Definition of "provost marshal" [provost marshal]

• The head of a unit of military police. (noun)

American Heritage(R) Dictionary of the English Language, Fifth Edition. Copyright (c) 2011 by Houghton Mifflin Harcourt Publishing Company. Published by Houghton Mifflin Harcourt Publishing Company. All rights reserved.

• "More likely, it was that I'd explained to them that provost marshal meant military police."
• "We got, through the instrumentality of Gen. Saxton, who was provost marshal under Gen. Gilmore at Beaufort, permission to send Deacon Steward to Beaufort; and there we found a little steamer that was in the government employ, on which we put Brother Steward with his credentials, as pastor of the African Methodism in Florida."