Gentleman ranker
Encyclopedia
A Gentleman ranker is an enlisted soldier who may have been a former officer
or a gentleman
qualified through education and background to be a commissioned officer but elects to remain a common soldier. The term also describes those soldiers who signed on specifically as 'gentleman volunteers' in the British army
to serve as private soldiers with the understanding being that they would be given a commission (without purchase) at a later date. These men trained and fought as private soldiers but messed with the officers and were thus afforded a social standing of somewhere in between the two.
adventurer unwilling to accept responsibility, or in the case of the US Army a shorter period of initial enlistment. Some Gentleman rankers may have been officers in one army but who are unable or unwilling to accept a commission in a different nations' army where they serve. During World War II, many men qualified to serve as commissioned officers chose to remain in the ranks.
The British army contained many gentleman volunteers who served as private soldiers but messed
with the officers. Many of these men hoped to be noticed through gallantry to receive commissions through valour without purchasing them.
The reserves of the United States Armed Forces contain many gentleman rankers who choose to serve out of a sense of adventure or duty. Some joined the military as enlisted soldiers prior to obtaining university and professional degrees and choose to continue their service in the ranks. Others are qualified to become commissioned officers but elect to serve in an enlisted capacity because of their interest in a specific enlisted speciality (tank gunner, for example) or because their civilian professions do not allow them the extra time and effort required of a commissioned officer in a reserve unit. Other gentleman rankers seek to avoid the higher profile and perceived pretense of a commission and serve for patriotic reasons.
Examples of Gentlemen rankers have been former officers from various nations serving as enlisted soldiers in the French Foreign Legion
. Three examples in fiction are David Niven
in The Guns of Navarone
, Private Percival Pinkerton of the American comic book
Sgt. Fury and his Howling Commandos
and Gunner Graham in it Aint Half Hot Mum. Other film examples recognized the widespread presence of gentleman rankers, who were so common in the U.S. military during World War II that movie audiences could readily identify them on film. In the 1946 film, The Best Years Of Our Lives
, Sergeant Al Stephenson (played by Frederic March) was a US Army sergeant, who, in civilian life, was a wealthy, university-educated banker who lived in a penthouse and had his own household staff.
's stories and as the title of a poem he wrote which appeared in Barrack-Room Ballads, and Other Verses
, first series, published in 1892.
In Kipling's poem "Gentlemen-Rankers," the speaker "sings":
Kipling's poem, in translation, was set to music by Edvard Grieg
in 1900 (EG 156, Gentlemen-Menige.) However, after he had completed it, he received a copy of the English original and was so dismayed by the omission of important passages that he did not publish it; it was published posthumously in 1991.
The poem was also set to music and sung at Harvard and Yale in the early 1900s. According to Whiffenpoof
historian James M. Howard, "...this song is known to have been sung at Yale as far back as 1902... Whatever its origins, 'Gentlemen-Rankers' was frequently sung at Yale in 1907-1909, mostly by the Growlers, '08, with whom it was a favorite." The words were famously adapted by Meade Minnigerode
and George Pomeroy to become The Whiffenpoof Song. According to Howard, the musical setting is often attributed to Tod B. Galloway, but is almost certainly the work of a Harvard student named Guy H. Scull, who in turn may have borrowed from a Negro spiritual.
Billy Bragg
borrows part of this poem in his song "Island Of No Return": "Me and the corporal out on the spree, Damned from here to Eternity".
Officer (armed forces)
An officer is a member of an armed force or uniformed service who holds a position of authority. Commissioned officers derive authority directly from a sovereign power and, as such, hold a commission charging them with the duties and responsibilities of a specific office or position...
or a gentleman
Gentleman
The term gentleman , in its original and strict signification, denoted a well-educated man of good family and distinction, analogous to the Latin generosus...
qualified through education and background to be a commissioned officer but elects to remain a common soldier. The term also describes those soldiers who signed on specifically as 'gentleman volunteers' in the British army
British Army
The British Army is the land warfare branch of Her Majesty's Armed Forces in the United Kingdom. It came into being with the unification of the Kingdom of England and Scotland into the Kingdom of Great Britain in 1707. The new British Army incorporated Regiments that had already existed in England...
to serve as private soldiers with the understanding being that they would be given a commission (without purchase) at a later date. These men trained and fought as private soldiers but messed with the officers and were thus afforded a social standing of somewhere in between the two.
