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Jayhawker and red leg are terms that came to prominence in Kansas Territory during the Bleeding Kansas period of the 1850s; they were adopted by militant bands affiliated with the free-state cause during the American Civil War. These gangs were guerrillas who often clashed with pro-slavery groups from Missouri, known at the time in Kansas Territory as "" or "". After the Civil War, the word "Jayhawker" became synonymous with the people of Kansas, or anybody born in Kansas. Today a modified version of the term, Jayhawk, is used as a nickname for a native-born Kansan. Jayhawker - Dictionary.com Jayhwaker - Merriamwebster.com Jayhawker - Thefreedictionary.com
It was established that the term was adopted as a nickname by a group of emigrants from Illinois traveling to California in 1849, who got stuck in Death Valley.Fox, Simeon M. "The Story of the Seventh Kansas," Transactions of the Kansas State Historical Society 8(1904): 13–49.William A. Lyman. Origin of the Name "Jayhawker," and How It Came to Be Applied to the People of Kansas, Kansas State Historical Society Collections, vol. 14, 1918, pp. 203-207.
In 1858–59, the slang term "Jayhawking" became widely used as a synonym for stealing.Robley, History of Bourbon County Kansas, p. 95;Cutler, History of the State of Kansas, 1:878.William Anselm Mitchell, Linn County, Kansas: A History (Kansas City, Kans.: Campbell-Gates, 1928), p. 22Daniel W. Wilder, Annals of Kansas: 1541–1885 (Topeka: Kansas Publishing House, 1875), pp. 615–16; Starr, Jennison's Jayhawkers, p. 29 Kansas Magazine 3 (1873), p. 553. Examples include:
O'ive been over till Eph. Kepley's a-jayhawking.Kansas History: A Journal of the Central Plains 34 (Summer 2011):, 117
Men are now at Fort Scott, working by the day for a living as loyal as Gen. Blunt himself, who have had every hoof confiscated, or jayhawked, which is about the same thing, for all the benefit it is to the Government.Pearl T. Ponce, Kansas's War: The Civil War in Documents (Ohio University Press, Athens, Ohio, 2011), p. 174
Farmer's Americanisms, old and new (1889) linked the term with anti-slavery advocates of late 1850s in Kansas.Farmer, John Stephen. Americanisms – Old & New: a Dictionary of Words, Phrases And Colloquialisms Peculiar to the United States, British America, the West Indies, Etc. Etc., Their Derivation, Meaning And Application, Together With Numerous Anecdotal, Historical, Explanatory, And Folk-lore Notes. London: T. Poulter, 1889, p. 323.
G. Murlin Welch, a historian of the territorial period, described the Jayhawkers as bands of men that were willing to fight, kill, and rob for a variety of motives that included defense against pro-slavery "Border Ruffians", abolition, driving pro-slavery settlers from their claims of land, revenge, and/or plunder and personal profit.Welch, G. Murlin. Border Warfare in Southeast Kansas: 1856–1859. Pleasanton, Kan.: Published for the Linn County Historical Society by Linn County Publishers, 1977.
