Tommy Atkins
Americannoun
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any private of the British army.
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one of the rank and file of any organization or group.
Other Word Forms
Example Sentences
Examples are provided to illustrate real-world usage of words in context. Any opinions expressed do not reflect the views of Dictionary.com.
In the palmy Victorian days when Kipling's Tommy Atkins called the British army the "thin red line of 'eroes," few Englishmen could predict how thin the line might get.
From Time Magazine Archive
Last week the average Londoner had a new hero as glamorous as Tommy Atkins: the British fireman.
From Time Magazine Archive
As a veteran commander, the Field Marshal called it "dangerous" to keep on telling Tommy Atkins that the enemy is not the actual soldiers he will have to fight but vague "Hitlerism."
From Time Magazine Archive
He feels a personal relationship with his Commander in Chief, the President, as Kipling's archetypal soldier, Tommy Atkins, seems to have done with his Queen.
From Time Magazine Archive
"Tommy Atkins doesn't read history, and those who remember it have long since convinced themselves that the Boer successes were due to strange tricks or are merely legendary."
From The Guns of Europe by Altsheler, Joseph A. (Joseph Alexander)
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.
