or whichever branch to which they belong.

Hoosier