Digger is a military slang term for soldiers from Australia and New Zealand. Evidence of its use has been found in those countries as early as the 1850s, but its current usage in a military context did not become prominent until World War I, when Australian and New Zealand troops began using it on the Western Front around 1916–17. Evolving out of its usage during the war, the term has been linked to the concept of the Anzac legend, but within a wider social context, it is linked to the concept of "egalitarian mateship".
Origin
Before World War I, the term "digger" was widely used in Australasia to mean a miner, and also referred to a Kaurigum-digger in New Zealand. In Australia and New Zealand, the term "digger" has egalitarian connotations from the VictorianEureka Stockade Rebellion of 1854, and was closely associated with the principles of "mateship", which may have had resonance from earlier use of the term Diggers as egalitarians. Many Australian and New Zealand soldiers in the Second Boer War, 1899–1902, were former miners, and at the Battle of Elands River (1900), the Australian defenders earned a reputation as diggers, who hastily constructed dugout defences in the hard ground.
"Prior to that, New Zealanders, like Australians, soldiers were referred to as diggers, but at least calling them Kiwi gave them a rather separate identity." ... So, I think that sort of helped cement the association between the soldiers and the bird.
“Sometimes we make graves on top of graves,” he said ...Sign up ... The fighting has killed 329 Israeli soldiers ... Palestinian grave digger Sa'di Baraka, center, oversees a burial in the cemetery in Deir al-Balah, Gaza Strip, Saturday, Aug. 10, 2024 ... ....
The second was a much larger column of heavily armed soldiers, who numbered over one thousand men and were led by George Armstrong Custer...Expedition soldiers knew they were being watched.
It was called Virgo, because a young girl indicated certain water veins to the soldiers who were hunting for water, and the diggers who were to pursue them summoned up an enormous quantity of water.
Blew up an booby-trapped tunnel opening on an Israeli military engineering unit east of the city of Rafah in southern Gaza comprising three vehicles, a digger, and several soldiers, resulting in multiple casualties.
Listen to the review ... Jim is about 19 ... The best moments though are the details that don't quite fit that format, obviously plucked from real-life diggers' diaries ... The nurse refuses to treat a wounded soldier because she's busy with people she can help.
Jem commented ... He was in a group of three who had escaped out of the ‘Harry’ tunnel but were recaptured when a cottage they had hoped to rest in turned out to be full of soldiers Ken Rees, a digger, was in the tunnel when the escape was discovered.
A precious taonga stolen from a museum dedicated to the memory of the legendary 28th Māori Battalion was recovered in November, just five days after the brazen theft sparked outrage among the soldiers' descendants.
World War I (WWI) soldiers who died in combat and were laid to rest in official Commonwealth war graves, but no one has similarly honoured the survivors—until now.
... brazen theft sparked outrage among the soldiers' descendants ... Soldiers of the 28th Māori Battalion's A Company, most of whom were Ngāpuhi from Northland, were affectionately known as 'the Gum Diggers'.
Every nation or army that had to fight an enemy using tunnels quickly realised that regular soldiers were near-useless for that specialised task. They were not trained diggers, and many were ...
Using shovels and a mechanical digger, they scooped out earth to prepare plots for the soldiers' final resting place at Mount HerzlNational Cemetery... for a sacred soldier," he told Reuters.
‘Nathaniel was full of life and the life of the party – he carried the nickname DJ on base and at Benji’s house the lone soldier house that he lived at ... Shocking video shows militants capturing Israeli soldier and tearing down border fences.
The limited-edition coin first released in 2015 is encrusted with symbols commemorating the sacrifice of Australian diggers ... flower dedicated to remembering soldiers who fought in the two world wars.
