[f. EJECT v. + -MENT; app. first used in legal Anglo-French.]
1. a. Law. The act or process of ejecting a person from his holding. b. In wider sense, = EJECTION 2 (but chiefly with allusion to a.).
1567. Rastell, Termes of Law, 68 b. A writ of eiectement of warde lieth wher [etc.] [Fr. briefe deiectment de gard gist, [etc.].].
1602. Warner, Alb. Eng., Epit. (1612), 359. This Eiectment of the Britons.
1672. H. Stubbe, Justif. Dutch War, 60. Continued after their [the Danes’] ejectment, by our English Kings.
1851. Ht. Martineau, Hist. Peace (1877), III. V. xiii. 468. Forcible ejectments of the negroes from their habitations.
1869. Spurgeon, Treas. Dav., Ps. xxiv. 1. [Man] is but a tenant at will … liable to instantaneous ejectment.
1869. Pall Mall Gaz., 4 Aug., 1/1. The Irish land question divides itself naturally into three great points—improvements, tenant right, and ejectment.
2. (More fully, action, writ of ejectment): ‘An action at law whereby a person ousted or amoved from an estate for years may recover possession thereof’ (Tomlins, Law Dict.); the writ (otherwise de ejectione firmæ) by which this action is commenced.
An action of this kind, under which damages were claimed for a fictitious ejectment by an imaginary person, was formerly the recognized mode of trying the title to landed property.
1697. Prideaux, Lett. (1875), 188. An ejectment hath been left at Sr H. Hobarts house for 8000l.
1715. Act Reg. Papists 2 Geo. I., in Lond. Gaz. (1716), No. 5455/2. He may bring an Ejectment upon his own Demise.
1755. Young, Centaur, vi. Wks. 1757, IV. 253. But will not be at the trouble of bringing a writ of ejectment.
1768. Blackstone, Comm., III. 199. A writ then of ejectione firmae, or action of trespass in ejectment.
1788. J. Powell, Devises (1827), II. 45. He might bring his ejectment.
1794. S. Williams, Vermont, 216. Actions of ejectment were commenced in the courts at Albany.
1886. Stephen, Comm. Laws Eng. (ed. 10), III. 415.
† 3. pl. [after L. ejectamenta]. Things cast up or out. Obs. rare.
1658. Sir T. Browne, Gard. Cyrus, iii. 47. Ejectments of the Sea.
