It's an age-old classic, of course, but none the worse for that.
There's a slightly similar one (actually not very similar, now I think about it) from WW2: The German propaganda machine was gearing up to announce that a U-boat had damaged the major English ship "Nelson", when they realised that the radio message that they had thought said (in translation): "Nelson torpedoed but not sunk" had actually used the word "Felsen" (which means rock)...
Also the reputed message sent from a bored warship in the South Atlantic during a quiet period of the war:
I wish I were a little grub
With whiskers round my tummy.
I'd climb into the honey pot
And make my tummy gummy.