how do you pronounce Antietam?

Subject: how do you pronounce Antietam?
From: greg stephens
Date: 11 Nov 03 - 10:26 AM

Could any American help me with this easily solved problem? It is I word I have often read, but never heard spoken (not being in America).

Subject: RE: how do you pronounce Antietam?
From: katlaughing
Date: 11 Nov 03 - 10:31 AM

There are two ways, that I know of. I think an-tee-at-um with the accent on the third syllable is the preferred, currently. I've also heard an-tee-um an-tee-tum with the accent on the middle syllable.

Subject: RE: how do you pronounce Antietam?
From: Alaska Mike
Date: 11 Nov 03 - 10:34 AM

AN rhymes with man, TIE pronounced tee, TAM pronounced tum

Accent on the second sylable an TEE tum

Subject: RE: how do you pronounce Antietam?
From: Nancy King
Date: 11 Nov 03 - 10:42 AM

Here in Maryland, where the place is located, it is pronounced An-TEE-tum. In fact, I've never heard it any other way.

Cheers, Nancy

Subject: RE: how do you pronounce Antietam?
From: GUEST,Geographer
Date: 11 Nov 03 - 10:48 AM

In the same vein, what is the origin of New York suburb Tri-Be-Ca, why the un-usual spelling and what is the place like? One of the "Daily Telegraph" reporters lives there and often refers to it.

Subject: RE: how do you pronounce Antietam?
From: GUEST,Nancy King's Secret Santa
Date: 11 Nov 03 - 11:10 AM

So, you know how to pronounce Maryland place-names? Bet you can't pronounce where your kind jolly generous Santa comes from. But we'll find out that for sure at Christmas........

Subject: RE: how do you pronounce Antietam?
From: Mark Clark
Date: 11 Nov 03 - 11:15 AM

From The American Heritage® Dictionary of the English Language, Fourth Edition:

An·tie·tam (ăn-tē'təm)
A creek of north-central Maryland emptying into the Potomac River. The bloody and inconclusive Civil War Battle of Antietam (or Sharpsburg, as it is often called in the South) was fought along its banks on September 17, 1862.

Clicking on the word will play a WAV file of the word, correctly spoken.

      - Mark

Subject: RE: how do you pronounce Antietam?
From: WFDU - Ron Olesko
Date: 11 Nov 03 - 11:17 AM

TRY - BECK - AH.

It stands for "Triangle Below Canal Street". The term became used during the 1960's when the city was revitalizing the area during the WTC construction.   Primarily a residential community with lots of great shops.

Subject: RE: how do you pronounce Antietam?
From: WFDU - Ron Olesko
Date: 11 Nov 03 - 11:19 AM

Forgot to mention - the three streets that form the triangle are Broadway, Canal and Vesey.

Subject: RE: how do you pronounce Antietam?
From: greg stephens
Date: 11 Nov 03 - 11:20 AM

And while we're at it, is Antietam Dutch, or what?

Subject: RE: how do you pronounce Antietam?
From: The_one_and_only_Dai
Date: 11 Nov 03 - 11:23 AM

...and why is it that the Union nomenclature for battles is often a geographical feature (e.g. Antietam, Bull Run) but the Confederate name for the same battle a place (Sharpsburg, Manassas)?

Just read 'Confederates in the Attic' by Tom Horwitz (as I'm moving to the South-ish soon-ish) - marvellous. Hilarious and disturbing, all at once...

Subject: RE: how do you pronounce Antietam?
From: GUEST,Geographer
Date: 11 Nov 03 - 11:26 AM

Thanks Ron. All is now clear. No wonder our the English reporter( a fine lass) for the "D.T." lives there with the shops and all!

Subject: RE: how do you pronounce Antietam?
From: Amos
Date: 11 Nov 03 - 12:03 PM

The Confederates used local knowledge, while the Unions used maps more likely anchored to known features such as creeks and hills. The Union boys would disdain local naming conventions if possible, as a mild form of psy-ops -- he who names a place has power over it.

