Also 9 vedet; 7– vidette. The [F., ad. It. vedetta, prob. f. vedere to see. incorrect spelling vidette, now rare, was common in the first half of the 19th cent.]
1. Mil. A mounted sentry placed in advance of the outposts of an army to observe the movements of the enemy.
α. 1690. Davies, Diary (Camden), 129. And then lay down to sleep … without posting any scouts or videttes abroad.
1778. Gouv. Morris, in Sparks, Corr. Amer. Rev. (1853), II. 228. A few good cavalry may be requisite for the videttes.
1812. Examiner, 7 Sept., 561/2. He fell in with the enemy’s videttes.
1843. Prescott, Mexico, III. iii. (1864), 152. One of the videttes perceived … a large body of Indians moving towards the Christian lines.
1868. Regul. & Orders Army, § 892. Instructions for the guidance of Outposts,… videttes, and sentries.
1902. R. W. Chambers, Maids of Paradise, xxii. 376. The rigid system of patrol which brought death … to our sleet-soaked videttes.
β. 1702. Milit. Dict., Vedette, a Sentinel of the Horse … detached from the main Body of the Army [etc.].
1746. Rep. Cond. Sir J. Cope, 78. To post the Out-Guard, and see the Vedettes placed properly.
1786. Gillies, Hist. Greece, iii. I. 100. The order of their guards and watches was highly judicious; they employed, for their security, out-sentries and vedettes.
1809. Wellington, in Gurw., Desp. (1836), V. 355, note. The vedettes of the outposts were within shot of each other.
1844. Queen’s Reg. & Ord. Army, 394. Whether they have been in the habit of placing piquets, posting vedets, conducting patrols, &c.
1879. Blackw. Mag., July, 23. A vedette was killed to-day. Half-a-dozen Zulus rushed out on him soon after he had been posted for the day.
transf. 1807. Pike, Sources Mississ. (1810), 248. I made a pretext to halt—established my boy as a vedet, and sat down peacably under a bush and made my notes.
1812. Col. Hawker, Diary (1893), I. 53. An old cock, who was the vidette.
1878. L. W. M. Lockhart, Mine is Thine, xxii. II. 98. The blackcock vedette rolled his burnished plumage leisurely against the sun.
fig. 1801. Jefferson, Writ. (1859), VII. 483. Philosophical vedette at the distance of one thousand miles … is precious to us here.
1880. Spectator, 13 Nov., 1439. They cannot bear to see the landlords, whom they regard as their own vedettes, terrorized.
2. Vedette boat, a small vessel used for scouting purposes in naval warfare.
1884. Pall Mall G., 6 Oct., 6/1. Building armour-clads, fast cruisers, vedette and torpedo boats.
1892. Times (weekly ed.), 7 Oct., 7/2. They are vedette boats and not torpedo boats in the proper sense.
