go west

present singular third person goes west · participle present going west · past went west · participle past gone west

1. Used other than figuratively or idiomatically: see go, west.

   Go west until you hit the ocean, then turn left.

2. Synonym of set: to move toward the western horizon, to go down.

   For hit was nyght, the sonne goth west

   c. 1400, The Laud Troy Book, l. 13365

   1 more example

   I see the rocks set in the sky, and maybe the sun going west, and the trees getting dark.

   2006, W.H. Henderson, Augusta Locke, page 263

   Synonyms: set

3. datedfigurativelySynonym of die.

   Women and mony wilsome wy,

   a. 1532, Glassinberry, poem preserved in Gray's Manuscipt

   5 more examples

   The Irish, and the Scottish Highlanders, always describe persons lately dead as having gone west.

   1833 Oct., Johnstone's Edinburgh Magazine, p. 89

   Does any one know the origin or meaning of the soldiers' curious phrase for death, ‘Going West’?

   1914 Dec. 31, The Times, p. 4

   In this war we're always moving, Moving on; When we make a friend another friend has gone... When the bravest and the best Of the boys you know "go west", Then you're choking down your tears and Moving on.

   1918, Banjo Paterson, Moving On

   You'd think, to hear some people talk, That lads go West with sobs and curses, And sullen faces white as chalk... But they've been taught the way to do it... With due regard for decent taste.

   1918, Siegfried Sassoon, How to Die", Counter-Attack and Other Poems

   Jack has ‘gone west’. He died peacefully in the loving arms of his son.

   2008 June 17, Anchorage Daily News, p. A9

   Synonyms: die

4. datedfigurativelyTo be lost, destroyed, or otherwise ruined.

   Their parcels... went persistently ‘west’.

   1919 Sept., Blackwood's Magazine, p. 368

   3 more examples

   The glare of a burning house shone red in the sky over the roof tops. 'Somebody's 'appy 'ome gone west', remarked one man.

   1916, Boyd Cable, Action Front, page 167

   Socialism? Ha! ha! ha! Where’s the money to come from? Ha! ha! ha! The lords of property were firm in their seats, and they knew it. But after the French collapse there came something that could not be laughed away, something that neither cheque-books nor policemen were any use against—the bombing. Zweee—BOOM! What’s that? Oh, only a bomb on the Stock Exchange. Zweee—BOOM! Another acre of somebody’s valuable slum-property gone west.

   1941, George Orwell, The Lion and the Unicorn, Pt. II

   I had a dinky [handkerchief], but it went west earlier this evening. Soaked, dear.

   1976, Rosamond Lehmann, Sea-Grape Tree, page 42

5. USTo move to the American West, particularly (historical) during the 19th century era.

   Go west, young man!

   3 more examples

   It reminds me of the advice that Mr. Secretary Corwin gave to a young man that was applying for a clerkship. He said, ‘Young man, go West’.

   1856 May, Wisconsin Farmer, p. 209

   Go West, young man! Buy a good, stout farming outfit... and then go out to the far West upon Government-land.

   1870 Aug. 20, O.C. Kerr, Punchinello, p. 323

   Go west, young man. But stop before you get to California.

   1992 Dec. 1, San Diego Union-Tribune, p. E1