Today, most people in the UK think nothing of jetting off for an overseas holiday or weekend break. Paris, Budapest, Barcelona are on our doorstep in 2025, but for the working class and lower middle class lads who filled the ranks of the armed services during the First World War, foreign travel was nothing more than a pipedream or fantasy.
Pre-war, the men who served as regular soldiers and sailors had the opportunity to serve overseas at Empire stations and garrisons, but with this adventure, came the risk of death in battle or through illness and disease.
Such was the patriotic fervour, some 2.5 million men enlisted in the British armed forces by the end of 1915, and in early 1916, conscription was introduced as the rush to volunteer dwindled as the casualty lists increased.
Men who would otherwise have been born, lived, worked and died probably within a radius of 25 miles, found themselves in France, Belgium, Egypt, India, Salonica, Gallipoli, Mesopotamia, Italy and Palestine. Although leading a regimented life and facing acute danger and death, one thing that ‘Tommy Atkins’ had in abundance was humour, and it was this, often black humour, that allowed ‘Tommy’ to survive and often thrive, especially when behind the lines resting and training.
Periods of rest, particularly in France and Flanders, saw ‘Tommy’ able to visit the estaminets (café bars) that were still trading, as food, drink and a smoke were staples of daily life and sought out at every opportunity.
Having so many men from all corners of the British Isles rubbing shoulders with each other, led to exchanges of culture and behaviour which often filtered through into their daily language and spawned a whole new lexicon of slang which became conversational mainstream for the men, and amazingly, much of their slang remains with us today, some of which has its origins in the Hindu and French languages.
THE ENEMY
The Germans were and still are referred to as Huns, Fritz, Boche, Jerry and Alleyman (From the French Allemand)
DEATH and WOUNDING
A Blighty one – A wound severe enough for a man to return to England (Blighty from the Hindustani belati)
Go West/Gone For A Burton – To be killed. The Burton reference is to Bass Beers advertising line.
In Dock – To be in hospital.
Landowner – To be killed, thus occupying a small plot of land.
Na’pood – To be killed,
Get It In The Neck – To be killed or punished for a misdemeanour.
Caught A Packet – To be wounded.
Peg Out – To die.
Pushing Up Daisies – To be dead and buried.
To Stop One – To be hit by a bullet.
FOOD AND DRINK
Afters – Pudding or a second meal course.
Batter – (To go on a) drinking bout.
Burgo – Porridge
Blotto/Blind-o – Very drunk.
Bombadier Fritz – Pommes de terres frites (Chips)
Bun Strangler – A teetotaller
Chin chin – cheers!
Cow Juice – Milk.
Cup and Wad – A cuppa tea and a bun.
Erfs – Eggs from the French, Oeufs.
Gasper – Cheap cigarette.
Grog – Rum
OFFICERS and SHIRKERS
Brass Hat – Senior staff officer.
Dug Out King – An officer rarely seen in the trenches.
Red Hat – A Staff Officer.
Base Wallah – A soldier permanently employed at a base.
Conchie – A conscientious objector.
Cuthbert – Any man employed back in the UK.
Firesiders – Any man who didn’t join up.
Leadswinger – A malingerer and shirker.
Limpet – A man who clings to a job back in the UK.
SOLDIERS and their LIVES
All Spruced Up – Ready for parade.
Bantams – Soldiers 5’ 3” and less tall.
Binting – To look for girls. From the Egyptian Bint = Girl.
Buckshee – Something for nothing, from baksheesh
Canteen Medals – Beer slops on uniform.
Cold Feet/Catch A Cold – To get the wind up, be frightened.
Chat – A louse.
Clink – Guard room detention.
Doss – To sleep.
Fair Cop – To be caught out.
Got Your Number On – The bullet that hits you.
Kibosh – To put a stop to.
Lick In to Shape – To make a soldier out of a man.
Muck In – To share.
Old Sweat – A Regular pre-war soldier.
On The Pegs – Under arrest.
Over The Top/Over The Bags – To make an attack across No Man’s Land.
Pukka – Real, proper. From Hindustani.
Rumbled – To be found out.
THE REGIMENTS and ARMIES
Ally Slopers Cavalry – The Army Service Corps ASC.
Rob All My Comrades – The Royal Army Medical Corps RAMC.
Dirty Little Imps – Durham Light Infantry DLI
Doughboy – An American soldier.
Froggies – French Soldiers.
Leave Nothing Loose – Loyal North Lancashire Regiment LNL(R).
Pork and Beans – Portuguese soldiers.
Red Caps – The Military Police.
Suicide Club – The Machine Gun Corps.
WEAPONS and EQUIPMENT
Archie – Anti-aircraft fire.
Battle Bowler – Steel helmet.
Billy Can – Mess tin.
Bivvy – Shelter, bivouac.
Black Maria/ Coal Box/ Jack Johnson/Wooly Bear – A German HE shell that emitted black smoke when it exploded.
Crump – The Burst of a shell.
Dixy – Cooking pot. From the Hindustani Degchi.
Dud – A shell that failed to explode.
Emma Gee – MG Machine Gun.
Five Mile Sniper – Gunner in the Heavy Artillery.
Meat Skewer – Bayonet.
Minnie – Shell from a German Mortar, a Minenwerfer.
The above list is just a selection of the terminology that involved from the First World War and yet many of the sayings are recognisable to us in 2025. Despite the events being over one hundred years ago, their effects are still with us today.