Who Was "Old Bill?"

Since 1904, the symbol of the US. Armor Association was a drawing of a frontier cavalryman by the noted Western artist Frederick Remington.

Remington, a famous magazine illustrator, loved the US. Cavalry and spent a lot of time visiting cavalry posts. And when the cavalry prepared to go to to Cuba for the Spanish-American War, Remington was sent by the publishing mogul, William Randolph Hearst, to cover the war and the buildup.

The drawing of the cavalryman was apparently made by Remington at a staging camp in Tampa, Florida in 1898. The cavalryman who posed for the sketch was Sergeant John Lannen, a snowy-haired veteran on his last enlistment. Lannen would later die of yellow fever, as did so many of the veterans of the Cuba fighting. in 1904, the archives of the US. Cavalry Association note that Remington, an honorary member, had agreed to let the Association use the drawing as its symbol. The sketch of Sergeant Lannen on horseback appeared on the cover of the old Cavalry Journal for years. The Journal, evolving with the missions of the men it served, later became the Amored Cevalry Journal and, still later, ARMOR, which became a Department of the Army publication in 1974. Today, ARMOR'S office at Fort Knox is Building 4401, called Lannen House, and the drawing still appears in the magazine from time to time. But over the years, the sketch has been called "Old Bil; not "Old John." We at ARMOR were wondering why. What do we know about this cavalryman, and why was he renamed "Bill"? Could 'Old Bill' have been SGT Lannen's horse?

If you have any information at all about the origin of Old Bill, the facts of the matter, personal theories, or just interesting N-mors, we'd like to hear about them. We've begun investigating the question and will publish the results in a forthcoming issue. ARMOR - November-December 1992