A friend with some French relations just came up with another: poilu. Apparently this was current in WW1, but I don't know the level of diction - i.e., was this a serious term, a joking term, a familiar term or what. According to the Wikipedia entry it sounds more jocular, perhaps not serious enough for my purposes. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Poilu
Anyone have a view? Thanks in advance!