[f. BUCK sb.1 + SHOT.]
† 1. ? The distance at which a buck may be shot. Obs. rare.
1447–8. Shillingford, Lett. (1871), 87. The said Cathedrall Churche stant a buc shote fro and more.
2. A coarse kind of shot, larger than swan-shot, used in shooting deer or other large game. Also attrib., as in buckshot-cartridge; buckshot-cinder (see quot.); buckshot-rule, a political nickname for government (of Ireland) upheld by a constabulary with loaded rifles, which arose during the Chief-Secretaryship of Mr. W. E. Forster, and was especially associated with his name, though the order that the constabulary should load with buck-shot, instead of ball as formerly, was made under his predecessor Mr. J. Lowther.
1776. O. Schuyler, in Sparks, Corr. Amer. Rev. (1853), I. 252. Should the enemy advance … we shall be at a loss for ball and buckshot.
1871. Napheys, Prev. & Cure Dis., III. iv. 740. A piece about the size of a buckshot is the ordinary dose.
1881. Parnell, in Daily News, 3 Oct., 6/3. Enemies to buckshot rule.
1881. Raymond, Mining Gloss., Buckshot-cinder, cinder from the iron blast-furnace, containing grains of iron.
1885. Suakin, iv. 88. These were to be used at night ‘pending the arrival of buckshot cartridges from England.’
