[ad. F. escouade, earlier esquade (esquouade), var. of esquadre SQUADER.]
1. Mil. A small number of men, a subdivision or section of a company, formed for drill or told off for some special purpose.
1649. G. Daniel, Trinarch., Hen. V., clxxxv. The Ragged Squad, whose Pay, ill-husbanded, Gives him nor Shooes nor Shirt.
1673. Reg. Privy Counc. Scotl., IV. 98. The commander of that squad of his Majesties troup of guardes, quartered at Bathgate.
1757. Washington, Writ. (1889), I. 468. Divide your men into as many squads as there are Sergeants.
1811. Regul. & Orders Army, 244. The Commanding Officer will cause them, by Squads of 20 or more, to move round the Vessel in double quick time, each Squad for ten or twelve minutes. Ibid. (1844), 133. The Subaltern Officers, to whom the Squads are entrusted, are responsible for the same to the Captain.
1877. Field Exerc. Infantry, 4. Recruits formed into a Squad should be directed to observe the relative places they hold with each other.
b. Awkward squad: (see quot. 1802).
1796. Burns, in Cunningham, Wks. & Life B. (1834), I. 344. John, don’t let the awkward squad fire over me.
1802. James, Milit. Dict., s.v., The aukward squad consists not only of recruits at drill, but of formed soldiers that are ordered to exercise with them, in consequence of some irregularity under arms.
1842. Macaulay, Ess., Fredk. Gt. (1877), 659. The household regiments of Versailles and St. James’s would have appeared an awkward squad.
1878. Besant & Rice, Celia’s Arb., v. The march and movement of troops,… the drill of the awkward squad, delighted his soul.
transf. 1797. S. James, Narrative Voy., 205. The butchers here are a truly aukward squad.
1816. [see AWKWARD a. 4 b].
1856. P. Thompson, Hist. Boston, Provincialisms, They’re a dirty squad, an awkward squad.
c. Without article.
1833. Regul. & Instr. Cavalry, I. 9. Each Recruit must be trained … in squad.
† 2. = SQUADRON sb. 3. Obs. rare.
1673. in 10th Rep. Hist. MSS. Comm., App. I. 80. On Monday the fleets ingadged;… a whole squad surroundit Sir Edward Sprag, who was in the Royal Prince.
1676. Row, Contn. Blair’s Autobiogr., xii. (1848), 509. All that the King was able to do was to set out some squads of small ships.
3. A small number, group or party of persons.
1809. Malkin, Gil Blas, IV. ix. ¶ 2. In my mistress’s female squad there was a nymph named Portia.
1830. Scott, Demonol., ix. 284. The witches of Auldearn were so numerous that they were told off into squads, or covines.
1841. Catlin, N. Amer. Ind., xxiv. (1844), I. 201. The same intelligence was soon communicated by little squads to every family.
1856. Kane, Arct. Expl., I. xx. 243. I cannot realize that some may not yet be alive; that some small squad or squads … may not have found a hunting-ground.
b. Const. of.
1818. Keats, Lett., Wks. 1889, III. 115. I am in a high way of being introduced to a squad of people, Peter Pindar, Mrs. Opie, Mrs. Scott.
1825. Cobbett, Rur. Rides, 83. We saw … squads of labourers … migrating from tract to tract.
1857. Borrow, Romany Rye, xlii. He had a very shabby squad of animals, without soul or spirit.
1896. E. A. King, Ital. Highways, 91. There is then also a large squad of liveried servants following the hearse, a survival, it is said, of the old Roman custom of a rich man being followed to the grave by all his freed men.
c. In the phr. in squads.
a. 1848. O. W. Holmes, Stethoscope Song, 64. They every day her ribs did pound In squads of twenty.
1852. Motley, Corr. (1889), I. v. 132. People … making excursions into the country in small squads.
1869. Th. Rogers, Hist. Gleanings, I. 84. In the Georgian era men and women were hanged in squads.
4. A particular set or circle of people.
1786. Burns, To J. S., xxviii. The hairum-scairum, ramstam boys, The rambling [1787 rattling] squad.
1809. Malkin, Gil Blas, III. xi. ¶ 8. To study the feelings of authors … would only be the way to spoil them. I know that contemptible squad.
1818. Blackw. Mag., III. 533. Tho’ used by Hunt, and Keats, and all that squad.
5. attrib., as squad-dance, drill, instructor, etc.; squad bag (see quot. 1876).
1844. Regul. & Ord. Army, 121. In other Corps a Troop, Company, or Squad Police has been introduced.
1859. Musketry Instr., 46. The squad instructor opposite the 50 yards point.
1864. Daily Tel., 14 March, 5/1. A suttler, seated on a truck drawn by dogs, is dispensing beer from squad barrels to a knot of thirsty labourers.
1865. E. Burritt, Walk to Land’s End, 171. Inaugurating a new term of service with … squad-dances in the public street.
1869. E. A. Parkes, Pract. Hygiene (ed. 3), 403. Squad bags are issued to infantry, four to each company.
1876. Voyle & Stevenson, Milit. Dict., 398/1. Squad Bags, canvas bags provided for troops (one for every 25 men), for the purpose of relieving a soldier from carrying a complete kit on the line of march or in the field.
1899. Lt.-Col. T. S. Baldock, Cromwell as Soldier, 24. The drill consisted of what we should now call ‘squad drill.’
