War of Words: Bridging the Language Divide in the Great War

Abstract

This article explores the different ways in which soldiers in the First World War communicated with the enemy. Drawing, in particular, on accounts of capture and captivity recorded in interview with escaped and exchanged British prisoners of war, it argues that language was central to these experiences, and that a soldier’s ability to understand, and make himself understood, was often pivotal to the question of whether he survived or perished.