Give Us Back Our Old Commander

Philadelphia: Wm. A. Stephens, n.d. [c.1862]. Sonsheet or lettersheet; bifolium, 9" x 5-1/2", overprinted on ruled paper (top page only). Hand-colored engraved portrait of Gen. George B. McLellan beside his horse above title; text in five stanzas below. Advertisement at lower margin for "Stephens' Colored Album Drolleries...photographs, illustrated army ballads and envelopes." Old folds; creased at upper and lower margins, with some soil and toning; Very Good.

Songsheet promoting General George B. McLellan's return to command in 1862. Following his perceived tactical errors in the Seven Days Battles and the Battle of Antietam in 1862, McLellan (truncated) was relieved of his command as General-in-Chief of the Union, exacerbating the already strong mutual antipathy between himself and Abraham Lincoln; despite popular appeals for his reinstatement, and despite being, as this song argues, "a perfect man," he never held another field command during the Civil War. In an effort to unseat his now bitter rival, McLellan ran as a Democrat for the presidency in 1864, but lost in a landslide, winning only 21 electoral votes. This song was originally composed by Septimus Winner and published as sheet music under his own imprint in 1862. Wolf notes thirteen variations on this sheet, some with slightly different titles, from at least six different publishers. Wolf (American Song Sheets) 754l. (Inventory #: 63687)