What is "battens"

Usage examples of "battens".

Heavy spaced wooden battens, held in place by wooden slots in deck and deckhead, ran the whole fore-and-aft length of the hold.

There were four rows of those battens, and behind the two rows nearest the port and starboard sides wooden boxes and open-sided crates were piled to the very top, except where a space had been left free for the air from the ventilators to find its way in.

Between the outer and inner rows of battens other boxes and sacks were piled half the height of the hold: between the two inner rows, extending from the engine-room bulkhead to the two small doors in the for'ard bulkhead, was a passage perhaps four feet wide.

Henry waited till Fleck's head was clear of the hatch, then pushed back some of the sliding battens that bordered the central aisle.

Her eyes widened still further, she took that deep breath that is so often prelude to a scream, so I picked her up hurriedly, walked the ten feet to where Henry had pushed the battens aside and sat her there, her back propped up against the inner battens.

I pulled back some battens across the aisle from her and hoisted myself up on a platform of wooden boxes, the three by one ready to hand.

I jumped down to the deck, swung myself up on the other side and seated myself as comfortably as I could with my feet propped against the outboard battens.

The half-filled spaces between the two sets of battens on either side were taken up by crates of food and drink: meat, fruit and soft drinks.

The battens in those rows weren't of the free-sliding type in the inboard rows but were hinged at the top and were designed to lift upwards and inwards: with their lower halfs jammed by the boxes in the inner rows, this was quite impossible.

But two of the battens, the two directly behind the lemonade crate, were loose: I examined their tops with the torch and could see that there were no hinges attaching them to the deckhead: from the freshness of the wood where the screws had been, the hinges appeared to have been recently removed.

I pushed the battens as far apart as possible, wrestled the top box out of position without breaking my neck, not so easy as it sounds for the boxes were heavy and the rolling of the schooner pretty violent by this time-and placed it on the platform where we'd spent the night.

I replaced all the boxes and battens, took the torch and went aft to see what else there was.

Then I came down and started rummaging around in the metal boxes in the starboard corner until I found a bottle-screw that suited me, picked up a couple of hardwood battens and stowed them away, together with the bottle-screw, behind some boxes.

Back at the platform of wooden boxes where we'd spent the night I pushed aside the two loose battens in the outboard row, cautiously lifted down the boxes with the compasses and binoculars, shoved them to one side, took down the box with the aircraft-type life belts and emptied out the contents.

I gave her the torch and asked her to hold it in position while I climbed up the ladder with the bottle-screw and two hardwood battens and set about opening the hatch.