The Origin of Taps

Taps to me is one of the most haunting beautiful few notes composed ever. Where did it come from?

The true story is that in July 1862, after the Seven Days battles at Harrison's Landing (near Richmond), Virginia during the Civil War, the wounded Commander of the 3rd Brigade, 1st Division, V Army Corps, Army of the Potomac, General Daniel Butterfield reworked, with his bugler Oliver Wilcox Norton, another bugle call, "Scott Tattoo," to create Taps. He thought that the regular call for Lights Out was too formal. Taps was adopted throughout the Army of the Potomac and finally confirmed by orders. Soon other Union units began using Taps, and even a few Confederate units began using it as well. After the war, Taps became an official bugle call. Col. James A. Moss, in his Officer's Manual first published in 1911, gives an account of the initial use of Taps at a military funeral:

"During the Peninsular Campaign in 1862, a soldier of Tidball's Battery A of the 2nd Artillery was buried at a time when the battery occupied an advanced position concealed in the woods. It was unsafe to fire the customary three volleys over the grave, on account of the proximity of the enemy, and it occurred to Capt. Tidball that the sounding of Taps would be the most appropriate ceremony that could be substituted."

There are no official words to Taps... but here are some of the the most popular put to it...

Day is done,

gone the sun,

From the hills,

from the lake,

From the sky.

All is well,

safely rest,

God is nigh.