Crossword clues for linstock
linstock
The Collaborative International Dictionary
Linstock \Lin"stock\ (l[i^]n"st[o^]k), n. [Corrupt. fr. luntstock, D. lontstok; lont lunt + stok stock, stick. See Link a torch, Lunt, and Stock.] A pointed forked staff, shod with iron at the foot, to hold a lighted match for firing cannon. [Written also lintstock.]
Douglas Harper's Etymology Dictionary
forked staff used for firing a cannon, 1570s, from Dutch lonstok, from lont "match" + stok "stick."
Wiktionary
n. A pointed forked staff, shod with iron at the foot, to hold a lighted match for firing cannon.
WordNet
n. a stick about a meter long with a point on one end (to stick in the ground) and a forked head on the other end (to hold a lighted match); formerly used to fire cannons
Wikipedia
A linstock (also called a lintstock) is a staff with a fork at one end to hold a lighted slow match. The name was adapted from the Dutch lontstok, "match stick". Linstocks were used for discharging cannons in the early days of artillery; the linstock allowed the gunner to stand farther from the cannon as it was dangerous applying the lighted match to the touch hole at the breech of the gun.
Usage examples of "linstock".
The gun captain brought the linstock down on the touchhole, and the gun roared out and came recoiling back through the smoke.
Sometimes a Mahratta battery would pause to let the smoke thin and Sharpe, riding twenty paces behind the General who was advancing just to the right of the 778th, could watch the enemy gunners heave at their pieces, see them back away as the gun captain swung the linstock over the barrel, then the gun would disappear again in a cloud of powder smoke and, an instant later, a ball would plunge down in front of the infantry.
Barnes, whose job it was to light the fuse of the shell, and Jackson, who would fire the mortar when Kenton gave the order, hurriedly wound slow match round linstocks, thin snakes round sticks each with a single red eye, where it burned.
By then both men were running aft with their linstocks, heading for the second mortar, and Rossi was busy organizing the sponging and reloading of the forward mortar, which looked like an enormous cast-iron bulldog squatting open-mouthed in the midst of a smoky bonfire.
The guns were advanced, the artillerymen blew the ash off their linstocks, and an officer gave the word "Fire!
Naval guns did not use linstocks, for the spluttering sparks of an open match were too dangerous on board a wooden ship crammed with gunpowder.
A nearby battery of nine-pounder cannons was deserted, the gunner's linstocks still smoking, the dirty sponge water in the buckets still rippling.
The original gun used a percussion cap for this ignition, but a flintlock or even a bit of glowing slow match from an artillerist's linstock would work as well.
The gunners swabbed out the barrel, rammed down a new charge and canister, pricked the powder bag through the touch-hole, then ducked aside after putting the smoking linstock to the powder fuse.