What was the role of a world war one sapper?

Question

I am researching an old boy from my school. he was in the royal engineers

Answer 1

I think a sapper was a combat engineer, and also maybe either laid mines or cleared minefields.

Answer 2

All Engineers in the British army are referred to as 'Sappers', the role of the corps would be pretty much anything that required a level of construction.

Answer 3

The term sap originated in the Middle Ages, and first defined a trench dug to undermine a castle wall. By the 17th century it referred to the zigzag trenches driven forward from the parallel trenches dug by the besiegers of a fortress (see fortification and siegecraft). Sappers had the dangerous job of digging these zigzag trenches. Their work made them the targets of concentrated hostile fire, and they often wore heavy helmets and armour to afford them some protection. In the British army a Royal Corps of Sappers and Miners was formed in 1772, and later absorbed within the Royal Engineers. The British-Indian army preserved the term sappers and miners, with a corps for each of the presidencies of Bombay, Bengal, and Madras, to the end of its existence.

In Britain private soldiers in the Royal Engineers are styled sappers, and the term is applied generally to any military engineer—what would in America be termed a combat engineer. It makes the useful point that much military engineering is inherently dangerous. When the British stormed Delhi in 1857 the Kashmir gate was blown in by engineers (fittingly two officers, four sergeants, and seven sappers of the Bengal Sappers and Miners, most of whom were killed by heavy close-range fire), and the successful German airborne attack on Fort Eben Emael in 1940 was the work of assault engineers. It is small wonder that Royal Engineers pride themselves on the aphorism: ‘Follow the sapper.’

The French army's sapeurs were similar to (and often as famously bearded as) regimental pioneers in the British army, while the expression sapeur du génie defines a private soldier in the engineers. And one who both digs and pumps is a sapeur-pompier—a fireman.

http://www.answers.com/topic/sapper

Answer 4

A minesweeper, Royal Engineers.