Jayhawker

Jayhawkers is a term that came to prominence just before the American Civil War in Bleeding Kansas, where
it was adopted by militant bands aliated with the
free-state cause. These bands, known as Jayhawkers,
were guerrilla ghters who often clashed with pro-slavery
groups from Missouri known at the time as "Border Ruans". After the Civil War, the word Jayhawker became
synonymous with the people of Kansas.[1] Today a modied version of the term, Jayhawk, is used as a nickname
for a native-born Kansan,[2][3][4] but more typically for a
student, fan, or alum of the University of Kansas.

Lane addressing his forces as Jayhawkers in December

1857.[11][12] 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. McReynolds reportedly
picked up the term from Pat Devlin, a Free State partisan described as nothing more nor less than a dangerous bully.[13] In mid-1858, McReynolds asked Devlin
where he had acquired two ne 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, ies 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 aliated
with the Free State cause.[14][15]

Origin

The origin of the term Jayhawker is uncertain. The

term was adopted as a nickname by a group of emigrants
traveling to California in 1849.[5] The origin of the term
may go back as far as the Revolutionary War, when it
was reportedly used to describe a group associated with
American patriot John Jay.[6]
The term became part of the lexicon of the MissouriKansas border in about 1858, during the Kansas territorial period. The term was used to describe militant bands
nominally associated with the free-state cause. One early
Kansas history contained this succinct characterization of
the jayhawkers:[7]

The meaning of the jayhawker term evolved in the opening year of the Civil War. When Charles Jennison, one
of the territorial-era jayhawkers, was authorized to raise a
regiment of cavalry to serve in the Union army, he characterized the unit as the Independent Kansas Jay-Hawkers
on a recruiting poster. The regiment was ocially termed
the 7th Regiment Kansas Volunteer Cavalry, but was
Confederated at rst for defense against
popularly known as Jennisons Jayhawkers.[16] Thus, the
pro-slavery outrages, but ultimately falling
term became associated with Union troops from Kansas.
more or less completely into the vocation of
After the regiment was banished from the Missourirobbers and assassins, they have received the
Kansas border in the spring of 1862, it went on to parname --- whatever its origin may be -- of jayticipate in several battles including Union victories of the
hawkers.
Battle of Iuka and the Second Battle of Corinth. Late in
the war, the regiment returned to Kansas and contributed
Another historian of the territorial period described the to Union victory in one of the last major battles in the
jayhawkers as bands of men that were willing to ght, Missouri-Kansas theatre, the Battle of Mine Creek.
kill, and rob for a variety of motives that included defense
against pro-slavery Border Ruans, abolition, driving Jennisons court martial and dismissal from the Union
pro-slavery settlers from their claims of land, revenge, forces in June, 1865 illustrate, however, how the Union
army disciplined against excesses among pro-Union parand/or plunder and personal prot.[8]
tisans; while, on the other hand, the Confederacy collabWhile the Bleeding Kansas era is generally regarded as orated with the pro-slavery Bushwhackers and paramilibeginning in 1856, the earliest documented uses of the tary partisans on the Confederate side, such as in Sterling
term jayhawker during the Kansas troubles were in the Prices invasion of Missouri in September 1864 when he
late 1850s, after the issue of slavery in Kansas had essen- collaborated with Missouri Bushwhackers culminating in
tially been decided in favor of the Free State cause.[9][10] depravations such as the massacre at Centralia, MO. EviThe earliest dated mention of the name comes from the dence shows that, while Confederate commanders did not
autobiography of August Bondi, who came to Kansas in discipline their paramilitary marauders, they did not con1855. Bondi claimed that he observed General James
1

