Lance-Constable

2010-10-23T18:39:21Z

86.177.214.186:

'''Lance-Constable''' is the lowest rank that a member of the [[Ankh-Morpork City Watch]] can be, and where they all join unless by dint of some surpassing virtue such as [[Cheery Littlebottom]]'s then-potential abilities as a forensic expert or [[A.E. Pessimal]]'s personal talents as a filing clerk.

Even [[Carrot]] began Watch life as a Lance-Constable. Well may it be said that each new recruit may well be carrying a Field Marshall's baton in his (or indeed, her) knapsack...

==Annotation==

Lance-Constable is an unknown rank on [[Roundworld]]. To be Lance- something in uniform is to be a junior one. The lowest non-commissioned commanding rank is Lance Corporal - a one-stripe officer. A "real" corporal is a two-striper, and a sergeant has three stripes. So a Lance-Constable would be an under-constable, i.e. so low on the pecking order as to not get a peck at all. In the British Army the rank is an ''appointment'', not a ''promotion'' - so lacking in status that it becomes, as George McDonald Fraser remarked, a "thankless dogsbody job". McDonald Fraser should know: he was appointed lance-corporal four times, and busted back to Private three times, for various misdemeanours and infractions.

France follows the British model where its equivalent of a lance-corporal is the ''sous-caporal'', the "undercorporal". In the United States Army , the equivalent rank is ''private, first class'' - rather more positive, this is the alternative idea of the "superior private;" the US Marines use both Pfc. AND Lance-Corporal (this is also the idea current in the Japanese Army, incidentally).

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Lance-Constable