local. [In local English use chiefly in eastern counties. Its relation to SWASH sb.1 3 is not clear.] A passage or channel of water lying between sandbanks or between a sandbank and the shore.
1626. in Foster, Eng. Factories India (1909), III. 117. [Anchored] without the swatch of Swally.
1726. G. Roberts, Four Yrs. Voy., 336. From a Mile distance off, to the Shore, are several Swatches and Channels to go through, having Water enough for any Ship.
1775. Romans, Florida, App. 86. There are two swatches thro’ the east breaker.
1830. Lyell, Princ. Geol., I. 243. A nearly circular space called the ‘swatch of no ground’ [in the middle of the Bay of Bengal].
1889. A. T. Pask, Eyes Thames, 66. The famous ‘Swatch’ caused by the meeting of the Thames and Medway tides.
1912. Hannay, in Blackw. Mag., March, 369/1. The access to the roadstead was through ‘swatches.’
b. Comb. Swatchway = swash-way (SWASH sb.1 9).
1798. Hull Advertiser, 29 Dec., 2/1. Anchors and cables, lost and left in the Humber in the open of Patrington Swatch Way.
1851. Taylor, Improvem. Tyne, 85. Such is an origin of swatchways in tidal rivers.
1890. Nature, 10 April, 539/2. The Duke of Edinburgh Channel, the deepest swatchway of the estuary.
1903. Childers, Riddle of Sands, xii. 154. We traversed the Steil Sand again, but by a different swatchway.