A

Subject: RE: how do you pronounce Antietam?
From: katlaughing
Date: 11 Nov 03 - 12:13 PM

Has anyone else run across the first pronunciation I posted? I'd be curious to know if it was indigenous to a certain area, i.e. the Rocky Mountains, as I think that is where I first heard it.

Dai, the US South? (I thought you were cross the pond?)

I'll never forget when we first moved to New England. We kept seeing monuments to the "War of the Rebellion." Finaly asked Rog about it since he'd grown up there. It was the North's reference to the "Civil War." Not once did we see anything referring to the latter.

Subject: RE: how do you pronounce Antietam?
From: McGrath of Harlow
Date: 11 Nov 03 - 12:16 PM

Would it be fair to assume that's the same reason Iraq is mispronounced as "Eye-Rack" instead of "Irahk"? (But it's not such a good idea doing that when it's supposed to be liberation rather than conquest.)

Subject: RE: how do you pronounce Antietam?
From: Q (Frank Staplin)
Date: 11 Nov 03 - 01:21 PM

An-tee'-tum, as Nancy King posted, with the second "t' only slightly pronounced. The name is from well outside of the Dutch area; probably a corruption of an Indian name. The battlefield at Antietam (Sharpsburg) is being restored with original fence lines, woodlots, etc., the Park comprising almost 3300 acres.
Sharpsburg is a town on the edge of the battlefield, hence the alternate (and first) name for the battle.

Subject: RE: how do you pronounce Antietam?
From: Little Hawk
Date: 11 Nov 03 - 01:41 PM

A very interesting and challenging battle. It was McLellan's to win, and Lee's to lose (Lee being greatly outnumbered and lacking equivalent firepower)...but Lee managed to wangle a draw out of it, when he might have experienced a catastrophic rout and destruction of his army.

"Little Mac" then allowed the Southern Army to withdraw without suffering significant further damage, and for that Lincoln sacked him.

Every time Lee moved north in that war, it led to a defeat. He would have been better off to fight strictly defensive battles on home ground.

- LH

Subject: RE: how do you pronounce Antietam?
From: GUEST,Lighter
Date: 11 Nov 03 - 03:33 PM

The only pronunciation I've ever heard is "An-TEE-tum."

Subject: RE: how do you pronounce Antietam?
From: cetmst
Date: 11 Nov 03 - 05:41 PM

Was in Atlanta last week where it was referred to as "The War of Northern Aggression". My great-grandfather whom I used to cadge candy from when I was a lad was at Gettysburg (Union side) which, as far as I know, was the only battle whose name both sides agreed upon. Another great-grandfather was with Sheridan in Virginia. The only pronunciation I ever heard from the family was An-tee'-tum.

Subject: RE: how do you pronounce Antietam?
From: Stilly River Sage
Date: 11 Nov 03 - 06:01 PM

I've never heard that extra syllable in the name, Kat.

I grew up with a mother who was a precocious youthful reader and often mis-calculated the pronunciations of words that she didn't hear spoken until she was older. She continued with several of those pronunciations as an adult. Used to drive us nuts. ;-)

SRS

Subject: RE: how do you pronounce Antietam?
From: Nancy King
Date: 11 Nov 03 - 06:13 PM

WOW -- I never expected to hear from my (kind jolly generous) Secret Santa in THIS thread! I'll be waiting to see if I can pronounce my KJGSS's place of origin!

Nancy, on pins and needles!

Subject: RE: how do you pronounce Antietam?
From: Peace
Date: 11 Nov 03 - 06:19 PM

Tribeca refers to a geographical location/area in the very south of Manhattan. TRIangle BElow CAnal Street. If you look at a map of Manhattan, you'll see what it means.

Subject: RE: how do you pronounce Antietam?
From: Peace
Date: 11 Nov 03 - 06:20 PM

Sorry, Ron, I didn't see your post re Tribeca. Excuse me.

