Andrew Miller

English

Alternative forms

• Andrew Millar

Etymology

Sometimes said to originate from the name of an 18th-century Lieutenant named Andrew Millar, famed for impressing many people into naval service; however, there is no evidence such a person existed.

Proper noun

Andrew Miller

1. (chiefly UK, naval slang) The Royal Navy; service in the Navy.
   • 1826, Matthew Henry Barker, Greenwich hospital, page 2:

     He wont do for Andrew Millar, for he's mair like unto a cuckoo clock-maker than a Jack tar.

   • 1906, W. H. Blake, The Adventures of a Naval Chief Gunner‎^[1], page 5:

     Since those days I have met scores of men who have deserted from Her Majesty's Army and Navy, and every one of them, without exception, curses the day he left the service, or, as the seamen term it, ‘Andrew Miller’.

   • 1984, Kenneth Poolman, Chanter R.N., page 151:

     I'm not a flight sergeant, we don't have 'em in the Andrew Miller.

Noun

Andrew Miller (plural Andrew Millers)

1. (chiefly UK, naval slang, obsolete) A warship.
   • 1850, Herman Melville, chapter IV, in White-Jacket‎^[2], published 1850, page 24:

     And what did you know, you bumpkin! before you came on board this Andrew Miller?