where does the saying going to hell in a handbasket come from
To hell in a handbasket I. Windslow Ayer's 1865 polemic[2] alleges, "Judge Morris of the Circuit Court of Illinois at an August meeting of Order of the Sons of Liberty said: "Thousands of our best men were prisoners in Camp Douglas, and if once at liberty would 'send abolitionists to hell in a hand basket.'"[3]
Sunshower In the Southern United States, Utah as well as in Hungary a sunshower is said to show that "the devil is beating his wife" (or, more rarely, "the devil is beating his wife with a walking stick") because he is angry God created a beautiful day. The rain is said to be his wife's tears. A regional variant from Tennessee is "the devil is kissing his wife".[7][8] In French, the phrase is "Le diable bat sa femme et marie sa fille"[9] (i.e., "the devil is beating his wife and marrying his daughter"). In the Netherlands and Belgium, they say that there is a "funfair going on in hell".[10] In St. Kitts and Nevis, when rain is falling and the sun is shining, it is said that 'D devil a bang he wife'. In Liberia, it is said that "the devil is fighting with his wife over a chicken bone."