2 RELATIONSHIP TO THE UNIVERSITY OF KANSAS JAYHAWK

done the civilian-on-civilian murders either. The CSA

ocer whose company (about 100 CSA troops) joined
Quantrills gang (about 350) for the horric Lawrence
Massacre in August 1863, forbade his soldiers from participating in the killing once he witnessed the civilian
slaughter--which ended in 150 civilian men and boys shot
on the steps of their homes and the town burned. [17]
The jayhawker term was applied not only to Jennison and
his command, but to any Kansas troops engaged in predatory 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 Prices Missouri State Guard in the Battle of Dry
Wood Creek.[18][19] A number of other smaller Missouri
towns, and large swaths of the Missouri countryside, were
similarly plundered and laid waste by Union forces as
back and forth raids were undertaken by forces from both
sides.
However, lending to confusion over the precise meaning
of the jayhawker term along the Missouri-Kansas border,
it also continued to be used to describe outright criminals like Marshall Cleveland that operated on a smaller
scale and outside the Union military command, but still
under the cover of supposed Unionism.[20] A newspaper
reporter traveling through Kansas in 1863 provided denitions of jayhawker and associated terms:[21]
Jayhawkers, Red Legs, and Bushwhackers
are everyday terms in Kansas and Western Missouri. A Jayhawker is a Unionist who professes to rob, burn out and murder only rebels
in arms against the government. A Red Leg
is a Jayhawker originally distinguished by the
uniform of red leggings. A Red Leg, however, is regarded as more purely an indiscriminate thief and murderer than the Jayhawker or
Bushwhacker. A Bushwhacker is a rebel Jayhawker, or a rebel who bands with others for
the purpose of preying upon the lives and property of Union citizens. They are all lawless and
indiscriminate in their iniquities.
The depredations of the jayhawkers contributed to the descent of the Missouri-Kansas border region into some of
the most vicious guerrilla ghting of the Civil War. In the
rst year of the war, much of the movable wealth in western Missouri had been transferred to Kansas, and large
swaths of western Missouri had been laid waste, by an assortment of Kansas jayhawkers ranging from outlaws and
independent military bands to rogue federal troops such
as Lanes Brigade and Jennisons Jayhawkers. In February 1862, the Union command instituted martial law due
to the crime of armed depredations or jay-hawking having reached a height dangerous to the peace and posterity

to the whole State (Kansas) and seriously compromising

the Union cause in the border counties of Missouri.[22]
One expert on the jayhawkers stated that the Border
War would have been bad enough given the ghting 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.[23] The most infamous
event in this war of raids and reprisals was Confederate
leader William Quantrills retaliatory attack on Lawrence,
Kansas known as the Lawrence Massacre.[24] In response
to Quantrills raid, the Union command issued Order No.
11, the forced depopulation of specied Missouri border lands. Intended to eliminate sanctuary and sustenance for pro-Confederate guerrilla ghters, it was enforced by troops from Kansas, and provided an excuse for
a nal round of plundering, arson, and summary execution perpetrated against the civilian population of western
Missouri.[25] In the words of one observer, the KansasMissouri border was a disgrace even to barbarism.[26]
As the war continued, the jayhawker term came to be
used by Confederates as a derogatory term for any troops
from Kansas, but the term also had dierent meanings
in dierent parts of the country. In Arkansas, the term
was used by Confederate Arkansans as an epithet for any
marauder, robber, or thief (regardless of Union or Confederate aliation).[27] In Louisiana, the term was used
to describe anti-Confederate guerrillas, as well as freebooting bands of draft dodgers and deserters.[28]
Over time, proud of their states 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, similar to
the terms Hoosier for Indiana, Sooner for Oklahoma,
Tar Heel for North Carolina, and Buckeye for Ohio.

2 Relationship to the University of

Kansas Jayhawk
When the University of Kansas elded their rst football
team in 1890, the team was called the Jayhawkers.[29]
Over time, the name was gradually supplanted by its
shorter variant, and KUs sports teams are now almost
exclusively known as the Jayhawks. In the traditions promoted by KU, the jayhawk is said to be a combination
of two birds, the blue jay, a noisy, quarrelsome thing
known to rob other nests, and the sparrow hawk, a stealthy
hunter.[30]
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.[31] One of the

3
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.[5] 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.[32]
The link between the term Jayhawkers and any specic
kind of bird, if such an association ever existed, had been
lost or at least obscured by the time KUs bird mascot
was invented in 1912. 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 Mr. Maloy, the term 'jayhawk' in the
school yell was a verb and the term 'jayhawkers was the
noun.[33] KUs current Jayhawk tradition largely springs
from Frank W. Blackmar, a KU professor. In his 1926
address on the origin of the Jayhawk, Blackmar specically referenced the blue jay and sparrow hawk. Blackmars address served to soften the link between KUs athletic team moniker and the Jayhawkers of the Kansas territorial period, and helped explain the relatively recently
invented Jayhawk pictorial symbol with folklore that appears to have been of even more recent fabrication.[34]

Cultural inuence

Plunderers and militant abolitionists were referred to as

Jayhawkers or Red Legs and both were used as terms
of derision towards those from Kansas after the Civil
War. The term Jayhawk has evolved over the years to
a term of pride used by some Kansans. The term Red
Leg as applied to Kansans has disappeared from common lexicon.