Explanation
Reasons have been as varied as a previous disgrace, a gentlemanGentleman
The term gentleman , in its original and strict signification, denoted a well-educated man of good family and distinction, analogous to the Latin generosus...
adventurer unwilling to accept responsibility, or in the case of the US Army a shorter period of initial enlistment. Some Gentleman rankers may have been officers in one army but who are unable or unwilling to accept a commission in a different nations' army where they serve. During World War II, many men qualified to serve as commissioned officers chose to remain in the ranks.
The British army contained many gentleman volunteers who served as private soldiers but messed
Mess
A mess is the place where military personnel socialise, eat, and live. In some societies this military usage has extended to other disciplined services eateries such as civilian fire fighting and police forces. The root of mess is the Old French mes, "portion of food" A mess (also called a...
with the officers. Many of these men hoped to be noticed through gallantry to receive commissions through valour without purchasing them.
The reserves of the United States Armed Forces contain many gentleman rankers who choose to serve out of a sense of adventure or duty. Some joined the military as enlisted soldiers prior to obtaining university and professional degrees and choose to continue their service in the ranks. Others are qualified to become commissioned officers but elect to serve in an enlisted capacity because of their interest in a specific enlisted speciality (tank gunner, for example) or because their civilian professions do not allow them the extra time and effort required of a commissioned officer in a reserve unit. Other gentleman rankers seek to avoid the higher profile and perceived pretense of a commission and serve for patriotic reasons.
Examples of Gentlemen rankers have been former officers from various nations serving as enlisted soldiers in the French Foreign Legion
French Foreign Legion
The French Foreign Legion is a unique military service wing of the French Army established in 1831. The foreign legion was exclusively created for foreign nationals willing to serve in the French Armed Forces...
. Three examples in fiction are David Niven
David Niven
James David Graham Niven , known as David Niven, was a British actor and novelist, best known for his roles as Phileas Fogg in Around the World in 80 Days and Sir Charles Lytton, a.k.a. "the Phantom", in The Pink Panther...
in The Guns of Navarone
The Guns of Navarone (film)
The Guns of Navarone is a 1961 British-American Action/Adventure war film based on the 1957 novel of the same name about the Dodecanese Campaign of World War II by Scottish thriller writer Alistair MacLean. It stars Gregory Peck, David Niven and Anthony Quinn, along with Anthony Quayle and Stanley...
, Private Percival Pinkerton of the American comic book
American comic book
An American comic book is a small magazine originating in the United States and containing a narrative in the form of comics. Since 1975 the dimensions have standardized at 6 5/8" x 10 ¼" , down from 6 ¾" x 10 ¼" in the Silver Age, although larger formats appeared in the past...
Sgt. Fury and his Howling Commandos
Sgt. Fury and his Howling Commandos
Sgt. Fury and his Howling Commandos are a fictional World War II unit in comic books published by Marvel Comics. Created by Stan Lee and Jack Kirby, they first appeared in Sgt. Fury and his Howling Commandos #1 . The main character, Sgt...
and Gunner Graham in it Aint Half Hot Mum. Other film examples recognized the widespread presence of gentleman rankers, who were so common in the U.S. military during World War II that movie audiences could readily identify them on film. In the 1946 film, The Best Years Of Our Lives
The Best Years of Our Lives
The Best Years of Our Lives is a 1946 American drama film directed by William Wyler, and starring Fredric March, Myrna Loy, Dana Andrews, Teresa Wright, and Harold Russell, a United States paratrooper who lost both hands in a military training accident. The film is about three United States...
, Sergeant Al Stephenson (played by Frederic March) was a US Army sergeant, who, in civilian life, was a wealthy, university-educated banker who lived in a penthouse and had his own household staff.
Kipling's poem, "Gentlemen-Rankers," and its musical settings
The term appears in several of Rudyard KiplingRudyard Kipling
Joseph Rudyard Kipling was an English poet, short-story writer, and novelist chiefly remembered for his celebration of British imperialism, tales and poems of British soldiers in India, and his tales for children. Kipling received the 1907 Nobel Prize for Literature...
's stories and as the title of a poem he wrote which appeared in Barrack-Room Ballads, and Other Verses
Barrack-Room Ballads
The Barrack-Room Ballads, and Other Verses are a set of martial songs and poems by Rudyard Kipling originally published in two parts: the first set in 1892, the second in 1896...
, first series, published in 1892.
