[PW] Project-Wombat-FM Digest, Vol 22, Issue 27

[Hadden, Robert L ERDC-TEC-VA]

	This is an interesting question, and the answer is not complimentary.
I am writing a book about the 4th North Carolina Regiment during the Civil
War, and this term, "Soreback", comes from their brigade action at the battle
of Chancellorsville, VA in 1863. The NC troops, under Brigadier Stephen
Ramseur (2nd, 4th, 14th and 30th NC Regiments), were ordered to advance in
support of other advancing Confederate troops. But a portion of two brigades
of Virginia troops were crouched behind some captured Union breastworks, and
wouldn't move forward when ordered. This is the famous "Stonewall Brigade,"
named after its former commander, Thomas Jackson. It was composed of the
Second, Fourth, Fifth, Twenty-seventh and Thirty-third Virginia regiments.
Why the famous Stonewall Brigade did not advance with their usual élan is a
matter of conjecture. General Elisha Paxton was reported to have had a
foreboding of the loss of his life the night before the battle, and a general
sense of gloom and doom may have overshadowed the brigade. 
	General Ramseur ordered his NC troops to advance in their place, and
if the Virginians wouldn't move forward, the NC troops would advance
unsupported and attack the substantial rearguards of the retreating Union
troops.
	Whatever the reason for the Virginian's disobedience to orders,
Colonel Bryan Grimes of the 4th NC took great care to stomp on the backs of
the recumbent Confederate troops as he went over the breastworks, and
particularly ground down on the back of the head of a high ranked officer,
grinding his face and his honor into the soil before moving up and over.
	Was General Paxton the one Bryan Grimes' humiliated by grinding his
face in the dirt when the North Carolina troops advanced over the backs of
the Stonewall Brigade? The delicacy in relating the story after the war by
Grimes would indicate that the individual mentioned was dead. However, it
could have been any one of a number of high ranking brigade officers.
	From this period, the Stonewall Brigade had an insulting nickname
among the Tar Heel troops: the "Sorebacks,"  i.e. sore backs among the
brigade for having NC troops stamp on their backs to get at the enemy. 

Lee

R. Lee Hadden
Geospatial Information Library (GIL)
Topographic Engineering Center
ATTN: CEERD-TO-I (Hadden)
7701 Telegraph Road
Alexandria, VA 22315-3864
(703) 428-9206
Robert.L.Hadden at erdc.usace.army.mil

See some of my writings, both online and on paper, at my author page at:
http://www.librarything.com/author/haddenrobertlee


----------------------------------------------------------------------

Message: 1
Date: Mon, 29 Oct 2007 19:35:06 -0400
From: "Diane Rainaud" <drainaud at comcast.net>
Subject: [PW] Original of term "sorebacks"
To: <list at project-wombat.org>

I'm hoping someone here might know the origin of a term used when referring
to Virginians..."sorebacks".  In an Internet search I found a slang
dictionary which says the terms comes from the hospitality of Virginians and
their backslapping greetings which cause sore backs.
 
Any help would be much appreciated.
 
Diane