Jayhawker Colonel James Montgomery was portrayed as

a racist, vengeful, and larcenous commander of a black
regiment in the 1989 lm Glory, where he is referred to
as a real Jayhawker from Kansas.
The 1999 movie Ride With the Devil, directed by Ang
Lee, and starring Tobey Maguire, Skeet Ulrich, and Jewel
depicts Jayhawkers raiding Missouri homesteads.
In addition the University of Kansas, schools in
California, Utah, Kansas (besides KU), Iowa, Michigan,
Pennsylvania, New York, and Belgium have adopted the
Jayhawk as their mascots.
An alternative country/alternative rock band originating
in the 1980s from Minneapolis, Minnesota is named The
Jayhawks.
An unincorporated community in El Dorado County,
California is named Jayhawk, California.
The Wichita, Kansas wing of the Commemorative Air
Force is known as the Jayhawk Wing.
The VII Corps of the United States Army ocial nickname was The Jayhawk Corps.
The United States Army Company A of the 9th aviation
battalion of the 9th Infantry Division ocial nickname
was The Jayhawks.
The United States Coast Guard operates the medium
range twin engine helicopter HH-60 Jayhawk in the roles
of maritime patrol, interdiction, and search and rescue.
The United States Navy operates the AQM-37 Jayhawk
high speed target drone.
The United States Air Force and the Japan Air SelfDefense Force operate the advanced pilot trainer T-1 Jayhawk for students selected to y strategic/tactical airlift or
tanker aircraft.

Items stolen in raids into Missouri were frequently referred to as having been Jayhawked.

4 See also

In the Episode Texas Cowboys (1954 Radio) Jayhawkers follow a cattle drive and continue to stampede the
herd. Marshal Matt Dillon allows the cowboys to hurrah Dodge. A cattle drive being held up by Jayhawkers
is depicted in The Tall Men (1955).

Bushwhacker

In a 1959 Gunsmoke episode called The Jayhawkers,

men of that name try to extort money from cattle-drivers
by threatening to scatter their herds unless paid o.

German Americans in the Civil War

The movie The Jayhawkers! (1959) depicts a charismatic

leader (Je Chandler) of a new independent Republic of
Kansas in a showdown with an ex-renegade raider (Fess
Parker), sent by the military governor to capture him and
bring him to justice.
Clint Eastwood's Missourian character in the lm The
Outlaw Josey Wales (1976) took up the Confederate cause
after Redleg Jayhawkers from Kansas killed his son and
raped and murdered his wife.

Border Ruan
Quantrills Raiders

5 Notes
[1] Mechem, Kirke (1944). The Mythical Jayhawk. Kansas
Historical Quarterly (Kansas Historical Society) 13 (1): 1
15. Retrieved April 14, 2014.
[2] Jayhawker - Dictionary.com
[3] Jayhwaker - Merriamwebster.com
[4] Jayhawker - Thefreedictionary.com

[5] Fox, Simeon M. The Story of the Seventh Kansas.

Transactions of the Kansas State Historical Society
8(1904): 13-49.

EXTERNAL LINKS

[6] The Daily Cleveland Herald, (Cleveland, OH) Saturday,

December 21, 1861. Issue 301; column B

[25] 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.
http://digital.library.umsystem.edu/cgi/t/text/
text-idx?sid=e07d845a0242434deb73d27e3b7377e1;g=
;c=shs;idno=shs000022.

[7] Spring, Leverett Wilson. Kansas, The Prelude to the War

for the Union. New York: Boston Houghton, Miin and
Company, 1896

[26] Robinson, Charles. The Kansas Conict. 1892. Reprint.

Lawrence, Kans.: Journal Publishing Co., 1898. Page
455.

[8] Welch, G. Murlin. Border Warfare in Southeast Kansas:

1856-1859. Linn County Publishing Co., Inc. 1977.

[27] Daniel E. Sutherland. Jayhawkers and Bushwackers. The

Encyclopedia of Arkansas History and Culture. http:
//www.encyclopediaofarkansas.net .

[9] Welch, G. Murlin. Border Warfare in Southeast Kansas:

1856-1859. Linn County Publishing Co., Inc. 1977.
Chapter XV, Endnote No. 20.
[10] 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. http://skyways.
lib.ks.us/genweb/archives/1912/j/jayhawkers.html . Accessed January 21, 2011.

[28] Block, William T. Some Notes on the Civil War Jayhawkers of Confederate Louisiana. http://www.wtblock.com/
WtblockJr/jayhawke.htm
[29] Ocial KU web site, Traditions at the University, The
Jayhawk.
[30] The University of Kansas, Traditios, The Jayhawk. http://
www.ku.edu/about/traditions/jayhawk.shtml. Accessed
1/28/11.

[11] August Bondi, Autobiography (Galesberg, Ill.: Wagoner

Printing Co., 1911), 3334, 6

[31] The Daily Tribune (Manitowoc, WI), February 4, 1859,

page 1, column A. From the N.Y. Tribune.

[12] http://kuscholarworks.ku.edu/dspace/bitstream/1808/
8265/1/Kansas%20History_v33_4_lane_final.pdf

[32] T. F. Robley, History of Bourbon County. Fort Scott:

Press of the Monitor Book & Print. Co., 1894, p.96.

[13] The Kansas War, The Disturbances in Southern Kansas

Brown and Montgomery. New York Times, January 28,
1859.