In Kipling's poem "Gentlemen-Rankers," the speaker "sings":
- To the legion of the lost ones, to the cohort of the damned,
- To my brethren in their sorrow overseas,
- Sings a gentleman of England cleanly bred, machinely crammed,
- And a trooper of the Empress, if you please.
- Yea, a trooper of the forces who has run his own six horses,
- And faith he went the pace and went it blind,
- And the world was more than kin while he held the ready tin,
- But to-day the Sergeant's something less than kind.
- We're poor little lambs who've lost our way,
- Baa! Baa! Baa!
- We're little black sheep who've gone astray,
- Baa—aa—aa!
- Gentlemen-rankers out on the spree,
- Damned from here to Eternity,
- God ha' mercy on such as we,
- Baa! Yah! Bah!
- Oh, it's sweet to sweat through stables, sweet to empty kitchen slops,
- And it's sweet to hear the tales the troopers tell,
- To dance with blowzy housemaids at the regimental hops
- And thrash the cad who says you waltz too well.
- Yes, it makes you cock-a-hoop to be "Rider" to your troop,
- And branded with a blasted worsted spur,
- When you envy, O how keenly, one poor Tommy being cleanly
- Who blacks your boots and sometimes calls you "Sir".
- If the home we never write to, and the oaths we never keep,
- And all we know most distant and most dear,
- Across the snoring barrack-room return to break our sleep,
- Can you blame us if we soak ourselves in beer?
- When the drunken comrade mutters and the great guard-lantern gutters
- And the horror of our fall is written plain,
- Every secret, self-revealing on the aching white-washed ceiling,
- Do you wonder that we drug ourselves from pain?
- We have done with Hope and Honour, we are lost to Love and Truth,
- We are dropping down the ladder rung by rung,
- And the measure of our torment is the measure of our youth.
- God help us, for we knew the worst too young!
- Our shame is clean repentance for the crime that brought the sentence,
- Our pride it is to know no spur of pride,
- And the Curse of Reuben holds us till an alien turf enfolds us
- And we die, and none can tell Them where we died.
- We're poor little lambs who've lost our way,
- Baa! Baa! Baa!
- We're little black sheep who've gone astray,
- Baa—aa—aa!
- Gentlemen-rankers out on the spree,
- Damned from here to Eternity,
- God ha' mercy on such as we,
- Baa! Yah! Bah!
Kipling's poem, in translation, was set to music by Edvard Grieg
Edvard Grieg
Edvard Hagerup Grieg was a Norwegian composer and pianist. He is best known for his Piano Concerto in A minor, for his incidental music to Henrik Ibsen's play Peer Gynt , and for his collection of piano miniatures Lyric Pieces.-Biography:Edvard Hagerup Grieg was born in...
in 1900 (EG 156, Gentlemen-Menige.) However, after he had completed it, he received a copy of the English original and was so dismayed by the omission of important passages that he did not publish it; it was published posthumously in 1991.
The poem was also set to music and sung at Harvard and Yale in the early 1900s. According to Whiffenpoof
The Whiffenpoofs
The Yale Whiffenpoofs are the oldest collegiate a cappella group in the United States, established in 1909. Best known for "The Whiffenpoof Song", based on a tune written by Tod Galloway and adapted with lyrics by Meade Minnigerode & George S Pomeroy , the group comprises college...
historian James M. Howard, "...this song is known to have been sung at Yale as far back as 1902... Whatever its origins, 'Gentlemen-Rankers' was frequently sung at Yale in 1907-1909, mostly by the Growlers, '08, with whom it was a favorite." The words were famously adapted by Meade Minnigerode
Meade Minnigerode
Meade Minnigerode was an American writer, born in London. He graduated from Yale in 1910 and for several years was associated with publishers in New York. He represented the United States Shipping Board in France in 1917–1918 and in the year following was first lieutenant with the American Red...
and George Pomeroy to become The Whiffenpoof Song. According to Howard, the musical setting is often attributed to Tod B. Galloway, but is almost certainly the work of a Harvard student named Guy H. Scull, who in turn may have borrowed from a Negro spiritual.
Billy Bragg
Billy Bragg
Stephen William Bragg , better known as Billy Bragg, is an English alternative rock musician and left-wing activist. His music blends elements of folk music, punk rock and protest songs, and his lyrics mostly deal with political or romantic themes...
borrows part of this poem in his song "Island Of No Return": "Me and the corporal out on the spree, Damned from here to Eternity".