A horse-shoe bend in a river.
1797. In this town [Newbury] are those extensive intervales known by the name of the great Ox-Bow, which form the River assumes in its course at this place.—J. A. Graham, ‘Present State of Vermont,’ 148. (N.E.D.)
1845. Ox-bow, on the Ox-bow of the Oswegatchie River.—Barber and Howe, ‘Hist. Coll. N.Y. State,’ 201. (N.E.D.)
1858. The Connecticut … wantons in huge luxurious oxbows about the fair Northampton meadows.—Holmes, ‘The Autocrat of the Breakfast-Table,’ ch. x. (N.E.D.)
1860. The St. Clair flats, where the main channel of the St. Clair river takes a long bend around the flats in the shape of an ox-bow.—Mr. Chandler of Michigan, U.S. Senate, Feb. 6: Cong. Globe, p. 669.
