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By
Tony Tanzer |
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In the 18th and 19th centuries, it was the task of
recruiting sergeants to go about the country, each accompanied, as a rule
by a drummer boy and sometimes a fifer. When a likely recruit was found,
the sergeant on enlisting him, would pay him a shilling as his enrolment
bounty. Once the shilling was taken, the young man was deemed in the law
to be a soldier. There were many occasions when a possible recruit was
still expressing doubts and a common way to overcome them was for the
recruiting sergeant to drop a shilling into a pot of beer and press it on
the hesitant man. Even a sip at the beer was then construed as taken, or
drinking, the King’s Shilling. In Victoria’s day it was of course
known as the Queen’s Shilling. |
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