One lot of soldiers, say (4)
I believe the answer is:
unit
'soldiers say' is the definition.
(I know that soldier is a type of enlisted person)
'one lot' is the wordplay.
'one' becomes 'un' (northern English dialect form of 'one').
'lot' becomes 'it' (I can't explain this - if you can you should give a lot more credence to this answer).
'un'+'it'='UNIT'
'of' acts as a link.
Can you help me to learn more?
(Other definitions for unit that I've seen before include "A considerable number of soldiers" , "Kitchen fitment" , "A single self-contained item" , "Any division of quantity accepted as a standard of measurement" , "Individual thing; one" .)