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prisoner's friend

prisoner's friend noun: an officer acting as counsel for the defendant in a court-martial.

Noun

prisoner's friend

  1. (historical) An officer acting as counsel for the defendant in a court-martial.
    • Prior to trial a soldier would be offered the assistance of an officer to act as 'prisoner's friend'. In essence the officer acted as defending counsel, although little is heard of legally qualified officers appearing. Foolishly some men declined this assistance, although more often than not the...1990, Julian Putkowski, Julian Sykes, Shot at Dawn
    • I was 'counsel for the defence', or 'prisoner's friend'. My chap had deserted for nearly two years and spent six months in a civvy jug. With papers under my arm and serious countenance I visited him in his cell day after day, […]1998, John Gunn, Dear Descendants: Recollections for a Gunn Family History 1945-1957, page 19

Questions about prisoner's friend

What does prisoner's friend mean?
Prisoner's friend means an officer acting as counsel for the defendant in a court-martial.
What part of speech is prisoner's friend?
Prisoner's friend is a noun.

Words near prisoner's friend in the dictionary

  1. prisoner swaps
  2. prisoner visa
  3. prisoner visas
  4. prisoner's base
  5. prisoner's cinema
  6. prisoner's friend
  7. prisoner-of-war camp
  8. prisoner-of-war camps
  9. prisonerlike
  10. prisoners
  11. prisoners at large

Source and license

Adapted from Wiktionary: prisoner's friend (page history and authors). Text available under the Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike 4.0 license. Word.ws reformatted the entry and added links. Wiktionary data of 2026-09-02.

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