[f. KNUCKLE sb. + DUSTER. (orig. criminals’ slang, U.S.)]
A metal instrument made to cover the knuckles, so as to protect them from injury in striking, and at the same time to add force to a blow given with the fist thus covered.
1858. Times, 15 Feb., 10/5 (Farmer). An instrument called a ‘knuckle duster,’ a formidable article, supposed to be of Yankee origin, and made of brass, which slips easily on to the four fingers of a man’s hand, and having a projecting surface across the knuckles is calculated in a pugilistic encounter to inflict serious injury on the person against whom it is directed.
1861. All Year Round, 13 July, 372/2. But what the crew most feared, was the free use of the ‘brass knuckles’ or ‘knuckle dusters.’… These are brass finger-guards, not unlike what the Roman gladiators called the cestus; they constitute a regular portion of the equipment of an officer of the American mercantile marine.
1862. Illustr. Lond. News, 11 Jan., 51/2. The American ‘shoulder-hitters,’ ‘knuckle-dusters,’ and ‘gum-ticklers.’
1862. Ann. Reg., 193. One of them struck him a fearful blow with a ‘knuckle-duster.’
1873. Slang Dict., s.v., Sometimes a knuckle-duster has knobs or points projecting, so as to mutilate and disfigure the person struck.
attrib. 1870. Standard, 15 Dec., 5/6. I have been in many mobs, and have been charged both by cavalry and the knuckleduster brigade in Paris.