Subject: RE: how do you pronounce Antietam?
From: PoppaGator
Date: 11 Nov 03 - 06:23 PM

As a lifelong American born and raised in the North but who has lived more than half his life in the South (well, in New Orleans, which is really a whole north place), I have observed that the winners (Northerners) almost always say "Civil War" while many of those who identify as Southerners prefer the term "War Between the States." These two terms are by far the most commonly used, way more than others mentioned above.

I never heard that "War of Rebellion" New Englandism, but then I've never lived northeast of New York City for more than a couple of weeks at a time.

Back to the original subject, I've only heard the one pronunciation that has already been established here as the standard one. I remember *not* knowing how to pronounce it myself, many years ago as a youngster, since I read it many times before hearing it spoken.
Coincidentaly, my wife asked me how to pronounce "Antietam" just two nights ago -- hence my intertest in reading this thread.

Kat, I think you just heard a confidently-spoken mispronunciation (not unusual) and took it seriously.

Subject: RE: how do you pronounce Antietam?
From: GUEST,Nancy King's SS
Date: 11 Nov 03 - 06:37 PM

Ho Ho Ho Ho
Hmmmmmmmmmm
Still keeeping an eye on your tastes and interests, Nancy

Subject: RE: how do you pronounce Antietam?
From: katlaughing
Date: 11 Nov 03 - 07:10 PM

Thanks, folks, but I heard it as an adult, somewhere.:-)

Subject: RE: how do you pronounce Antietam?
From: LadyJean
Date: 12 Nov 03 - 01:10 AM

My father was a civil war buff. His grandparents had been children, (on opposite sides!) during the war, and they'd told him stories. Dad served as a reconaissence officer with the First Armored Division. A portion of all family vacations was spent following somebody's route to some battle. I've been past Antietam several times. I've always heard it pronounced An Tee Tum. I've never visited the ballte field, or any civil war battlefield. Though we went to Yorktown one year.
I know of two American towns called Versailles. That's pronounce ver sales. There's also Elizabethton Tennesee, which is pronounced eliz a BETH ton. As opposed to Elizabethtown Kentucky, which is called E-Town.

Subject: RE: how do you pronounce Antietam?
From: Ebbie
Date: 12 Nov 03 - 01:58 AM

Quiz: Do any of you know how to pronounce Staunton, Virginia? :)

Subject: RE: how do you pronounce Antietam?
From: greg stephens
Date: 12 Nov 03 - 03:38 AM

Yes, it's pronounced Stanton, I think. I acquired this information from a Mudcat thread also, when planning a visit to Staunton last year. And coincidentally, it was on that trip that I ended up taking a walk by Antietam Creek, which lead me to start this thread as I didnt know how to say it.

Subject: RE: how do you pronounce Antietam?
From: The_one_and_only_Dai
Date: 12 Nov 03 - 03:44 AM

Yes kat, the US south. Yes, I am currently across the pond. Over here we have things called 'passports' (85% of Europeans have one; 5% of our Colonial Cousins have one) and certain people are eligible for 'visas' to 'work' in a 'different country'.

Subject: RE: how do you pronounce Antietam?
From: GUEST,Geographer
Date: 12 Nov 03 - 06:55 AM

We visited STAUNTON while on holiday from England and we saw the most
attractive young black bear while passing some time on the Appalachian Trail (having read Bill Bryson). The hosts at our B&B had never seen one in the wild and they had lived there all their lives so we counted ourselves doubly lucky on a most enjoyable time.

Subject: RE: how do you pronounce Antietam?
From: Nancy King
Date: 14 Nov 03 - 08:56 PM

On the off chance anybody's still interested in this, I found a book today titled "The Place Names of Maryland: Their Origins and Meaning," by Hamill Kenny. It says Antietam was named for Antietam Creek (not too surprising), and the entry for the creek says:

"A tributary of the Potomac River in Washington County. It had such strange spellings as ODIETA (1721), ANTIEATAM and even ANDIRTON (1730). The name is Indian and may contain the general Algonquin word '-EHTAN' for 'flow, current.' An 1868 authority gives the meaning as 'swift water'."

