I saw this the other day – The trench talk that is now entrenched in the English language – Telegraph – and wondered whether there was a lesson in it.  This absolutely fascinating article talks about how the language of the Trenches has been absorbed into our everyday speech.

It started me off on a bit of an internet wander, and led me to this piece – http://www.firstworldwar.com/features/slang.htm at FirstWorldWar.com, which gives some fascinating vignettes, like the fact that for the Germans, front line soldiers were Frontschwein, “front-pigs”, whilst for the French they were poilu – “hairy beasts”.

There’s even a book, apparently – Trench Talk: Words of the First World War.