Definitions
from The Century Dictionary.
- noun A small mortar for throwing grenades, light enough to be carried by a small number of men, usually four. Also spelled
cohorn .
from the GNU version of the Collaborative International Dictionary of English.
- noun (Mil.) A small bronze mortar mounted on a wooden block with handles, and light enough to be carried short distances by two men.
from Wiktionary, Creative Commons Attribution/Share-Alike License.
- noun military, historical A small
bronze mortar mounted on a wooden block withhandles , and light enough to be carried short distances by two people.
Etymologies
from Wiktionary, Creative Commons Attribution/Share-Alike License
From its inventor, Baron Coehorn.
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Examples
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Oglethorpe had many of them in his 1740 bombardment of St. Augustine when the Spanish, trying to translate coehorn into their own tongue, called them
Artillery Through the Ages A Short Illustrated History of Cannon, Emphasizing Types Used in America Albert Manucy
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There were two coehorn mortars in the depression already referred to, and I suggested to him that he could serve them.
History of Kershaw's Brigade D. Augustus Dickert
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A shell from a coehorn burst prematurely, just as it left the mouth of the piece, and a fragment striking Prideaux on the head, killed him instantly.
Montcalm and Wolfe Francis Parkman 1858
yarb commented on the word coehorn
"That we might do the Spaniards as much honour as possible, it was determined, in a council of war, that five of our largest ships should attack the fort on one side, while the battery, strengthened by two mortars and twenty-four cohorns, should ply it on the other."
- Smollett, Roderick Random, 1748
May 27, 2014