# Hell in a handbasket??
**URL:** https://boards.straightdope.com/t/hell-in-a-handbasket/66104
**Category:** Factual Questions
**Created:** [May 21, 2001, 5:21pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/hell-in-a-handbasket/66104 "2001-05-21T17:21:21Z")
**Posts on this page:** 9
**Page:** 1
### Author:  [@kmeyers](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/kmeyers)
#### Post date: [May 21, 2001, 5:21pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/hell-in-a-handbasket/66104/1 "2001-05-21T17:21:21Z")
What is the origination of the term ‘Going to Hell in a handbasket’?
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### Author:  [@JeffB](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/JeffB)
#### Post date: [May 21, 2001, 5:30pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/hell-in-a-handbasket/66104/2 "2001-05-21T17:30:48Z")
Basically, it sounds good because of the alliteration. Here are links to [The Word Mavens’ article](http://www.randomhouse.com/wotd/index.pperl?date=19960629) and [The Word Detective’s article](http://www.word-detective.com/back-e2.html#handbasket) on the phrase.
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### Author:  [@Francesca](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Francesca)
#### Post date: [May 21, 2001, 11:21pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/hell-in-a-handbasket/66104/3 "2001-05-21T23:21:14Z")
I can understand that explanation, but I wonder why we (or at least several of my friends) say “Christ in a hand basket!” as an exclamation of surprise?
My WAG is that it’s just a random phrase that sounds ridiculous, but it would be nice if there were a story behind it. Anyone?
Fran
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### Author:  [@DrFidelius](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/DrFidelius)
#### Post date: [May 22, 2001, 12:41am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/hell-in-a-handbasket/66104/4 "2001-05-22T00:41:26Z")
Helena Hans-Beckett ran a brothel in Glouster MA during the 1820s. The house became famous when a mayoral candidate in Boston was run out of town after allegations arose that his entire campaign staff went to it.
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### Author:  [@KneadToKnow](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/KneadToKnow)
#### Post date: [May 22, 2001, 12:44am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/hell-in-a-handbasket/66104/5 "2001-05-22T00:44:46Z")
> [@](#):
>
> \*Originally posted by JeffB \*
> it sounds good because of the alliteration
And as Duke Ellington said, “If it sounds good, it is good.”
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### Author:  [@samclem](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/samclem)
#### Post date: [May 22, 2001, 2:58am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/hell-in-a-handbasket/66104/6 "2001-05-22T02:58:49Z")
I should let this end with **DrFidelius’** story. But…
…since you asked-in 1928 we get _Christ on a raft_, 1942, _Christ on a crutch_, 1947-_Kee-rist-on-a-bicycle_ and finally in 1962, _Christ in a basket_.
I think that writers just got a bit looser starting around WWI and things just went to hell in a handbasket since that time.
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### Author:  [@Inky\_1](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Inky_1)
#### Post date: [May 22, 2001, 3:43am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/hell-in-a-handbasket/66104/7 "2001-05-22T03:43:29Z")
My history teacher claimed that the term originated from the 1860’s railroad construction boom. Then, it was not an uncommon practice to [lower Chinese laborers in baskets to place dynamite in precarious places:](http://www.sfusd.edu/schwww/sch405/IUP/rail.html)
**…The Chinese workers e.g., Ah Goong, were usually small and skinny so they could easily go down on a basket to put dynamite to blow it. After they put the dynamite, they had to get back up in a hurry of they might be blown into pieces…**
Thus “Blown to Hell in a handbasket”.
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### Author:  [@samclem](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/samclem)
#### Post date: [May 22, 2001, 4:00am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/hell-in-a-handbasket/66104/8 "2001-05-22T04:00:29Z")
Ask you teacher for a cite in print for “blown” to Hell in a handbasket. The term _handbasket_ as used in any form of the phrase comes from this century and almost certainly has a non-literal origin.
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### Author:  [@aseymayo](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/aseymayo)
#### Post date: [May 22, 2001, 4:22am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/hell-in-a-handbasket/66104/9 "2001-05-22T04:22:11Z")
No, no - you’ve got it all wrong. According to the Big Book of Shambolics, the phrase originated in New Orleans and referred to a fashionable restaurant in the French Quarter. In the Roaring Twenties, the eatery became The Place to be Seen for the daring young things of the city, and before long, _everyone_ was bragging, “We’re going to Helene’s for a ham biscuit!”
Of course, with the fat content of Helene’s cooking, it was really their diets that went to hell.