George William Bagby (August 13, 1828 – November 29, 1883) was an American

physician A physician (American English), medical practitioner (Commonwealth English), medical doctor, or simply doctor, is a health professional who practices medicine, which is concerned with promoting, maintaining or restoring health through th ...

and

humorist A humorist (American) or humourist (British spelling) is an intellectual who uses humor, or wit, in writing or public speaking, but is not an artist who seeks only to elicit laughs. Humorists are distinct from comedians, who are show business e ...

Early life and education

He was born in

Buckingham County, Virginia Buckingham County is a rural United States county located in the Commonwealth of Virginia, and containing the geographic center of the state. Buckingham County is part of the Piedmont region of Virginia, and the county seat is Buckingham. B ...

, to George Bagby and Virginia Evans. He attended Delaware College and the

University of Pennsylvania The University of Pennsylvania (also known as Penn or UPenn) is a private research university in Philadelphia. It is the fourth-oldest institution of higher education in the United States and is ranked among the highest-regarded universitie ...

, where he studied medicine.

Career

After finishing his studies, Bagby became engaged in editorial work, especially on the ''

Southern Literary Messenger The ''Southern Literary Messenger'' was a periodical published in Richmond, Virginia, from August 1834 to June 1864, and from 1939 to 1945. Each issue carried a subtitle of "Devoted to Every Department of Literature and the Fine Arts" or some vari ...

'' from 1859 to near the end of the

American Civil War The American Civil War (April 12, 1861 – May 26, 1865; also known by other names) was a civil war in the United States. It was fought between the Union ("the North") and the Confederacy ("the South"), the latter formed by states th ...

. Subsequently, he was made the state librarian and became widely known as a lecturer and humorist, writing under the name "Mozis Addums." He kept alive the old school of Southern humor, founded by

Augustus Baldwin Longstreet Augustus Baldwin Longstreet (September 22, 1790 – July 9, 1870) was an American lawyer, minister, educator, and humorist, known for his book ''Georgia Scenes''. He was the uncle of the senior Confederate General James Longstreet. He held p ...

and

Johnson J. Hooper Johnson Jones Hooper (June 9, 1815 – June 7, 1862) was an American lawyer and writer from Alabama known for his humorist works set in what was then known as the Southwest of America, particularly the collection of stories published as ''Adv ...

. An example of that humor, which contained local dialect, phonetic spelling and an eccentric character, is ''Rubenstein's Piano-Playin''. It is a short narrative of a surly, less-than-sophisticated soul, who describes how he was deeply moved by a piano concert. His works were collected in three volumes (Richmond, 1884–86). Bagby is less known for his work as a journalist. As the Richmond correspondent of the ''

Charleston Mercury The ''Charleston Mercury'' was a secessionist newspaper in Charleston, South Carolina, founded by Henry L. Pinckney in 1819. He was its sole editor for fifteen years. It ceased publication with the Union Army occupation of Charleston. After the ...

'' during the Civil War, Bagby covered the politics of the war and made a reputation for Hermes, his pen name, as a fearless writer who would criticize Confederate General

Robert E. Lee Robert Edward Lee (January 19, 1807 – October 12, 1870) was a Confederate general during the American Civil War, towards the end of which he was appointed the overall commander of the Confederate States Army. He led the Army of Nort ...

as easily as Confederate President

Jefferson Davis Jefferson F. Davis (June 3, 1808December 6, 1889) was an American politician who served as the president of the Confederate States from 1861 to 1865. He represented Mississippi in the United States Senate and the House of Representatives as a ...

Legacy

Bagby's most popular essay was "The Old Virginia Gentleman" (1877), a

paean A paean () is a song or lyric poem expressing triumph or thanksgiving. In classical antiquity, it is usually performed by a chorus, but some examples seem intended for an individual voice (monody). It comes from the Greek παιάν (also πα� ...

antebellum Antebellum, Latin for "before war", may refer to: United States history * Antebellum South, the pre-American Civil War period in the Southern United States ** Antebellum Georgia ** Antebellum South Carolina ** Antebellum Virginia * Antebellum ar ...

plantation A plantation is an agricultural estate, generally centered on a plantation house, meant for farming that specializes in cash crops, usually mainly planted with a single crop, with perhaps ancillary areas for vegetables for eating and so on. The ...

life in

Virginia Virginia, officially the Commonwealth of Virginia, is a state in the Mid-Atlantic and Southeastern regions of the United States, between the Atlantic Coast and the Appalachian Mountains. The geography and climate of the Commonwealth ar ...

References

*Wilson, James Southall. "Bagby, George William." ''Dictionary of American Biography.'' Vol. 1, Charles Scribner's Sons. 1928. * Trent, ''Southern Writers'' (1905) *

American National Biography The ''American National Biography'' (ANB) is a 24-volume biographical encyclopedia set that contains about 17,400 entries and 20 million words, first published in 1999 by Oxford University Press under the auspices of the American Council of Le ...

, vol. 1, pp. 868–869. *Andrews, J. Cutler. ''The South Reports the Civil War.'' Princeton, N.J.: Princeton University Press, 1970. *Bagby, George William, and

Thomas Nelson Page Thomas Nelson Page (April 23, 1853 – November 1, 1922) was an American lawyer, politician, and writer. He served as the U.S. ambassador to Italy from 1913 to 1919 under the administration of President Woodrow Wilson during World War I. In his ...

. ''The Old Virginia Gentleman, And Other Sketches.'' New York: C. Scribner's Sons, 191
googlebooks
Retrieved May 10, 2008 *The South Reports the Civil War by J. Cutler Andrews (Princeton University Press, 1970, and the Charleston Mercury, 1861 to 1865.

External links

Richmond: West, Johnston & Co., 1879.

– read an example of the old school of Southern humor.
George William Bagby
in '' Encyclopedia Virginia'' * * {{DEFAULTSORT:Bagby, George William American librarians American humorists 1828 births 1883 deaths American male non-fiction writers 19th-century American journalists 19th-century American male writers University of Delaware alumni Perelman School of Medicine at the University of Pennsylvania alumni People from Buckingham County, Virginia Journalists from Virginia