GUERRILLA • DICCIONARIO INGLES.COM • Definition of Guerrilla

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/gərˈɪlə/ Listen

noun

Guerrilla n.

An irregular mode of carrying on war, by the constant attacks of independent bands, adopted in the north of Spain during the Peninsular war.

One who carries on, or assists in carrying on, irregular warfare; especially, a member of an independent band engaged in predatory excursions in war time. Note: The term guerrilla is the diminutive of the Spanish word guerra, war, and means petty war, that is, war carried on by detached parties; generally in the mountains.... A guerrilla party means, an irregular band of armed men, carrying on an irregular war, not being able, according to their character as a guerrilla party, to carry on what the law terms a regular war.

adjective

Guerrilla adj. Pertaining to, or engaged in, warfare carried on irregularly and by independent bands; as, a guerrilla party; guerrilla warfare.

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Etymology of 'Guerrilla'

Collaborative International Dictionary of English 0.48

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"Guerrilla" Quotes from Famous Books

... the State line, burned the little town of Lawrence, and at the point of the pistol compelled the State officials to resign; issued writs for a new election, put in a slavery governor, captured the government, and started back into Missouri. On their way they passed through Pottawatamie. It was a guerrilla warfare. When John Brown reached his son's cabin, he found the settlers preparing for flight. He denounced them as cowards, and when one urged caution, answered, "I am tired of that word Caution. It is nothing but cowardice!" Either the ...

— The Battle of Principles - A Study of the Heroism and Eloquence of the Anti-Slavery Conflict • Newell Dwight Hillis

... have had in mind in leaving him behind "to look after the loyal Confederate people," John Mosby had no intention of posting himself in Laura Ratcliffe's front yard as a guard of honor. He had a theory of guerrilla warfare which he wanted to test. In part, it derived from his experiences in the Shenandoah Valley and in Fairfax County, but in larger part, it was based upon his own understanding of ...

— Rebel Raider • H. Beam Piper

... life leads to one of two consequences: either a sinking of the class to a low and hopeless level, where they become, through irresponsible conduct and economic inefficiency, a charge upon society; or revolt and guerrilla labor warfare. ...

— An American Idyll - The Life of Carleton H. Parker • Cornelia Stratton Parker

... a change from a flushed to a blanched countenance. We afterwards learned he was a captain of a guerrilla band, and had been sentenced to be shot, but the sentence had been commuted. A Union man who was a citizen here knew him, and said he ordered a Union man out of his buggy, and shot him dead; then he bayoneted him through and through, in the ...

— A Woman's Life-Work - Labors and Experiences • Laura S. Haviland

... Burgoyne was forced to surrender at Saratoga because he was surrounded and cut off from his base of supplies. As soon as the British got away from Charleston, they were harassed and worried by the guerrilla warriors of Marion, Sumter, and Pickens. Cornwallis could technically defeat Greene at Guilford far in the interior; but he could not hold the inland region he had invaded. Sustained by their own labor, possessing the interior to which their armies ...

— History of the United States • Charles A. Beard and Mary R. Beard

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