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USS Black Hawk MHC 58

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The Mottoes

Fortune Favors the Bold!
This is actually the motto of the current U.S. Navy Vessel, USS Black Hawk, MHC 58, and was adopted to honor that vessel & crew.  It was also the response of Captain Benjamin Sisko, just before the invasion to retake Deep Space Nine, to a remark that such a project was almost suicidal (DS9 episode Favor the Bold).  The motto is derived from a old Latin Proverb which says "Fortune favors the bold but abandons the timid".  However the motto "Fortune favors the bold" was first used by Virgil (70-19 B.C.), a Roman Writer and friend of the Emperor Augustus.

To learn from the past in order to seek the future...
This is the original motto of the USS Shiloh and was suggested by Lieutenant Commander Timothy Raines, Second Officer, USS Shiloh (1996-1997), a charter member.  The initial members of the USS Black Hawk resided in or near Henderson, Tennessee, which lays within 30 miles of the site of the U.S. Civil War Battle of Shiloh.  Henderson was also the site of a skirmish called the Battle of Dayton Station.  Henderson is the home of Freed-Hardeman University, which most of those early members attended.  The motto is reminiscent of the term "You must learn from history or you are doomed to repeat it."  It also reminds us that our past history and what we have learned from those events points the way to our future history and how we react to it.  It continues to be one of the two official mottoes of the USS Black Hawk.

We are the Bold!
The motto of the 263rd Marine Strike Group, derived from the USS Black Hawk's Motto "Fortune favors the bold"  is a take off of the MOS of the 263rd Marine Strike Group, the Hawk's Talons.  Where "Fortune favors the bold", in refernece to the officers and crew of the USS Black Hawk, as the Marines of the chapter look upon themselves as '...the BOLD!'

Captain's Motto: "Warp speed, if you'll please..."
This is the unofficial Captain's motto or 'catch phrase', established by the first captain of the USS Shiloh, to remind us that we are ever going and we need to do it "decently and in order".