ˈgrape-shot
[f. grape n.1]
Small cast iron balls, strongly connected together, so as to form a charge for cannon (see quots. 1769 and 1867).
| 1747 Gentl. Mag. 308 The violence of the grape and round shot. 1769 Falconer Dict. Marine (1780) M m b, Grape-shot is a combination of balls, put into a thick canvas-bag, and corded strongly together, so as to form a sort of cylinder, whose diameter..is adapted to the cannon. 1794 Southey Botany Bay Eclog. iii, The chain and the grape-shot roll splintering around. 1809 Med. Jrnl. XXI. 446 A middle aged man, of the name of Robinson..was wounded by a grape shot. 1867 Smyth Sailor's Word-bk. 346 A round of grapeshot consists of three tiers of cast-iron balls arranged, generally three in a tier, between four parallel iron discs connected together by a central wrought-iron pin. 1876 Bancroft Hist. U.S. VI. xxxix. 211 The two columns, heedless of musketry and grapeshot, gained the center of the works nearly at the same moment. |
Hence grapeshot v. trans., to fire upon with grape-shot.
| 1876 Ruskin Fors Clav. VI. lxv. 145 Not until England has had to stone..some of the children she has got: or at least to grapeshot them. |