---
title: Treeing Coons (pro-Polk cartoon), 1844
url: https://propagandaarchive.org/collection/treeing-coons-polk-1844/
description: Cartoon in which Polk, in buckskin hunter's dress with a knife, holds Clay and Frelinghuysen (raccoon bodies, the Whig "coon" emblem) by the tail while…
section: Collection
---

[Collection](https://propagandaarchive.org/collection/)

[![Treeing Coons (pro-Polk cartoon), 1844](https://propagandaarchive.org/collection/images/treeing-coons-polk-1844.jpg)](https://propagandaarchive.org/collection/images/treeing-coons-polk-1844.jpg)

# Treeing Coons (pro-Polk cartoon), 1844

Cartoon in which Polk, in buckskin hunter's dress with a knife, holds Clay and Frelinghuysen (raccoon bodies, the Whig "coon" emblem) by the tail while Jackson chops their branch and dogs bark "Down with the Coons". Tells: "vermin" and "coons" as labels (name-calling); Polk staged as a frontier hunter (plain folks).

## Text on the object

Original (English) · read from the image, not independently checked

```
Get down from my tree, you vermin!
Hickory.
from this old man good Lord deliver us!
I feel we are gone Coons !
This state of things is quite surprisin
Such d_d bad luck my Frelinghuysen
My struggles are of no avail
For Polk has got me by the tail.
You've got up the wrong tree this time! Down you must come.
This works according to my wish — The Coons are treed at last.
At them Bobby ! Catch them Johnny ! Dont let the other dogs get in before you I shall beat them yet.
Down with the Coons.
Down with the Coons.
Down with the Coons.
Repeal.
Madisonian.

Jackson.  Calhoun.  R.M.Johnson.  Frelinghuysen.  Clay.  Polk  John Jones  Bob Tyler.  Van Buren  Tyler.
Pub. by A. Purdy.
TREEING COONS.
Sold Wholesale & Retail at 98 Nassau St. N.Y.
Entered according to Act of Congress in the Year 1844. by A. Purdy in the Clerks Office of the Dist. Court of the Southern Dist. of N.Y.
```

Punctuation of the small imprint is read at reduced confidence.

[← Texas Coming In (pro-Polk cartoon), 1844](https://propagandaarchive.org/collection/texas-coming-in-polk-1844/) [Tyrants Prostrate, Liberty Triumphant (pro-Polk cartoon on Dorr), 1844 →](https://propagandaarchive.org/collection/tyrants-prostrate-liberty-triumphant-polk-1844/)

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