""Bandy-legged" a southern insult?" Topic

I have been enjoying Shelby Foote's massive 3-volume work, Civil War – a Narrative, and do not recall having him call any southern officer or soldier "bandy-legged." I may go back through the books for a second read, but I observe that almost all the Union cavalry leaders are called bandy-legged somewhere in the narrative.

It seems to mean bow-legged. Does anyone know is this is a negative term in the US South?

No, but among some Southern "neo-Confederates" any nasty thing said about any "Yankee" soldiers is appropriate.

Dan in Virginia

Never heard that one.

I do like the term "blue-bellies", which refers to the uniforms the Yankees wore, and also happens to be the name of a lizard indigenous to the region, so perhaps implying that those "blue-bellies" were a lower form of animal in the overall scheme of things.

Does it refer to a bantam rooster?
Chicken legs are pretty scrawny, and a banty rooster is a pretty disreputable useless bird. Hardly even fit for eating.

I heard it from my father in Nebraska when referring to his Marine Corps opposition at the end of WWII. Like others I always assumed it to mean someone bow-legged, though the way Dad used it there was no frame of reference.

As 21eRegt said, my Dad was a WWII Marine & referred to the Pacific foe as bandy legged B***ards.

Never heard the term before. Never seen it in any book that I can remember.

Perhaps just a different play on words for "weak-kneed", or rubbery legged opponents. Meaning they are shaking in their boots (so can barely stand on their own), and can't fight against the opposition.

As a Southerner, ther term is not used as negative. It may refer to a cavalryman who lived on the horse. But to the general public, the idea that a yeoman farmer even owned a horse meant that the family was well off. Rich folks were bowlegged not yeoman farmers.
At that time my family owned 1000s of acres in the county along the border with Georgia. They were dirt poor and counted wealth in the number of mules that they owned. With ancestors averaging 14 kids the family estate was reduced over the years. My father and his four siblings only split 250 acres among them.

As an insult, I like the chicken reference better. LOL!

"Bandy legged," "blue bellied," and "bantam rooster" have been added to my list of creative insult terms.

'Bandy legs' is a common term in Scotland. We do not use bow legged. 'He could not catch a bulldog in a tunnel'. I have yet to work that one out.

a banty rooster is a pretty disreputable useless bird. Hardly even fit for eating.

Yeah you would have to stew him, but a Banty rooster is as brave as could be and has a reputation for potency. As insults go, and like the Banty, it doesn't really fly.

Bandy legged could imply ricketts from poor feeding and that might fit with the 'Yankee Slum Boys' trope. Just a thought.

I have heard the term many times, but assumed it was simply a mildly unenviable descriptor.

Jedburgh has mentioned it's use in Scotland and, as an ex-Sassenach, I can confirm it's use in England too. I think my dad called me bandy-legged! Mind you, he was scottish. Hmm.

Bandy legged in England too.

Possibly a disparaging reference to the victims of ricketts, an unenviable disease of the urban poor.

"While that great Queen that rose out of the spray,
Being fatherless, could have her way,
Yet chose a bandy-legged smith for man."

(Yeats, "A Prayer for My Daughter")

The spray-born queen is of course Aphrodite, and bandy-legs the lame Hephaistos.

Oh, and "The case of the bandy-legged Diplodocus" – link

Bandy-legged:

Ricketts:

I thought it meant "scrappy".

The term "blue belly" was meant to liken Union soldiers to annoying flies (flying insects). The Federals countered by calling the Confederates "gray backs" which was originally a term for lice. It also implied that the Federals saw more of the Confederates' backs than of their bellies.

I'm Scottish and I can't say I've heard the term 'bandy legged' being used in anything other than in a descriptive mode of someone who has leg problems.

Mind you, terms of insult used in the American Civil War are rarely a topic of conversation amongst the general public.

Another word which is often misused as a term of abuse is 'sassenach' meaning 'English'. The vast majority of Scots are sassenachs as the term actually means anyone born south of the Highland Line which includes the Central Lowlands where most Scots live and the Borders.

At the end of the day many words are used outside their true context which is fine if everyone who hears them understands that whether they are bandy legged or not.

I have run across the term bandy legged as a description of a horse whose legs bow out slightly to the side. Such horses would be considered unfit for service. I like the thought of a person being bandy legged from long hours in the saddle, that could be either positive or negative.

I reenact an Irish unit and "Sassenach" is definitely NOT a complement.

McLaddie--you mean the one on the right? That's where the arrow's pointing. I would have thought the left one.

I may be completely off base here, (won't be the first time), but for quite a while it has been my impression that "banty-legged" referred to persons with legs that were somewhat shorter than normal and torsos that were somewhat longer than normal, and that in the mid nineteenth century Irishmen were generally supposed to posses these physical characteristics. IIRC at least one modern historian has referred to Phil Sheridan as a "banty legged Irishman". Many drawings of the period seem to depict the Irish in this manner. I was not under the impression that it was necessarily a disparaging remark. Thanks, John Miller

McLaddie--you mean the one on the right? That's where the arrow's pointing. I would have thought the left one.

Yes, the left one. The picture of a before and after shot of a surgical procedure. I couldn't get rid of the arrow or isolate the picture…