Sergeant
Sergeant names 2 different subjects across the 6 encyclopedias on this shelf. Each is set out below.
Sergeant THOMAS, an American jurist
Collier's New Encyclopedia (1921)
THOMAS, an American jurist; born in Philadelphia , Pa., Jan. 14, 1782; was graduated at Princeton College in 1798, and admitted to the bar in 1802. He was made associate justice of the Philadelphia District Court in 1814; was Secretary of State in 1817- 1819, and associate justice of the Pennsylvania Supreme Court in 1834-1846 . He resumed practice in 1847. He was the author of a "Treatise upon the Law of Pennsylvania Relative to the Proceedings of Foreign Attachment" (1811) ; "Reports of Cases adjudged in the Supreme Court of Pennsylvania" (with William Rawle, Jr., 17 vols., 1814-1829); "Sketch of the National Judiciary Powers exercised in the United States Prior to the Adoption of the Present Federal Constitution" (1838); etc. He died in Philadelphia , Pa., May 8, 1860.
Sergeant or SERJEANT, a sheriff's officer
Collier's New Encyclopedia (1921)
or SERJEANT, a sheriff's officer, a bailiff; a title given to certain officers of the British sove sovereign's household, serjeant; a police officer of superior rank to a private . Sergeant-at- -atarms, an officer appointed by a legislative body , whose duties are to enforce the orders given by such bodies, generally under the warrant of its presiding officer. In military language, the second permanent grade in the noncommissioned ranks of the army. In the United States service there are regimental as well as company sergeants. Their duties are mainly indicated by the title , which is a compound of sergeant with the superior officer or the department they are intended to serve; as, sergeant-major, quartermaster-sergeant, color-sergeant , commissary-sergeant, ordnance-sergeant.
What Has Changed in the Last Century
Collier's 1921 note on Thomas Sergeant needs no revision: he died in 1860, and his Reports with William Rawle remain a citation for early Pennsylvania case law. The rank itself has fared differently. The 1921 list of "regimental as well as company sergeants" and of commissary-sergeants and ordnance-sergeants belongs to a vanished structure; today's U.S. Army sergeant is pay grade E-5, one rung on a ladder that climbs through staff sergeant, sergeant first class, master and first sergeant to sergeant major, capped by the post of Sergeant Major of the Army, created only in 1966. The civil senses Collier's lists have proved durable: the House and Senate still elect a Sergeant at Arms, police forces still rank sergeants above constables and patrol officers, and the British Army still has colour sergeants.
Written for this edition, 2026.