Glory quotes

View Quote Shaw: So what do you want to do?
Trip: Don't know, sir.
Shaw: It stinks, I suppose.
Trip: Yeah, It stinks bad. And we all covered up in it too. Ain't nobody clean. Be nice to get clean, though.
Shaw: How do we do that?
Trip: We ante up and kick in, sir. But I still don't want to carry your flag.

View Quote Trip: Hey, yo, ****, that's my spot, see.
Searles: If you don't mind, there's more sufficient reading light here.
Trip: Oooh, I like it when ****s talk good as white folks!
Searles: I'd be happy to teach you.
Trip: Now, listen here, I ain't got nothin' to learn from no house ****, you hear?
Searles: I am a free man, like my father before me.
Trip: Oh, really? Then move your free black ass out my spot, see!

View Quote Trip: I ain't fightin' this war for you, sir.
Shaw: I see.
Trip: I mean, what's the point? Ain't nobody gonna win. It's just gonna go on and on.
Shaw: Can't go on forever.
Trip: Yeah, but ain't nobody gonna win, sir.
Shaw: Somebody's gonna win.
Trip: Who? I mean, you get to go on back to Boston, big house and all that. What about us? What do we get?
Shaw: Well, you won't get anything if we lose.

View Quote Trip: See the way I figure, I figure this war would be over a whole lot sooner if you boys just turned right on around and headed back on down that way, and you let us head on up there where the real fighting is.
Union Soldier: We got men dyin' up that road.
Trip: And there wouldn't be nothing but rebs dyin if they'd let the fifty-fourth in it.

View Quote [Shaw approaches Rawlins after having Trip horse-whipped for deserting]
Shaw: Mr. Rawlins... this morning, I... it would be a great help to me if I could talk to you from time to time about the men. That's all.
[turns to leave]
Rawlins: Shoes, sir.
Shaw: I beg your pardon?
Rawlins: The men need shoes, Colonel.
Shaw: Yes, I've been after the quartermaster for some time.
Rawlins: No, sir. Now. The boy ran off to find him some shoes, Colonel. He wants to fight. Same as the rest of us. More, even.

View Quote [The 54th Massachusetts is marching through Union soldiers, preparing to attack Fort Wagner]
Union Soldier: Give 'em Hell, 54!
All: Give 'em Hell, 54!

View Quote [Trip and Searles are about to fight when Rawlins steps in]
Rawlins: Look, goddamn it! The whole world gotta stomp on your face?
Trip: Oh, I see, white man give you some stripes, you start hollerin' and orderin' everybody around, huh! Like you the massa hisself? ****, you ain't nothin' but the white man's dog! Shit.
[Rawlins slaps him]
Rawlins: And what are you? So full of hate that you have to fight everybody, because you've been whipped and chased by hounds. Well that might not be living, but it sure as hell ain't dying. And dying's been what these white boys have been doing for going on three years now, dying by the thousands! Dying for you, fool! I know 'cuz I dug the graves. And all this time I keep askin' myself, when, O Lord, when gonna be our time? Gonna come a time when we all gonna hafta ante up and kick in like men, LIKE MEN! You watch who you callin' ****. If there's any ****s around here, it's YOU, just a smart-mouthed, stupid-ass, swamp-runnin' ****. And if you not careful, that's all you ever gonna be.

View Quote [addressing the 54th the night before battle] I ain't much about no prayin', now. I ain't never had no family, and...killed off my mama. Well, I just... Y'all's the onliest family I got. I love the 54th. Ain't even much a matter what happens tomorrow, 'cause we men, ain't we? We men.

View Quote [Handing a journalist his letters home] Got some letters here, personal things. Also, if I should fall, remember what you see here.

View Quote [in a letter] Dear Mother, They learn, learn quickly, faster than white troops it seems to me. They are almost grave and sedate under instruction and they restrain themselves. But the moment they are dismissed from drill every tongue is relaxed and every ivory tooth is visible and you would not know from the sound of it that this is an army camp. They must have learned this from long hours of meaningless, inhuman work to set them free so quickly. It gives them great energy. And there is no doubt we will leave this state as fine a regiment as any that as marched. As ever, your son, Robert.

View Quote [to Sgt. Maj. John Rawlins] ****, is you an old man or is you an old woman? I forget.

View Quote [Writing a letter to his mother] We are fighting for a people whose poetry has not yet been written.

View Quote Good morning gentlemen, I am Colonel Robert Gould Shaw. I am your commanding officer. It is a great pleasure to see you all here today. It is my hope that the same courage, spirit, and honor, which has brought us together, will one day restore this Union. May God bless us all.

View Quote If you men will take no pay, then none of us will.

View Quote Let me tell you something, boy. You can march like the white man, you can talk like him. You can sing his songs, you can even wear his suits. But, you ain't NEVER gonna be nothing to him, than an ugly ass chimp... in a blue suit.