a soldier who digs trenches
(in the British Army) a private of the Royal Engineers
Examples are provided to illustrate real-world usage of words in context. Any opinions expressed do not reflect the views of Dictionary.com.
George Batts, who lived in Barming, near Maidstone, Kent, was an 18-year-old sapper when he landed in France on Gold Beach in June 1944.
From BBC • Nov. 8, 2022
He was a sapper in the Royal Engineers, attached to the Parachute Regiment for a few days, with the specific job of clearing barricades.
From BBC • Dec. 3, 2018
A sapper contracted a fever and realized that her wisdom teeth were coming in.
From Washington Post • Aug. 4, 2017
Instead he became an improbable sapper in 560 Field Company, which he later described as "a very working-class unit trying to build some patently inadequate defences against invasion on the coasts of East Anglia".
From The Guardian • Oct. 1, 2012
He promised that we would soon have a satire acted upon the rebels, writ by the notorious wit Major-General Burgoyne, with curtain-tunes and airs by this same excellent sapper to please the crowd.
From "The Astonishing Life of Octavian Nothing, Traitor to the Nation, Volume II: The Kingdom on the Waves" by M.T. Anderson
Definitions and idiom definitions from Dictionary.com Unabridged, based on the Random House Unabridged Dictionary, © Random House, Inc. 2023
Idioms from The American Heritage® Idioms Dictionary copyright © 2002, 2001, 1995 by Houghton Mifflin Harcourt Publishing Company. Published by Houghton Mifflin Harcourt Publishing Company.
