Queen of Battle

Wilson Gray hwgray at EARTHLINK.NET
Tue Apr 27 18:09:32 UTC 2004


On Apr 27, 2004, at 12:30 PM, James A. Landau wrote:

> ---------------------- Information from the mail header
> -----------------------
> Sender:       American Dialect Society <ADS-L at LISTSERV.UGA.EDU>
> Poster:       "James A. Landau" <JJJRLandau at AOL.COM>
> Subject:      Queen of Battle
> -----------------------------------------------------------------------
> --------
>
> In a message dated  Sun, 25 Apr 2004 23:43:02 -0400,  Wilson Gray
> <hwgray at EARTHLINK.NET> quotes
>
>>  "Infantry!
>>   Queen of battle!
>>   What is the meaning of 'infantry'?!
>>   [Response:] "Kill!!"
>
> When "As The Caissons Go Rolling Along" was promoted to be the
> official US
> Army song, the Field Artillery got a replacement song, which runs:
>
>      Count off, you cannoncockers,
>      You redleg cannoneers.
>      You've been the king of battle
>      for the past two hundred years.
>
>      The grunts and the tankers
>      need us to open the way.
>      So fire your gun
>      Till the battle's done
>      With the field artillery.
>
>                       - James A. Landau
>

Interesting! I'm familiar with "cannoncocker," and my wife is named
after St. Barbara, the patron saint of the Artillery. (Her father was
an artilleryman in WWII.) But both the existence of the song and the
existence of the phrase, "king of battle," are new to me.
At the gates of Fort Dix stands - or, perhaps, stood - a billboard
reading,

        Fort Dix
        Home of The Infantry
        Queen of Battle

I wonder whether there is/was a similar sign at Fort Sill.



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