While the "Bleeding Kansas" era is generally regarded as beginning in 1856, the earliest documented uses of the term "jayhawker" during the Kansas troubles were in the late 1850s, after the issue of slavery in Kansas had essentially been decided in favor of the Free State cause.Welch, G. Murlin. Border Warfare in Southeast Kansas: 1856–1859. Pleasanton, Kan.: Published for the Linn County Historical Society by Linn County Publishers, 1977. Chapter XV, End note No. 20. Kansas: a cyclopedia of state history, embracing events, institutions, industries, counties, cities, towns, prominent persons, etc. Standard Pub. Co. Chicago : 1912. Vols. I–II edited by Frank W. Blackmar. "Jayhawkers" entry . Transcribed July 2002 by Carolyn Ward. Accessed January 21, 2011. The earliest dated mention of the name comes from the autobiography of August Bondi, who came to Kansas in 1855. Bondi said he observed General James Lane addressing his forces as Jayhawkers in December 1857.August Bondi. Autobiography of August Bondi (1833-1907): Published by His Sons and Daughters for Its Preservation . Galesberg, Ill.: Wagoner Printing Co., 1911, pp. 6, 33–34.Baron, Frank. James H. Lane and the Origins of the Kansas Jayhawk. Kansas History: A Journal of the Central Plains'' 34 (Summer 2011): 114–27
Another early reference to the term (as applied to the Kansas troubles) emerging at that time is provided in the retrospective account of Kansas newspaperman John McReynolds.Henry King, and William Elsey Connelley. History of Kansas Newspapers: A History of the Newspapers And Magazines Published In Kansas From the Organization of Kansas Territory, 1854, to January 1, 1916; Together With Brief Statistical Information of the Counties, Cities And Towns of the State. Topeka: Kansas state printing plant, 1916, p. 239. McReynolds reportedly picked up the term from Pat Devlin, a Free State partisan described as "nothing more nor less than a dangerous bully.""The Kansas War, The Disturbances in Southern Kansas – Brown and Montgomery". The New York Times, January 28, 1859. In mid-1858, McReynolds asked Devlin where he had acquired two fine horses that he had recently brought into the town of Osawatomie. Devlin replied that he "got them as the Jayhawk gets its birds in Ireland", which he explained as follows: "In Ireland a bird, which is called the Jayhawk, flies about after dark, seeking the roosts and nests of smaller birds, and not only robs nests of eggs, but frequently kills the birds." McReynolds understood Devlin had acquired his horses in the same manner the Jayhawk got its prey, and used the term in a Southern Kansas Herald newspaper column to describe a case of theft in the ongoing partisan violence. The term was quickly picked up by other newspapers, and "Jayhawkers" soon came to denote the militants and thieves affiliated with the Free State cause."Origin of the Word Jayhawking In Application to the People of Kansas. Incidents in the early History of the Territory". The Allen County Courant (Iola, Kansas), May 23, 1868; Vol. 2, No. 19.
The Jayhawker term was applied not only to Jennison and his command, but to any Kansas troops engaged in punitive operations against the civilian population of western Missouri, in which the plundering and arson that characterized the territorial struggles were repeated, but on a much larger scale. For example, the term "Jayhawkers" also encompassed Senator Jim Lane and his Kansas Brigade, which sacked and burned Osceola, Missouri, in the opening months of the war after their defeat by Sterling Price's Missouri State Guard in the Battle of Dry Wood Creek.Goodrich, Thomas. Black Flag: Guerrilla Warfare on the Western Border, 1861–1865. Bloomington, IN: Indiana University Press, 1995.Benedict, Bryce. Jayhawkers: The Civil War Brigade of James Henry Lane. University of Oklahoma Press, 2009.Castel, Albert E. Kansas Jayhawking Raids into Western Missouri in 1861 , Missouri Historical Review 54, no. 1 (October 1959).
Union Major General Henry Halleck on January 18, 1862 in a letter to General Lorenzo Thomas described Jennison's regiment as "no better than a band of robbers; they cross the line, rob, steal, plunder, and burn whatever they can lay their hands upon. They disgrace the name and uniform of American soldiers and are driving good Union men into the ranks of the secession army."Starr, p. 96.
target="_blank" rel="nofollow"> Major General Henry Halleck to Brigadier General Lorenzo Thomas, January 18, 1862. In The War of the Rebellion: A Compilation of the Official Records of the War of the Union and Confederate Armies. Washington, DC: Government Printing Office, 1880-1901, series 1, volume 8, pp. 448-449 There were no charges against Lane, Jennison, or other officers under Lane's command for their role in the jayhawking raids of 1861–1862, but Union General David Hunter succeeded in curtailing Lane's military role,Castel, Civil War Kansas, pp. 77–80. and units of Kansas troops such as the 7th Regiment Kansas Volunteer Cavalry were shuffled off to other theaters of the war.
