This term was applied to General McClellan’s army, which was at one time expected to “crush the rebellion.”
1862. How supremely ridiculous … was the “anaconda theory,” of crushing the rebellion.—Yale Lit. Mag., xxviii. 63 (Nov.).
1863. If its [the army’s] foe never was caught in its coils, it still was the “anaconda”, for so the people had christened it.—O. J. Victor, ‘The History … of the Southern Rebellion,’ ii. 471.
1879. Now came the summons to tell that our turn had come for a little squeeze in the folds of the traditional “Anaconda,” that the New York Herald had so graphically depicted as encircling the South.—‘Southern Hist. Soc. Papers,’ xi. 119.
