Boots and Saddles (bugle call)

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Boots and Saddles (bugle call)

"Boots and Saddles" is a bugle call sounded for mounted troops to mount and take their place in line. [1] In the British Army it is used as a parade call. [2] Its name drives from the French phrase boute-selle, "put on saddle". [3]

Contents

The call has been used by the United States Army during the American Civil War [4] as well as World War II. [5] While the call was originally meant to apply exclusively to cavalry, [6] it was used later as an inspiring call for other military units as well. [5]

The tune was recorded in 1919 for the Victor Talking Machine Company's "Bugle Calls of the U.S. Army: Part 1". [7]

In literature

"Boots and Saddles" is blown several times in Mark Twain's 1907 novel A Horse's Tale . [8]

Elizabeth Bacon Custer's 1885 biography of her husband, General George Armstrong Custer, was titled Boots and Saddles: Or, Life in Dakota with General Custer. [9]

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References

  1. Gilman, Daniel Coit; Colby, Frank Moore; Peck, Harry Thurston (1905). The New International Encyclopedia. Dodd, Mead. p. 310.
  2. Byron Farwell, The Encyclopedia of Nineteenth-century Land Warfare: An Illustrated World View (W. W. Norton & Company, 2001), ISBN   978-0-393-04770-7, p. 118. Excerpt available at Google Books.
  3. Wedgwood, Hensleigh (1855). "On False Etymologies". Transactions of the Philological Society (6): 70.
  4. Nesbitt, Mark (2001). Saber & Scapegoat: J. E. B. Stuart and the Gettysburg Controversy. Stackpole Books. ISBN   9780811741361 . Retrieved 4 July 2020.
  5. 1 2 Tillman, Barrett (2012). Enterprise: America's Fightingest Ship and the Men Who Helped Win World War II. Simon & Schuster. p. 36. ISBN   9781439190890 . Retrieved 4 July 2020.
  6. "What the Bugles Tell in the Army and Navy". San Francisco Chronicle . June 5, 1898. p. 1. Retrieved 4 July 2020.
  7. Catalogue of Victor Records. Victor Talking Machine Company. 1919. Retrieved 4 July 2020.
  8. Twain, Mark (1907). A Horse's Tale. Harper and Brothers. Retrieved 4 July 2020.
  9. Hutton, Paul Andrew (August 16, 2017). "Libbie Custer: 'A Wounded Thing Must Hide'". HistoryNet. Retrieved April 5, 2020.