prisoner of war

See synonyms for prisoner of war on Thesaurus.com
noun
  1. a person who is captured and held by an enemy during war, especially a member of the armed forces. Abbreviation: POW

Origin of prisoner of war

1
First recorded in 1670–80

Words Nearby prisoner of war

Dictionary.com Unabridged Based on the Random House Unabridged Dictionary, © Random House, Inc. 2024

How to use prisoner of war in a sentence

  • He treated the wounded soldier and the prisoner-of-war with kindness.

    In the Shadow of Death | P. H. Kritzinger and R. D. McDonald
  • Imagine his astonishment on learning that he was then addressing the very man whom he had hoped to meet as a prisoner-of-war.

    In the Shadow of Death | P. H. Kritzinger and R. D. McDonald
  • I was at last acquitted, and could return to my lonely chamber not as a criminal, but as a prisoner-of-war!

    In the Shadow of Death | P. H. Kritzinger and R. D. McDonald
  • In my opinion no prisoner-of-war has ever escaped without more than a fair share of luck, and no one ever will.

    The Escaping Club | A. J. Evans
  • Armed with this document the colonel was no longer a poor prisoner-of-war.

    The Escaping Club | A. J. Evans

British Dictionary definitions for prisoner of war

prisoner of war

noun
  1. a person, esp a serviceman, captured by an enemy in time of war: Abbreviation: POW

Collins English Dictionary - Complete & Unabridged 2012 Digital Edition © William Collins Sons & Co. Ltd. 1979, 1986 © HarperCollins Publishers 1998, 2000, 2003, 2005, 2006, 2007, 2009, 2012