Also 6 byrth, 7 birth. [f. prec. sb.]
1. trans. To moor or place (a ship) in a suitable position. Also refl. of the ship or sailors.
1667. Pepys, Diary, 30 June. The ‘Henery’ … berthed himself so well as no pilot could ever have done better.
1673. Camden Soc. Misc. (1883), 27. We … anchored againe and birth’t our selves in our anchoring posture agreed on.
1871. Daily News, 30 June, 5/7. There was no dry dock in German waters where the monster ship [the König Wilhelm] could be berthed and cleaned.
b. intr. (for refl.) said of the ship.
1867. J. Macgregor, Voy. Alone, 57. The Rob Roy glided past the pier and smoothly berthed upon a great mud bank.
2. trans. To allot a berth or sleeping-place to (a person), to furnish with a berth. Usually in passive.
1845. Stocqueler, Handbk. Brit. India (1854), 81. A general cabin, where two others are berthed.
1869. Daily News, 12 June, 5/7. The lower deck, where the officers and crew are berthed.
1876. Davis, Polaris Exp., v. 122. Joe and Hans, with their families, were brought down and berthed below.
3. To provide with a situation or ‘place.’
1865. Leslie & Taylor, Sir J. Reynolds, II. viii. 365. Wilkes, by this time ‘purged and living cleanly,’ was now comfortably berthed in the City Chamberlainship.
1885. Manch. Exam., 14 Nov., 5/1. All four are berthed; not a man of the Fourth Party is left out.
