'Damn The Torpedoes!'

2a. ’Damn the torpedoes!’ – This expression is attributed to Admiral David Farragut during the Civil (or was it uncivil?) War.

On August 5, 1864, Farragut won a great victory in the Battle of Mobile Bay. Mobile was the Confederacy's last major port open on the Gulf of Mexico. The bay was heavily mined (tethered naval mines were known as torpedoes at the time). Farragut ordered his fleet to charge the bay. When the monitor USS Tecumseh struck a mine and sank, the others began to pull back.

Farragut could see the ships pulling back from his high perch, lashed to the rigging of his flagship the USS Hartford. "What's the trouble?" was shouted through a trumpet from the flagship to the USS Brooklyn. "Torpedoes!" was shouted back in reply. "Damn the torpedoes!" said Farragut, "Four bells. Captain Drayton, go ahead! Jouett, full speed!" The bulk of the fleet succeeded in entering the bay. Farragut then triumphed over the opposition of heavy batteries in Fort Morgan and Fort Gaines to defeat the squadron of Admiral Franklin Buchanan.

[Source: Wikipedia]


2s. ’Damn the torpedoes!’ – A corruption of a rallying cry of the revolutionaries during the 1848 uprising in Paris.

Because of its distinctive profile (the bottom being thicker than the top) as well as its intended use, Le Barrière Gersais (see ‘Jersey Barrier’ above) was often called ‘La Barrage’ (‘The Dam’) by the revolutionaries. A rallying cry became: “La Barrage empêche les balles!” (“The Dam impedes [blocks] the bullets!”) Soon [time was running out on the barricades] it was shortened to ‘La Barrage empêche!’ (‘The Dam impedes!’)

Somehow, this motto became corrupted in a bastardized translation into English. What was a noun became, homophonically, an expletive; and the verb ‘impedes’ was distorted into a noun containing the same vowel sound. Hence the origin, fanciful as it may seem, of the famous expression: ’Damn the torpedoes!’

Yes I know, this expression is attributed [Wikipedia: ‘It may be apocryphal.’ Do you see? Already we know its origins are in doubt] to Admiral David Farragut, who supposedly used it during the Civil War at the Battle of Mobile Bay. But what if he did say it? Is it not clear that this was a subtle reference to the rallying cry of Jacques Gersais and his fellow revolutionaries of just a few short years before?

- Theo May theomay@comcast.net