[f. phrase: FEAR v. (in imperative) + NOUGHT.]
1. A stout kind of woollen cloth, used chiefly on board ship in the form of outside clothing in the most inclement weather, also as a protective covering or lining for the outside door of a powder magazine, the portholes, etc. Cf. DREADNOUGHT.
1772–84. Cook, Voy. (1790), I. 31. At this time our seamen beginning to complain of cold, they were furnished with a pair of trowsers, and a Magellanic jacket, made of a thick woollen stuff called Fearnought.
1794. Sporting Mag., III. Jan., 193/2. The wadding to which we allude, is made of the cloth called fear-naught, or shepherd’s cloth, which is very generally known, fitted to the bore of the piece by a punch.
1835. Sir J. Ross, Narr. 2nd Voy., viii. 110. A skreen lined with fearnought was also found in tolerable condition; but the bears had overset the harness cask, and devoured nearly the whole of the contents.
1859. F. A. Griffiths, The Artillerist’s Manual (1862), 210. When the shell is not required for use it is kept in its place by a wooden plug covered with fearnought.
attrib. 1772–5. Cook, Voy. (1777), I. I. ii. 20. I … gave to each man the fearnought jacket and trowsers allowed them.
1825. J. Neal, Brother Jonathan, II. 77. He was bare-footed; half naked: ragged, and miserably unclean. His arms and legs were too long; his head, too large, for his body;—so that, altogether, when he was fairly mounted upon the box, just reaching the foot board, with his long toes out; his eager-looking red eyes continually snapping, with a spiteful vivacity; and a ragged fear-naught great coat, loosely dangling over the seat, in fringes—he looked not very unlike some wild creature, of the baboon family, skinned to the waist.
1882. Nares, Seamanship (ed. 6), 96. It is passed through fearnought shoots.
2. dial. (See quot.)
1883. Almondbury Gloss. (E.D.S.). Fearnought, a machine for mixing wool, shoddy, and mungo before putting upon the condenser.
3. A drink to keep up the spirits.
1880. L. Wallace, Ben-Hur, IV. x. 231. Drink, for this is the fearnaught of the tentmen.
