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A shilling of George III, king at the turn of the 19th century.. The King's shilling, sometimes called the Queen's shilling when the Sovereign is female, [1] is a historical slang term referring to the earnest payment of one shilling given to recruits to the armed forces of the United Kingdom in the 18th, 19th and 20th centuries, although the practice dates back to the end of the English Civil ...
The first watch that somebody adapted to wear on a wrist is unknown. The first series of purpose-made men’s wristwatches was produced by Girard-Perregaux in 1880 for the German Navy. [5] During World War I numerous companies, including Omega, Longines, Elgin and others produced wristwatches for the military. [3] [4] Rolex also produced trench ...
This figure constituted about 40 per cent of all men aged between 18 and 45 years of age. The recruitment initiatives during the war involved a considerable degree of state, social, media and moral pressure brought to bear on eligible males to enlist ("take the king's shilling"), especially in the later years of the war. [4]
Recruitment was entirely voluntary; about 1.3 million men served in the First World War, many on the Western Front, and 2.5 million in the Second. Initially the soldiers and NCOs were Indian, with British officers, but later Indian officers were promoted King's Commissioned Indian Officer.
A commonly held belief is that a trick was used in taverns, surreptitiously dropping a King's shilling ("prest money") into a man's drink, as by "finding" the shilling in his possession he was deemed to have volunteered, and that this led to some tavern owners putting glass bottoms in their tankards. However, this is a legend; press officers ...
A recruit would be given the King's shilling as a mark of the contract made. The term has passed into the English language to mean any set of circumstances which recruits or fails to recruit volunteers to the army. See Daily Telegraph headline The CIA is al-Qaeda's best recruiting sergeant
Metal tankards often come with a glass bottom. The legend is that the glass-bottomed tankard was developed as a way of refusing the King's shilling, i.e., conscription into the British Army or Navy. The drinker could see the coin in the bottom of the glass and refuse the drink, thereby avoiding conscription.
Delilah Dirk is a series of action adventure graphic novels following adventures of the titular character, Delilah Dirk. [1] Written and illustrated by Tony Cliff, Delilah Dirk started as a webcomic, [2] and now consists of three full graphic novels and one shorter story.