For what it's worth...

Nancy

Subject: RE: how do you pronounce Antietam?
From: Banjer
Date: 15 Nov 03 - 07:30 PM

The correct answer to the question:

...and why is it that the Union nomenclature for battles is often a geographical feature (e.g. Antietam, Bull Run) but the Confederate name for the same battle a place (Sharpsburg, Manassas)?



Is as follows:

The Union leaders would name their battle sites after the nearest body of water, while their Confederate counterparts would use the name of the nearest town, or church. Also, most of the battle sites today are known by the names the victors gave them. For instance in Florida the Battle of Olustee (a Confederate victory) is named after the town of Olustee, about 18 miles east of Lake City, had the Union been the victors it would be called the Battle of Ocean Pond, (a nearby lake)

Subject: RE: how do you pronounce Antietam?
From: McGrath of Harlow
Date: 15 Nov 03 - 07:40 PM

Is there a convention that the winner gets to name the battle?

Subject: RE: how do you pronounce Antietam?
From: Little Hawk
Date: 15 Nov 03 - 08:33 PM

Definitely. The winner gets to name the battle in most, if not all, cases.

There was a Sierra game out called "Civil War General II" that covered virtually every major battle in the Civil War very accurately. Antietam was one of the most interesting ones, and requires very careful handling by the South if they are to win or secure a draw.

McLellan actually had a captured map of all Lee's march and maneuver orders, taken off a dead or captured Confederate before the battle...and STILL did not sieze the opportunity to maximum effect and destroy Lee's army! That man was pathologically cautious...never willing to fight until he had absolute assurance of overwhelming material advantage. His soldiers, however, loved him...because he cut a grand figure and treated them very well, keeping casualties generally fairly low. The Army loved McLellan so much, in fact, that they would probably have marched on Washington when Lincoln relieved him...had McLellan given the order. He didn't, but tried instead to run against Lincoln in the next presidential election. The Gettysburg victory secured Lincoln's future, and McLellan's hopes were dashed...as were those of the South. Gettysburg was the watershed.

- LH

Subject: RE: how do you pronounce Antietam?
From: GUEST,BUTTERFLY
Date: 17 Nov 03 - 09:08 AM

On his excellent CD with Jerry Moses "North and South - Old Time Appalachian Songs and Tunes" (Newmills Sound Studio , Letterkenny, Co. Donegal, Republic of Ireland, 2002) Alec Somerville (on the 1st track called Rebel Soldier) has the lines:

"We marched north to Sharpsburg, called Antietam by some"

The prounciation sounds like "Anteetum" with no particular stress on any syllable. Alec Somerville is apparently English born but lived for many years in Ontario, Canada, before moving to Co. Donegal in 1998. I do not know anything about Jerry Moses.

The words were written by Somerville (the only such song on the album which is mostly traditional, but with Stephen Foster's "Hard Times" and Clarence Ashley's "My Home's Across the Blue Ridge Mountain"). The tune of Rebel Soldier incidently seems reminiscent of the tune "Boston Burglar" rather than "The Unreconstructed Rebel" which is an repentant song Confederate Song.

Somerville also has produced another CD "Pickin and Grinnin" with Jerry Moses. He is also working on a CD of American Civil War Songs, which if up to the standard of the other 2 should be well worth listening to.

My only connection with Alec Somerville is as someone who enjoyed his music enough at the Bluegrass Music Festival at the Ulster-American Folk Park at Omagh, Northern Ireland, in September 2003 to buy the 2 CDs which I have greatly enjoyed (and I am also trying to get him to perform at a local event).

Subject: RE: how do you pronounce Antietam?
From: Banjer
Date: 18 Nov 03 - 05:42 AM

Is there a convention that the winner gets to name the battle?

