Honestly I could think of no better picture for this word.
Die Hard
Unwilling to change or adapt
During the 1811 Battle of Alburea in Spain the British 57th Foot were engaged against the French and under heavy fire. Colonel Sir William Inglis knew that his men were going to be overwhelmed. As the battle raged in addressed them saying, “Stand your ground and die hard; die hard and make the enemy pay dear for each one of us.” When the battle ended Inglis had lost 438 of his 579 men.
After the battle the regiment became known as “The Diehards”. Before long the name began being used in common parlance to denote one that would not give up, even in face of long odds. And yes, it would become the name of one of the greatest movie franchises of our time. (Yeas? What? Oh, oh yeah.) How about one of the best movies, and bunch of middle of the road sequels?
The doodle and phrase seems to be everywhere that US Soldiers have visited throughout the years. It is really cool to think that something like this went viral before the term going viral even came to be. So who is Kilroy and where does he come from? Now that is an interesting story.
Mr. Chad
The origin of the doodle part, the bald man, big nose, hands looking over a wall, most likely originated in Britain in the early days of WWII. That character, named Mr. Chad, was a response to the rations during the war. His image would appear on walls with a phrase such as “Wot? No tea?” Or whatever was in short supply at the time. US servicemen stationed in Britain took note of Mr. Chad and took him onto the continent during the invasion of France.
Kilroy
The name Kilroy is a little tougher to nail down. For the most part it is thought that Kilroy wasn’t a real person, just a neat name to go with the image. There is however at least one possibility that makes sense. In 1946 a radio contest tried to find out where the name came and phrase came from. One of the contestants was James J. Kilroy, a steel worker from Massachusetts. During the war his primary job was inspecting tanks and ship hulls.
As Kilroy explained to the ATA:
I started my new job with enthusiasm, carefully surveying every inner bottom and tank before issuing a contract. I was thoroughly upset to find that practically every test leader [the head of a work crew] I met wanted me to go down and look over his job with him, and, when I explained to him that I had already checked the job and could not spare the time to crawl through one of those tanks again, he would accuse me of not having looked the job over.
I was getting sick of being accused of not looking the jobs over and one day as I came through the manhole of a tank I had just surveyed, I angrily marked with yellow crayon on the tank top, where the tester could see it, ‘Kilroy was here.’
The following day, a test gang leader approached me with a grin on his face and said, ‘I see you looked my job over.’ I nodded in agreement.
Kilroy figured that other workers may have seen his mark and took the expression with them when the went in the military. He was able to provide witness and collaboration for the events and won the contest.
Uncle Joe?
That seems like a good enough answer to me. The best Kilroy story though by far is from the Potsdam Conference in 1945. Churchill, Truman and Stalin were meeting to make their plans for the post war world. During a break Stalin reportedly went into one of the restrooms. When finished he came out asking one of his aids who Kilroy was. Not even Uncle Joe could avoid a visit by Kilroy!
This term became popular during the Vietnam War and is an indication of distance, a kilometer to be exact. The range of the big artillery guns was managed by turning one of two dials (for lack of a better term). One of which was for large adjustments, one click of the dial equaled one kilometer. The other was for smaller adjustments, less than a kilometer.
Some have indicated that the term predates Vietnam and could be from the Korean War or in the interwar period. It may, but it definitely came into popular use during the 60’s.
When a military officer was to be kicked out of the service it is said that he was cashiered. This comes from the French casser, “to break”. When this happened the officer would stand in front of the regimental drummer while the reasons for his dismissal was being read aloud, all the while the drummer played. After the reading was over the drums would change to a somber tattoo while the officer’s sword was broken and the buttons torn from his uniform. The rhythm of the drums would then change again as the officer was escorted from the scene.
Besides having “faced the music” the officer was also said to have been “drummed out”. “Drummed out” entered general speech in 1776, but “face the music” took much longer not reaching general use until the 1880’s.
Yes, when you hear grape you most likely think about those little beauties in the picture above. But how did they get their name?
Well from this:
The curved knife in the lovely lady’s hand was called by several names during the medieval era, one of which was grape. During times of war grapes (the knife) were used to penetrate the cracks, crevices and joints of armor. The sharp point and hook were very effective at getting around the protection and into the flesh of the enemy.
In times of peace the grape was very effective in harvesting “wine berries” from their vine. (Yep that’s what they were called!) Eventually the name transferred from the knife to the berries which they harvested.
Braille is a tactile writing system used by people who are blind or visually impaired. It is traditionally written with embossed paper.
The origin of the system, and later the word, came from a young French artillery officer in 1819, Captain Charles Barbier de la Sierra. Faced with the difficulty of reading his orders at night and trying avoid the dangers of lighting a lantern and thus giving away his position to the enemy, Barbier came up with a code of embossed writing that allowed him to read the messages in the dark. The method used raised dots on paper, each cluster indicating a letter that the user would be able to feel on the paper. Though revolutionary, the military took no interest in it.
Shortly after, a teacher at the French National Institute for Blind Children, Louis Braille, took an interest and began using the system in his school. From there the usage grew until it became the standard for visual impaired writing.
All thanks to a French military man that had trouble reading in the dark.
Going back as far as the 9th century, having ones nostrils slit stood as common punishment for not paying your taxes/fines or for theft
It was practiced by the Vikings in areas of northern England where those that could not pay were sliced as a reminder that they should save up for the next time. Not only was this an everyday reminder for the poor person it happened to, but it was a mark where by the next time the raiders came back they would know who had trouble paying last time.
Later when the actually slitting of the nose became less common the phrase turned to mean paying a high price for something.
That guy at work is always trying to undermine me with the boss.
The term undermine comes from way back in the day when a military forced besieged a castle or walled town, the main goal was to breach the walls.
At first this was done by having sappers get close to the wall and either set fire or later place explosives next to it. When moats, deep ditches filled with water surrounding the walls, came into play this got more difficult as they could not get as close.
One way around this was to dig tunnels starting from he other side of the moat and leading to the foundations of the wall. There they would either start fires and allow the heat to crack and damage the wall from underneath, or later they would set off explosions below the foundations hoping to bring he walls down. This became known as undermining.
Garnish, as in to decorate . Mostly used now in reference to food preparation. It does however hearken back to old French where it meant to warn a town of impending attack.
Once a town was given a “garnish” it would start to prepare for the battle by “dressing” the fortifications with banners and soldiers.
Medieval chefs, if their side was victorious, would later cook a feast where a cake or some such desert that resembled a castle was the centerpiece. This “cake” would be decorated with the banners and flags of the town and even little soldiers and such to show that the town was standing “garnished”. The term would eventually just stay in the kitchen and away from the battlefield.
As in “Buffy and I took the yacht out to the island this morning.”
A yacht is a type of light water craft that wayyyy back in the day was favored by pirates. Small and quick they were perfect for coastal raiding and quick strikes at sea. The name comes from the Dutch word jachten which means “to hunt”.
in 1660 Holland presented the English King Charles II with a yacht named Mary. It was 100 tons, carried eight cannon and was given to celebrate the restoration of the English monarchy. It was at the precise time that the word entered the English language. There are not many times when you can actually point to the exact entrance of such a word, that alone makes it kind of cool. The pirate connection adds a little also and provides the military connection. Hmmm… makes you wonder what the Minnow was really doing on that three hour tour…
People, Places and Things from US Military History
