Forecastle

Also written fo’c’sle. [f. FORE- + CASTLE.]

  1.  Naut. A short raised deck at the fore end of a vessel. In early use raised like a castle to command the enemy’s decks. Obs. exc. arch. or Hist.

c. 1400.  Destr. Troy, 5657.

a. 1533.  Ld. Berners, Huon, xxiii. 440. The fore castell of whyght crystal medelyd with rych cassydony.

1624.  Capt. Smith, Virginia, III. vi. 62. Targets … about the forepart of our Boat like a forecastle, from whence we securely beat the Salvages from off the plaine.

1748.  Anson’s Voy., I. iii. 29. The waste of the ship was filled with live cattle, and the forecastle was manned with its customary watch.

1805.  in Nicolas, Disp. Nelson (1846), VII. 203, note. Her people still firing from her tops, forecastle, and lower-deck.

1863.  Longf., Wayside Inn, Saga of Olaf, XIX. vi.

  2.  The fore part of a ship (see quots. 1704, 1867). To ride forecastle in, i.e., with bows under.

1490.  Caxton, Eneydos, xxxi. 116. Theyr chyeff maryner, that vpon a nyghte was halfe a slepe vpon the forcastell felle doun in to the see, and was drowned.

a. 1529.  Skelton, Col. Cloute, 1253.

a. 1661.  Holyday, Juvenal, 232. Sometimes the one end, as the fore-castle, sometimes the other, as the Sterne, is mounted up by the waves, and this is called the Heaving and Setting of a Ship.

1704.  J. Harris, Lex. Techn., Fore-castle of a Ship, is that Part where the Fore-Mast stands, and ’tis divided from the rest of the Floor by a Bulk-Head; that Part of the Fore-Castle which is aloft, and not in the Hold, is called the Prow.

1719.  De Foe, Crusoe, I. 9. Our Ship rid Forecastle in.

1794.  Nelson, 26 Oct., in Nicolas, Disp. (1845), I. 499. The weather continues so bad and heavy gale of wind that we are riding forecastle in; and a foul wind, therefore cannot get out.

1867.  Smyth, Sailor’s Word-bk., Forecastle … is now applied in men-of-war to that part of the upper deck forward of the after fore-shroud, or maintack-block, and which is flush with the quarter-deck and gangways.

  3.  In merchant vessels, the forward part of the vessel, under the deck, where the sailors live.

1840.  R. H. Dana, Bef. Mast, ix. 19. No man can be a sailor, or know what sailors are, unless he has lived in the forecastle with them—turned in and out with them, eaten of their dish and drank of their cup.

1888.  W. C. Russell, Death Ship, I. xviii. 251. I felt a seaman’s curiosity to have a good look at a ship of which there were a thousand stories afloat in every forecastle throughout the world.

  4.  attrib. and Comb. Chiefly attributive (of or pertaining to the forecastle), as forecastle-deck, -hatch, -joke, -netting, -rail, song, -yarn; also forecastle-man, a sailor stationed on the forecastle.

1726.  Shelvocke, Voy. round World (1757), 229. He had contracted such a liking to the fore-castle conversation and caballing, that he became dead to all the civilities I had continually heap’d upon him.

1851.  H. Melville, Whale, i. 5. Finally, I always go to sea as a sailor, because of the wholesome exercise and pure air of the *forecastle deck.

1869.  C. Gibbon, Robin Gray, I. vi. 93–4. He did not turn into his hammock that night at his usual hour, but lay down on a heap of canvas near the *forecastle hatch.

1867.  Smyth, Sailor’s Word-bk., *Forecastle-jokes. Practical tricks played upon greenhorns.

1804.  Naval Chron., XII. 246. When on board, except the *Forecastlemen, the other may wear round hats.

1823.  J. F. Cooper, Pioneer, xx. He handles an axe, much the same as a forecastle-man does his marlin-spike, or a tailor his goose.

1867.  Smyth, Sailor’s Word-bk., *Forecastle-nettings. Ibid., *Forecastle-rail. The rail extended on stanchions across the after-part of the forecastle-deck in some ships.

1856.  Kane, Arct. Expl., II. xxiv. 243. The men broke out in their old *forecastle-songs; the sledges began to move merrily ahead, and laugh and jest drove out the old moody silence.

1873.  [T. E. Brown], (title), Betsy Lee: a *fo’c’s’le yarn.