Further compounding confusion over what the term Jayhawker meant along the Missouri–Kansas border was its use in describing outright criminals like Marshall Cleveland, a captain of Jennison's Regiment, who resigned and turned to jayhawking. Cleveland operated under cover of supposed Unionism, but was outside the Union military command. Marshall Cleveland, Kansas Historical Society
A newspaper reporter traveling through Kansas in 1863 provided definitions of jayhawker and associated terms:
target="_blank" rel="nofollow"> General Order No. 17; Headquarters Department of Kansas, Fort Leavenworth, Kansas, February 8, 1862.. In The War of the Rebellion: A Compilation of the Official Records of the War of the Union and Confederate Armies. Washington, DC: Government Printing Office, 1880-1901, series 1, volume 8, pp. 547-548
One expert on the Jayhawkers stated that the Border War would have been bad enough given the fighting between secessionist and unionist Missourians, "but it was basically Kansas craving for revenge and Kansas craving for loot that set the tone of the war. Nowhere else, with the grim exception of the East Kentucky and East Tennessee mountains, did the Civil War degenerate so completely into a squalid, murderous, slugging match as it did in Kansas and Missouri."Starr, p. 50. The most infamous event in this war of raids and reprisals was Confederate leader William Quantrill's raid on Lawrence, Kansas, known as the Lawrence Massacre.Castel, Albert. "Kansas Jayhawking Raids Into Western Missouri in 1861" . Missouri Historical Review 54/1. October 1959. In response to Quantrill's raid, the Union command issued General Order No. 11 (1863), the forced depopulation of specified Missouri border counties.
Intended to eliminate sanctuary and sustenance for pro-Confederate guerrilla fighters, it was enforced by troops from Kansas, and provided an excuse for a final round of plundering, arson, and summary execution perpetrated against the civilian population of western Missouri.Bingham, George Caleb. "Address to the public, vindicating a work of art illustrative of the federal military policy in Missouri during the late civil war". Kansas City, MO. 1871. In the words of one observer, "the Kansas–Missouri border was a disgrace even to barbarism."Robinson, Charles. The Kansas Conflict. 1892. Reprint. Lawrence, Kans.: Journal Publishing Co., 1898. p. 455.
Over time, proud of their state's contributions to the end of slavery and the preservation of the Union, Kansans embraced the "Jayhawker" term. The term came to be applied to people or items related to Kansas.Kirke Mechem. The Mythical Jayhawk, Kansas Historical Quarterly, Vol. 13, No. 1, February 1944, pp. 1-15
Historic descriptions of the ornithological origin of the "Jayhawker" term have varied. Writing on the troubles in Kansas Territory in 1859, one journalist stated the jayhawk was a hawk that preys on the jay. The Daily Tribune (Manitowoc, WI), February 4, 1859, page 1, column A. From the N.Y. Tribune. One of the "Jayhawkers of '49" recalled that the name sprang from their observation of hawks gracefully sailing in the air until "the audience of jays and other small but jealous and vicious birds sail in and jab him until he gets tired of show life and slides out of trouble in the lower earth." In the Pat Devlin stories, the jayhawk is described more in terms of its behavior (bullying, robbing, and killing) than the type of bird it is.T. F. Robley, History of Bourbon County. Fort Scott: Press of the Monitor Book & Print. Co., 1894, p.96.
The link between the term "Jayhawkers" and any specific kind of bird, if such an association ever existed, had been lost or at least obscured by the time KU's bird mascot was invented in 1912, which was meant to serve as a visual representation of the Jayhawker movement, an homage by the university to the state's history. The originator of the bird mascot, Henry Maloy, struggled for over two years to create a pictorial symbol for the team, until hitting upon the bird idea. As explained by Maloy, "the term 'jayhawk' in the school yell was a verb and the term 'Jayhawkers' was the noun."Kirke Mechem. The Mythical Jayhawk. Kansas Historical Quarterly, February 1944 (Vol. 13, No. 1), pages 1 to 15.
In 2011, the city of Osceola, Missouri produced a declaration condemning what city leadership viewed as a connection between the Jayhawk mascot and the historical Jayhawkers who burned the town in 1861.
In 2017, the Kansas football team unveiled uniforms with an American flag on the helmet, blue jerseys, and red pants which featured the words "Kansas Jay-Hawkers" above a seal featuring a sword and a rifle. Kansas Athletics stated that the red pants was an homage to the term "Redlegs," another name for Jayhawkers.
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