Galinsoga is a genus of flowering plants in the family Asteraceae

Asteraceae

The Asteraceae or Compositae , is an exceedingly large and widespread family of vascular plants. The group has more than 22,750 currently accepted species, spread across 1620 genera and 12 subfamilies...

. Members include Galinsoga parviflora

Galinsoga parviflora

Galinsoga parviflora is a herbaceous plant in the Asteraceae family. It has several common names including Guasca , Mielcilla , Galinsoga , gallant soldier ....

, Galinsoga urticifolia, and Galinsoga quadriradiata

Galinsoga quadriradiata

Galinsoga quadriradiata is a species of flowering plant in the daisy family which is known by several common names, including shaggy soldier, hairy galinsoga, and fringed quickweed. It is found throughout most of the temperate world, but apparently its native home is Mexico. In Portuguese-speaking...

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Galinsoga parviflora was brought from Peru

Peru

Peru , officially the Republic of Peru , is a country in western South America. It is bordered on the north by Ecuador and Colombia, on the east by Brazil, on the southeast by Bolivia, on the south by Chile, and on the west by the Pacific Ocean....

 to Kew Gardens in 1796, and later escaped to the wild in Britain. In Britain its name Galinsoga is sometimes popularly rendered as "gallant soldiers", and then sometimes altered to "soldiers of the Queen".

G. quadriradiata (synonym G. ciliata) is sometimes called "shaggy soldiers".

The name Galinsoga was dedicated to Ignacio Mariano Martinez de Galinsoga, who founded the Spanish Real Academia Nacional de Medicina and was director of the Jardin botanique de Madrid.