Tattoos, yokes, and jackass rabbits

A collection of words I added to my vocabulary while reading about Zachary Taylor years ago

Oh, it’s on!

Not to toot my own horn, but this post was inspired by me (a civilian) knowing that “tattoo” is a bugle call and my cousin (not a civilian) not knowing. The hostilities were then considered as commenced.

Just kidding. There are no hostilities. Though I did find it offensive that he fact-checked my fact check. I suppose that just made being right even sweeter. My next tattoo will be a bugle to commemorate this special occasion.

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In any case, here’s a collection of words so you too can impress your family and become disproportionately proud of yourself:

Tattoo

Bugle call played after Taps; means it’s bedtime. Lights out. You have 15 minutes to STFU.

Keep scrolling to the end if you want to hear it.

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Jackass rabbit

Hares (not rabbits) that have donkey-like ears. Term coined by Mark Twain, probably coined after Zachary Taylor died. Unless Twain coined it as a teenager.

Breastwork

Low, temporary defense. Kinda like a defense fence.

18-pounder

Cannon. As in: “Erecting a breastwork containing two 18-pounders.” Okie-doke.

In any case, like many older officers Taylor was not a fond of artillery such as the 18-pounder. He preferred that “their main dependence must be on the bayonet.”

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Blue chapeau bra

Translates to “hat arm”. Allowed the wearer to smoosh the hat and allow them to carry it under their arm without being hurt, which begs the question: were there a lot of hat-induced injuries prior to the introduction of the hat bra?

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Chaparral

Pesky, thick shrubs/dwarf trees that got in troops’ way

Yoke of oxen

Two. Two oxen. As in “let’s add an unnecessary word problem to this book”:

“He further inhibited his mobility by including a pair of 18-pounders, each drawn by six yoke of oxen.”

(2 cannons, each pulled by 12 oxen … because why simplify the language when you can force the use of a dictionary and math?)

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Bivouacking

Finding a place to set up temporary shelter.

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Ouisconsin

Adorable French spelling of Wisconsin

Wooling

Grabbing someone by the ears and shaking the crap out of them.

Taylor (who had a very short fuse) did this to a German soldier he thought wasn’t listening to him. Turns out, there was just a language barrier. The German knocked Taylor to the ground with one punch. When the other officers came to his aid, Taylor dismissed them: “Let that man alone, he will make a good soldier.”

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Bureaucratic pettifogging

Pettifogging (misspelled twice in the doodle below) means obsessing on the teeny, tiny details. Like whether I misspelled pettifogging.

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Opprobrium

According to Merriam-Webster, “public disgrace or ill fame that follows from conduct considered grossly wrong or vicious.” As in “Taylor missed of the opprobrium which Florida service attracted to command there.”

To be honest, I don’t know what that means. But he performed OK in one battle and so nobody noticed that he didn’t do much else, maybe?

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Physiognomy

Vice President Dallas declared “If he has any intellectual greatness, physiognomy is a cheat.” I believe this loosely translates to “If he’s smart, someone forgot to tell his dumb face.”

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“Jingoistic bumptiousness”

Arrogant superpatriotism

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BONUS!

Thaddeus Koscuiusko

Here’s another thing I looked up — but not in the dictionary. On July 4, 1850, Taylor was at the four-decades-from-completion Washington Monument for a ceremony. Dust from Koscuiusko’s tomb was being put into the monument. (Taylor died five days later.)

There’s a bridge not far from me named for Thaddeus, but I knew nothing about him. Kosciusko (full name: Andrzej Tadeusz Bonaventura Kościuszko) was a military engineer and Revolutionary War hero from Poland. With the anniversary of the Revolutionary War approaching, I want to dig into this guy more. He is freaking fascinating. For now, I’ll just say he “heavily fortified” West Point…

… which leads nicely into this West Point Band tattoo bugle call…

Lights out.

All of the doodles in this post were inspired by Zachary Taylor: Soldier, Planter, Statesman of the Old Southwest by K. Jack Bauer