Buggins' turn

Source: Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia.

Buggins' turn or Buggins's turn is a humorous, disparaging British term for appointment to a position by rotation or seniority rather than by merit.[1]

This practice in the British Royal Navy was a concern of the reforming Admiral Fisher (1841 –1920) who wrote, "Going by seniority saves so much trouble. 'Buggins's turn' has been our ruin and will be disastrous hereafter!"[2]

Buggins previously appeared in an epigram of Robert Herrick.[3]

Upon Buggins
Buggins is Drunke all night, all day he sleepes;
This is the Levell-coyle that Buggins keeps.

Level-coil was an old party game in which the players changed seats.

References

  1. ^ John Arbuthnot Fisher Baron Fisher (1953), Arthur Jacob Marder (ed.), Fear God and Dread Nought: The Correspondence of Admiral of the Fleet Lord Fisher of Kilverstone, vol. 1, Jonathan Cape, p. 181