First Performance of the "Contrabands" of Georgetown College, 1861

First Performance of the "Contrabands" of Georgetown College, 1861

Minstrel shows--United States--History; Georgetown University--History

Playbill for a blackface minstrel show at Georgetown dated December 17, 1861.

 By December 1861, the word "contraband" had come to refer to enslaved people who had escaped to the Union Army. 

For more information on the Georgetown "Contrabands", see Marcus Lustig, "Blacking Up the Ivory Tower: Blackface Minstrelsy in College Life at Georgetown" (B.A. Thesis, Georgetown University, 2019).

Georgetown Slavery Archive

Georgetown Slavery Archive

1861-12-17

Marcus Lustig, Adam Rothman

Georgetown University

PDF

English

Playbill

GSA367

First Performance

Of The

“Contrabands”

Of

Georgetown College.

Tuesday Evening, December 17, 1861, at 7 o’clock.

-----

Overture                          …           Troupe

Opening Chorus, (Operatic)         “

Fare-thee-well, Kitty Dear, …      F. H. Gerdes.

Old Grey Mare,               …           J.P. McElroy.

Off for Baltimore             …           J.F. Mathews.

‘Way down Souf’,           …           H.S. Williamson’

Old Folks are Gone         …           C. Hein’

Darling Rosebel               …           J. Jones.

Anvil Chorus                    …           Company

Part II

Hiring an Actor                …           Gerdes and McElroy

Quartette for violin, guitar, and fluthes, “Agathe.”

                                                          Jones, Hein, Major, and Mathews

Old Bob Ridley                 …           McElroy

Stocks up, and Stocks down        Closs and Williamson

Dat’s what’s de matter  …           Gerdes

Burlesque Grinders        …           Company

Banjo Solo                        …           Hein

Intermission for Change of Dress

[p. 2]

Part III

Gimlet.

Dunce of Penmark.

--------- 

Funniman, King of Trumps          …           C.T. Close

Gimlet, Dunce of Penmark, a green young man, addicted to black eyes, blue devils and blue rain, and who “hasn’t nary red,”                     …           J.P. McElroy

Leatherlungs, the royal favorite barrow-tone; a specimen of Young America, bound for Nicaragua,

                                                          …           F.H. Gerdes

Voracio               }                                                                       {H.C. Williamson

Rosinosi              }             Chums-in-Chief to the Dunce      { J.F. Mathews

Raggedstein       }                                                                       { J. Jones

Count Dandini, a “demnition swell, you know.”                 H. Major

Ghost,                               …                                                       C. Hein

Courtiers, Gymnasts, Dancers, Supes, &c., by the Corps de Ballet

The entire piece, including songs, choruses, dances, tableaux, &c., written, stolen, and arranged with rhyme and without reason, by a gentleman of well-known abilities, A. Steele Penne, Esq.