[33] Kirke Mechem. The Mythical Jayhawk. Kansas Historical Quarterly, February 1944 (Vol. 13, No. 1), pages 1 to
15.

[14] 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.

[34] Blackmar, Dr. F.W. Origin of the Jayhawk, Delivered on the Annual KU Radio Nite Program, December,
1926. http://www.union.ku.edu/legend.shtml. Accessed
4/15/08.

[15] Origin of the Word 'Jayhawking'". The (Junction City)

Smoky Hill and Republican Union. June 18, 1864.
[16] Starr, p. 57.

6 References

[17] Sesquicentennial proceedings in August 2013 in

Lawrence, Kan.

Castel, Albert (1997). Civil War in Kansas: Reaping

the Whirlwind. (ISBN 0-7006-0872-9)

[18] Goodrich, Thomas. Black Flag: Guerrilla Warfare on the

Western Border, 1861-1865. Bloomington, IN: Indiana
University Press, 1995.

Kerrihard, Bo. Americas Civil War: Missouri and

Kansas. TheHistoryNet.

[19] Benedict, Bryce. Jayhawkers: The Civil War Brigade of

James Henry Lane. University of Oklahoma Press, 2009.
[20] Starr
[21] Connelly, William E. Quantrill and the Border Wars.
Cedar Rapids, Iowa: The Torch Press. 1910. Page 412.
[22] General Order No. 17; Headquarters Department of
Kansas, Fort Leavenworth, Kansas, February 8, 1862.
[23] Starr, p. 50.
[24] ICastel, Albert. Kansas Jayhawking Raids Into Western
Missouri in 1861. Missouri Historical Review 54/1. October 1959.

Starr, Steven Z. (1974). Jennisons Jayhawkers: A

Civil War Cavalry Regiment and its Commander.
(ISBN 0-8071-0218-0)
Wellman, Paul. (1962) A Dynasty of Western Outlaws (details the origins of the James-Younger and
other outlaw gangs in the Kansas-Missouri border
war).

7 External links
Seventh Regiment (Jennisons Jayhawkers) Kansas
Volunteer Cavalry, Kansas Historical Society

5
The Mythical Jayhawk, Kansas Historical Quarterly, Kansas Historical Society
Cool Things - Pogo Comic Strip featuring Jayhawk,
Kansas Historical Society
"Jayhawker".
1905.

New International Encyclopedia.

"Jayhawker". Encyclopedia Americana. 1920.

8 TEXT AND IMAGE SOURCES, CONTRIBUTORS, AND LICENSES

Text and image sources, contributors, and licenses

8.1

Text

Jayhawker Source: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jayhawker?oldid=652801948 Contributors: Jengod, Reddi, The quark, Bkell, Cyrius,
Dina, Hlj, DocWatson42, Bkonrad, Varlaam, BruceR, Neutrality, Moverton, Antaeus Feldspar, Paul August, Swid, Viriditas, Hohum,
Snowolf, Rjwilmsi, Stardust8212, FlaBot, Spyder130, Scott Mingus, THB, Kgwo1972, Nekura, Fightindaman, SmackBot, Burroughsks88,
Grazon, Flux.books, Hmains, Squiddy, MadameArsenic, TGC55, Bobjuch, Risssa, Drieux, Loccditty, Iridescent, Vanished user vjhsduheuiui4t5hjri, Khatru2, Nick Number, RobotG, North Shoreman, TuvicBot, Dogru144, WolfmanSF, Twisted86, Sduraybito, Fix Bayonets!, Skylights76, Fconaway, JoDonHo, UnitedStatesOfCanadia, Red Harvest, Crgrier, Skier Dude, Belovedfreak, Kmanblue, VolkovBot,
Al421297, Bovineboy2008, Jdcaust, NPrice, Oxfordwang, Arobsmn, Ericnandrea, Ryan2845, Monegasque, RSStockdale, Cuprum17,
ClueBot, Avenged Eightfold, GorillaWarfare, EoGuy, Mild Bill Hiccup, DBTigers, Kansasbecca, TrulyGroup, WooteleF, Addbot, Queenmomcat, Nohomers48, Download, JustbobXL, Captain Obvious and his crime-ghting dog, Lightbot, Yobot, Slbartkoski, Legobot II,
Slothus, Materialscientist, Redranger141, Citation bot, Bob Burkhardt, LilHelpa, LibertyHiller, FrescoBot, Surv1v4l1st, Dancingbonez,
Carel.jonkhout, NameIsRon, Bettymnz4, Slightsmile, Lithistman, Mz7, ZroBot, PBS-AWB, MOhistorybu, Donner60, Lance Long,
ClueBot NG, Joefromrandb, Tom soldier, Rockchalk717, Chango Luchador, BobDohse, Mogism, Scoot KC, Jackm80 and Anonymous:
102

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