Was there a Union yell?

[Will Carry]

I know the Rebels are known for their yell. Even though it was not one yell but it seems there were different yells. Maybe as a form a recognition on the battlefield. What did the Union soldiers yell? WHOOZZAA??? HOORAH??? DIE YOU REBEL @#$%$#??

Did you know that the Daughters of the Confederacy have a gramophone cylinder of some CSA vets giving the Rebel Yell, but they will not let anyone listen to it? What good is that?

I have seen talking movies of some old CSA vets trying to do the rebel yell, but you have got to be young to yell with such a high pitched voice and it doesn't hurt to have 12 lb shot whizzing over your head. That would make me scream like a girl....

 

[Jeff in Ohio]

Not to insult anyone, but I believe the Union "Hurrah" was a low-pitched, bass battle cry, manly and masculine in sound, in contrast to the high pitched "eek" of the rebel yell. To say it a different way, the Union troops roared like a lion while the the Southern troops shrieked like a woman spying a mouse in her dressing room.

 

[Pete Longstreet]

I can quote the great Shelby Foote:

"The Northern troops made a sort of hurrah — it was called by one soldier 'the deep, generous, manly shout of the Northern soldier.'

 

[dgfred]

Was it hurrah... for some reason I thought it was 'huzzah'.

 

[Pete Longstreet]

I also remember playing the computer game: Sid Meier's: Gettysburg, and after a Union victory they shouted "hurrah" and of course a Confederate victory they had the rebel yell.

 

[Coonewah Creek]

Not to insult anyone, but I believe the Union "Hurrah" was a low-pitched, bass battle cry, manly and masculine in sound, in contrast to the high pitched "eek" of the rebel yell. To say it a different way, the Union troops roared like a lion while the the Southern troops shrieked like a woman spying a mouse in her dressing room.

Ummmm, not quite an "eek." As described by a soon to become famous Union junior officer at the Battle of Chickamauga:

"At last it grew too dark to fight. Then away to our left and rear some of Bragg's people set up 'the rebel yell'. It was taken up successively and passed around to our front, along our right and in behind us again, until it seemed almost to have got to the point whence it started. It was the ugliest sound that any mortal ever heard -- even a mortal exhausted and unnerved by two days of hard fighting, without sleep, without rest, without food and without hope..." - Narrative of then-Lieutenant Ambrose Bierce, 2nd Brigade, 2nd Division, XXI Corps, Army of the Cumberland, at the Battle of Chickamauga

 

[Waterloo50]

T

Not to insult anyone, but I believe the Union "Hurrah" was a low-pitched, bass battle cry, manly and masculine in sound, in contrast to the high pitched "eek" of the rebel yell. To say it a different way, the Union troops roared like a lion while the the Southern troops shrieked like a woman spying a mouse in her dressing room.

To quote wiki...if you claim you heard it and weren't scared that means you never heard it". ..apparently the rebel yell was similar to the Comanche war cries, I dare anyone to stand in front of the Comanche and tell em they sound like women shrieking...lol

 

[Jeff in Ohio]

There are clips on youtube of the Library of Congress recordings of vets giving the rebel yell. You'll hear groups and then individuals give the yell - one fellow sounded like he was calling an owl, and another made a gesture with each yell of raising his arms up like someone crying boo and trying to scare a child.

Well, maybe my mention of the word "eek" was not meant too seriously.....maybe.

Of all the animal sounds that I've heard that raised some hair on the back of my neck, the most effective was the screech owl, which sounds like a woman screaming in terrible pain. The rebel yell by one individual wouldn't beat a screech owl, but hundreds or thousands yelling at one time might!

 

[UCVRelics]

 

[JD Mayo]

Union weren't that cool to have one. But the Irish Brigade would chant Fall A Ballah at Antietam and Fredericksburg etc

 

[Jeff in Ohio]

Yep, that's the clip - watch that short fellow raise his arms as if saying boo each time he yells - he didn't do that in combat, but I bet he did it for years for children and developed that "scaring" gesture to add some emphasis.

 

[Coonewah Creek]

Yep, that's the clip - watch that short fellow raise his arms as if saying boo each time he yells - he didn't do that in combat, but I bet he did it for years for children and developed that "scaring" gesture to add some emphasis.

IIRC, one of those veterans said in order to do the Yell correctly, you really needed "a full set of teeth and an empty belly."

 

[Cdoug96]

I heard of multiple accounts of Union soldiers letting loose rolling hurrahs when advancing. I imagine it didn't sound all that different from the Urah, Urah, Urah heard in this video. In fact they may have sounded identical in the heat of battle.

 

[Irishtom29]

I heard of multiple accounts of Union soldiers letting loose rolling hurrahs when advancing. I imagine it didn't sound all that different from the Urah, Urah, Urah heard in this video. In fact they may have sounded identical in the heat of battle.

Yeah, I too thought of the Russian urrah.

 

[JD Mayo]

Did they have code words for patrols and sharpshooters during war?

 

[Mango Hill]

Laughed so hard that I cried. Wonderful film clip.

 

[Quaama]

Did you know that the Daughters of the Confederacy have a gramophone cylinder of some CSA vets giving the Rebel Yell, but they will not let anyone listen to it? What good is that?

You can hear a recording from the Daughters of the Confederacy version here from 4:22 - Rebel Yell Lives. From 1:44 of that same video you can hear another recording of the rebel yell (and from 3:22 a simulation of how that same yell might sound from a company of 70 men).
I also recall hearing another recording that used differently voiced recordings and combined them to simulate how it might sound from a company or regiment of men (who would have all yelled in a slightly different manner) and I could well imagine how scary it would have been to have a mass of men with fixed bayonets coming towards you screaming/yelping like that. [When I've been watching a horse race from the rail and a large field of horses pass by at the gallop the sound of their hooves is quite loud and the vibrations can be felt through the ground so I can imagine that a cavalry charge coming at you would be another scary experience.]

 

[unionblue]

Then there is the time honored yell of a Union soldier when he first comes under fire and is told to advance, passed down through the generations of soldiers to the present day.

"OH S***!"

Unionblue
Former First Sergeant, US Army, Retired.

 

[Tennis]

Thanks for posting this video -- Yell is very close to my imagination

 

[Blessmag]

They only yelled when they received a fresh batch of hardtack