go west

Etymology

In reference to death, originally Scottish, reaching broader usage among the soldiers of World War I. In reference to Manifest Destiny in the United States, a paraphrase of Horace Greeley's 25 Aug. 1838 advice in The New Yorker that young men should "Go to the West" if free to do so.

Pronunciation

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Verb

go west (third-person singular simple present goes west, present participle going west, simple past went west, past participle gone west)

1. Used other than figuratively or idiomatically: see go,‎ west.

   Go west until you hit the ocean, then turn left.

2. (of the sun) Synonym of set: to move toward the western horizon, to go down.
   • c. 1400, The Laud Troy Book, l. 13365:

     For hit was nyght, the sonne goth west

   • 2006, W.H. Henderson, Augusta Locke, page 263:

     I see the rocks set in the sky, and maybe the sun going west, and the trees getting dark.

3. (figuratively, dated) Synonym of die.
   • a. 1532, Glassinberry, poem preserved in Gray's Manuscipt:

     Women and mony wilsome wy,
     As wynd or wattir ar gane west...

   • 1833 Oct., Johnstone's Edinburgh Magazine, p. 89:

     The Irish, and the Scottish Highlanders, always describe persons lately dead as having gone west.

   • 1914 Dec. 31, The Times, p. 4:

     Does any one know the origin or meaning of the soldiers' curious phrase for death, ‘Going West’?

   • 1918, Banjo Paterson, Moving On:

     In this war we're always moving,
     Moving on;
     When we make a friend another friend has gone...
     When the bravest and the best
     Of the boys you know "go west",
     Then you're choking down your tears and
     Moving on.

   • 1918, Siegfried Sassoon, How to Die", Counter-Attack and Other Poems:

     You'd think, to hear some people talk,
     That lads go West with sobs and curses,
     And sullen faces white as chalk...
     But they've been taught the way to do it...
     With due regard for decent taste.

   • 2008 June 17, Anchorage Daily News, p. A9:

     Jack has ‘gone west’. He died peacefully in the loving arms of his son.

   Och, your ma's gone west, dearie. You'll hear her voice no more.

4. (figuratively, dated) To be lost, destroyed, or otherwise ruined.
   • 1916, Boyd Cable, Action Front, page 167:

     The glare of a burning house shone red in the sky over the roof tops. 'Somebody's 'appy 'ome gone west', remarked one man.

   • 1919 Sept., Blackwood's Magazine, p. 368:

     Their parcels... went persistently ‘west’.

   • 1941, George Orwell, The Lion and the Unicorn, Pt. II:

     Socialism? Ha! ha! ha! Where’s the money to come from? Ha! ha! ha! The lords of property were firm in their seats, and they knew it. But after the French collapse there came something that could not be laughed away, something that neither cheque-books nor policemen were any use against—the bombing. Zweee—BOOM! What’s that? Oh, only a bomb on the Stock Exchange. Zweee—BOOM! Another acre of somebody’s valuable slum-property gone west.

   • 1976, Rosamond Lehmann, Sea-Grape Tree, page 42:

     I had a dinky [handkerchief], but it went west earlier this evening. Soaked, dear.

5. (US) To move to the American West, particularly (historical) during the 19th century era.
   • 1856 May, Wisconsin Farmer, p. 209:

     It reminds me of the advice that Mr. Secretary Corwin gave to a young man that was applying for a clerkship. He said, ‘Young man, go West’.

   • 1870 Aug. 20, O.C. Kerr, Punchinello, p. 323:

     Go West, young man! Buy a good, stout farming outfit... and then go out to the far West upon Government-land.

   • 1992 Dec. 1, San Diego Union-Tribune, p. E1:

     Go west, young man. But stop before you get to California.

   Go west, young man!

References

• “west, adv., adj., n.¹, and prep.”, in OED Online ⁠, Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2021.