Actually it is not that the winner gets to name the battle but more correctly that the battle is known by the victors name for it. In their reports to their headquarters the Union officers would send information about Ocean Pond while the Confederates would have sent their reports to their HQs about Olustee.

The newspapers of the time would use whatever their leanings were, Union papers would refer to the battle at Ocean Pond while the Confederate papers would refer to Olustee, both the same battle. Later when the authors of the history texts compiled their information they would use the name that the winnig side had given to teh battle.

This applies to most other battles as well. (Mannassas - Bull Run, Antietam - Sharpsburg, etc..)

Subject: RE: how do you pronounce Antietam?
From: GUEST,Claymore
Date: 19 Nov 03 - 08:02 PM

Since Antietam, is literally across the river from Shepherdstown (Southern dead are buried here) the pronunciation has always been Ann TEE Tum.

A couple of tid-bits, Little Hawk:

Lee's Orders were found wrapped around a couple of cigars, by a couple of Union skirmishers, near the battle of South Mountain, a preliminary fight. Longstreet had captured Harpers Ferry to protect Lee's right flank. (Harpers Ferry changed hands some six times during the War).

Several Union failures allowed Lee to get away:

Burnside failing to cross the Antietam Creek, at what is now Burnside's Bridge, until late in the afternoon. He had several divisions which were held off by some 300 Texan sharpshooters, and could have crossed some 400 yards up stream but continued to try and cross the bridge.

McLellen commiting his forces piecemeal. First in the north at the Cornfield, next in the middle at the Dunker Church, then finally in the south at Burnside's Bridge. Lee hit them in the north, next swung his troops to the middle, stopped them at the Church, but lost ground at Bloody Lane. Finally in the afternoon, Burnside crossed in the south and was prepared to deal the exhaused Southerners a fatal blow, when Longstreets divison (thereafter called the Foot Cavalry)from Harpers Ferry, slammed into the Union troops and drove them back two miles. Lee crossed back into the South at Shepherdstown, and when McLellen started a pursuit, the battle of Shepherdstown took place, where the Southerners drove the Union back a second time.

A final tidbit. The Antietam Battlefield Cemetary contains only Union dead, and one recent burial. When Patrick Roy was killed on the USS Cole, his father lived in Shepherdstown and his mother lived in Keedysville, within sight of the Cemetary. The area congressmen got together and had one grave site opened. Patrick had worked at O'Hurleys General Store before going into the Navy, and had many friends in town. His grave sits next to a walled overlook, so his mother could see it from her house (she has since moved away). At the grave site his brother screamed out "Kill every raghead with a gun". As the local paper recently reported, returning West Virginia National Guardsmen have been leaving scraps of rags on his grave...

Subject: RE: how do you pronounce Antietam?
From: Coyote Breath
Date: 19 Nov 03 - 10:49 PM

I was amused to read of the Civil War (War of Northern Aggression) being referred to as "The late unpleasentness" in some correspondence dated around the turn of the century (19th to 20th).

LH, what was the "other" name for Shiloh? Was it Yellow Tavern?

CB

Subject: RE: how do you pronounce Antietam?
From: Nerd
Date: 20 Nov 03 - 03:05 PM

One more thing to add to the TriBeCa part of this thread: it's not a suburb but very much part of NYC.

Okay, so what about Ho-Ho-Kus New Jersey? Anyone know the origin of that one?

Subject: RE: how do you pronounce Antietam?
From: Q (Frank Staplin)
Date: 20 Nov 03 - 03:59 PM

The battle of Valverde (New Mexico), won by the Confederates under Sibley in 1862, is named for the town on the Rio Grande River. General Sibley's forces, including the Fourth Texas Cavalry, advanced northward along the river and occupied Albuquerque. The territorial government abandoned Santa Fe and moved to Las Vegas. Santa Fe was occupied. Union volunteers from Colorado came to join the fray.
In what is known now as the Battle of Glorieta Pass, a series of skirmishes (at Pigeon Ranch, Apache Cañon) in the Glorieta Mountains east of Santa Fe, the Confederate troops lost most of their supplies. Never really defeated, they withdrew and never were a threat in the area again.
At Glorieta Pass, the Texas Division, United Daughters of the Confederacy, in 1939 erected a monument "In loyal memory of the Texas Volunteers, Sibley's Brigade, CSA who died in service at Glorieta Pass, March 28, 1862."

