For the Motörhead album see Ace of Spades (album); for the Motörhead song see Ace of Spades (song)

In a deck of playing cards, the Ace of Spades is commonly thought of as the highest card in the deck, although the actual value of the card varies from game to game.

Design

The ornate design of the Ace of Spades, common in packs today, stems from the 17th Century, when certain duties on playing cards were exacted by the monarchy. William III of England imported the idea of stamp duty and extended these to playing cards in 1711, this taxation lasted until 1960.

Over the years a number of methods were used to show that duty had been paid. From 1712 onwards, one of the cards in the pack, usually the Ace of Spades, was marked with a hand stamp. In 1765 hand stamping was replaced by the printing of official Ace of Spades by the Stamp Office, incorporating the royal coat of arms. In 1828 the Duty Ace of Spades (known as 'Old Frizzle') was printed to indicate a reduced duty of a shilling had been paid.

The system was changed again in 1862 when official threepenny duty wrappers were introduced and although the makers were free use whatever design they wanted, most chose to keep the ornate Ace of Spades that is popular today.

War

The Ace of Spades has been employed, on numerous occasions, in the theatre of war. In the second World War, the American 101st Airborne Army Division were marked with the symbol painted on their helmets. In this capacity, it was used to represent good luck, due to its fortunate connotations in card playing. All four card suits were used for ease of identification of regiments within the airborne division following the confusion of a large scale combat airborne operation. Battalions within the regiments were denoted with tic marks or dots, marked from top clockwise; Headquarters at the twelve o'clock position, 1st Battalion at the three o'clock, et cetera.

Some twenty years later, the Ace of Spades was again used by American soldiers - this time as a psychological weapon in the Vietnam war. It was erroreously believed that Vietnamese ancient traditions held the symbolism of the spade to mean death and ill-fortune. The soldiers were quick to pick up this misconception, and in a bid to scare away Viet Cong soldiers without firefight, it was common practice to leave an Ace of Spades on the bodies of killed Vietnamese and even to litter the forested grounds and fields with the card. This custom was believed to be so effective, that the Bicycle Playing Cards company was asked to supply crates of that single card in bulk. The crates were often marked with 'Bicycle Secret Weapon.'

More recently, in 2003 a deck of Most-wanted Iraqi playing cards issued to US soldiers during Operation Iraqi Freedom; each card had the picture of a wanted Iraqi official on it. Saddam Hussein got the nickname "Ace of Spades" as his was the face which adorned that card.

External links

• The Ace of Spades as the Death Card