Drumming out

Drumming out is the historical act of being dishonorably dismissed from military service to the sound of a drum. In modern figurative use it refers to any act of expulsion or dismissal in disgrace.

Origin
The earliest recorded reference to drumming out comes in a figurative use of the phrase, in Thomas Amory's The life of John Buncle, in 1766: "They ought to be drummed out of society."

The earliest known discharge of a U.S. soldier for sodomy involved the drumming out of Lt. Frederick Gotthold Enslin during the revolutionary war.

U.S. Civil War
U.S. Civil War officers drummed out of service might have their heads shaved and their uniforms stripped of insignia and be paraded in front of their comrades. Fellow officers were forbidden to touch the person being dishonorably discharged, but in more than one case after the war had ended, a drummed-out man was found dead after receiving a beating from his former comrades. When someone was being drummed out, the tune "Rogue's March" would be played.

Modern uses
At the Virginia Military Institute, cadets that are convicted of Honor Code violations are removed from the school and a formal announcement of the former cadet's offense is given in the morning after the corps is woken by drums.

Fiction
The opening to the 1965 NBC series Branded used the ceremony as the plot to series.