I guess my point, sort of lost in the above, was that there were a lot of skirmishes that were named after geographic features, ranch or town locales, that fit no rules of nomenclature. The little "battles" outlined above, while very small when compared to the large battles in the east, secured the lands and routes to California for the Union.

Subject: RE: how do you pronounce Antietam?
From: McGrath of Harlow
Date: 20 Nov 03 - 05:05 PM

So Banjer, you're saying that it's not who wins the battle that decides the name it ends up with, but who wins the war?

I suspect that this might work out differently in civil wars and wars between nations, or colonial wars.

Subject: RE: how do you pronounce Antietam?
From: Dani
Date: 20 Nov 03 - 06:51 PM

Does anyone remember a joke that had the punchline, "No, Aunty-et-em!"? That's how I learned to pronounce it, right or wrong ;)

Kind of like Groucho Marx's joke about hunting elephants...

Dani

Subject: RE: how do you pronounce Antietam?
From: Janice in NJ
Date: 20 Nov 03 - 09:07 PM

The last time I heard someone speak of The War of Northern Aggression, I responded by calling it The War of African-American Liberation.

Subject: RE: how do you pronounce Antietam?
From: Dani
Date: 20 Nov 03 - 09:59 PM

CB, in Charleston they STILL refer to it as the Late Unpleasantness. I was in residence there during Hurricane Hugo, which was afterwards referred to (with the same smiling, polite lifting of skirts and carrying on through the mud) as the Latest Unpleasantness!

Dani

Subject: RE: how do you pronounce Antietam?
From: Suffet
Date: 21 Nov 03 - 05:24 AM

War of African-American Liberation? Good one! In the Soviet Union they used to call World War II either the Great Patriotic War or else the Great War Against Fascism. I wonder what various people will call the current US-UK invasion and occupation of Iraq? I prefer to call it the US-UK Invasion and Occupation of Iraq. Blunt and to the point!

--- Steve

Subject: RE: how do you pronounce Antietam?
From: The_one_and_only_Dai
Date: 21 Nov 03 - 05:39 AM

I thought your Civil War was about the right of states to determine their own laws, and the merciful ending of slavery was a side effect. Weren't some constitutionally opposed-to-slavery states in the confederacy? And vice versa?

Dai, most assuredly not a troll, but genuinely seeking to get to the bottom of this

Subject: RE: how do you pronounce Antietam?
From: Banjer
Date: 21 Nov 03 - 05:40 AM

So Banjer, you're saying that it's not who wins the battle that decides the name it ends up with, but who wins the war?

No, that is not what I said. I am saying that the winner of the battle doesn't necessarily choose a name, it is whatever they used as a name for the battle in their reports that usualy sticks.

Actually it is not that the winner gets to name the battle but more correctly that the battle is known by the victors name for it Here meaning the victor of that battle, not the overall victor of the war.

My next thought was that:

Later when the authors of the history texts compiled their information they would use the name that the winning side had given to the battle. Here also meaning the winning side of the battle, not the war

Sorry for the confusion!!

Subject: RE: how do you pronounce Antietam?
From: GUEST
Date: 21 Nov 03 - 03:59 PM

The other name for Shiloh was Pittsburg Landing

Subject: RE: how do you pronounce Antietam?
From: Greg F.
Date: 21 Nov 03 - 05:22 PM

Hullo, Dai-

Weren't some constitutionally opposed-to-slavery states in the confederacy? And vice versa?

Nope.

Check THIS

or do a forum search on "secession"- we've been around & around on this many times before.

Be happy to recommend some reading matter if you want to PM me; don't know about availability of some books in the UK.

Best, Greg