Where did the phrase 'the whole shebang' come from?

"Shebang." Vocabulary.com Dictionary, Vocabulary.com, https://www.vocabulary.com/dictionary/shebang. Accessed 23 Jun. 2024.

"The whole shebang" informally means "everything," which you could also call "the whole box and dice" or "the whole enchilada."

Shebang is an American word, first used by Civil War soldiers and soon after the poet Walt Whitman (describing soldiers living in "shebang enclosures of bushes" and coming "out from their tents or shebangs of bushes." ) to mean "rustic dwelling" or "hut." (It is thought to have been adapted from the French word 'chabane' but this is not proven) In 1872, Mark Twain used shebang to mean "vehicle," but also in 1872 appeared in a Confederate newspaper with its contemporaneous meaning, in the first known use of "the whole shebang."