Bosun's cosh/starter/persuader

[kronckew]

naval memorabilia. billed as early 19th century. a bosun's cosh, used on his own sailor's as needed to 'start' or 'persuade' them that did not move fast enough. would be a fearsome weapon tho.

22 in. long. lead egg head covered in typical naval knotwork, malacca shaft, nicely spliced loop of hemp rope at the end. the knotwork appears relatively new, i suspect replaced for display, but it looks right for a proper bosun's work.

[fernando]

The type of thing to be posted in the Miscellania section .

[kronckew]

wasn't sure, as it is sort of a weapon/naval badge of rank....

[drac2k]

I always liked these "method of enlightened persuasion," items.I remember talking to an old U.S.Navy WW2 Chief Warrant Officer who relayed how when he was newly enlisted in the U.S. Navy, aboard the ship, participating in the "non- voluntary," brass polishing period. He was laying on his side, gently caressing the brass, when much to his surprise, he was startled by the rather rough application of the bosun's foot to his rear . The bosun gave him a look and the meaning was understood; he told me that after that, he was the "brass polishing," champion.This was the age of on deck boxing smokers and such.
Imagine if that was tried today with a modern day sailor.

[kronckew]

item was teleported to me this morning, slightly before the vendor mailed it, i think. probably dipped in asmovian theotimoline.

anyway, the photo colours are off. the head twine is actually quite brown, though lighter than the haft, very tightly done, no cuts, and the malacca rattan haft is intact with a few small dents, a couple of tar stains and a slight split near the lanyard hole, and a small chunk is missing. end shows a typical rattan x-section with the typical tear-drop ridge of malacca. the missing piece exposes the rattan interior and looks well aged, it has been missing for a good while.

the lanyard is neatly spliced, and is not hemp, but a smoother material, possibly cotton 'small stuff'. it is the same colour as the cotton twine knot-work over the lead, both almost exactly the colour of the exposed rattan interior. length is actually 20.25 in. (~55cm.), just under an inch haft dia. & 360 grams in weight.

[VANDOO]

THERE WERE QUITE A VARIETY OF THESE I HAVE SEEN SOME DOUBLE ENDED ONES ABOUT 12 INCHES LONG OR LESS AND WERE EASILY CONCEALED. THE HANDLE WAS MADE OF WHALE BALEEN SO WAS FLEXIBLE WHICH ADDED TO THE POWER OF THE STRIKE MUCH LIKE THE LEATHER BLACKJACKS OR SAPS. A MUCH SHORTER SWING WAS NEEDED TO GET THE DESIRED EFFECT AS WELL. THE HISTORY OF THESE IS A DARK ONE AS THEY WERE OFTEN USED BY PRESS GANGS TO KIDNAP (SHANGHAI) OR OTHERWISE IMPRESS MEN AGAINST THEIR WILL TO CREW THEIR SHIPS. THEY WERE EASILY CONCEALED AND COULD BE USED BY AN EXPERT WITHOUT NOTICE OR BLOOD SO WERE USED BY THIEVES TO MUG AND ROB THE UNWARY OR DRUNKS. A LOVE TAP BEHIND THE EAR WHEN NO ONE WAS LOOKING AND HELP YOUR DRUNK FRIEND OUTSIDE TO GET SOME AIR AND THEN AWAY WITH HIS GOODS AND PERHAPS DELIVER HIM TO A SHIP FOR FURTHER GAIN. YOURS IS A NICE EXAMPLE LIKELY USED ON SHIP OR PERHAPS ASHORE OCCASIONALLY BY A PRESS GANG RATHER THAN BY A THIEF.

[kronckew]

when i was a merchant marine cadet we of course learned some knot-work, the deckies more than us engineers. one of the first knots we learned was a monkey's fist on the end of a piece of line, which could be tied around a spherical object, like a glass marble, and made nice lanyards for pocket knives, keys, etc. the more bellicose would tie them with a ball bearing or large steel nut with enough line to make a formidable weapon. they were of course frowned upon & confiscated if found. throwing lines, used to then pull a larger mooring line ashore were also made with a weight & the longshore men had to keep their eyes open when a vessel was being moored. getting hit with one smarts. the 'starters' i've seen were made with thicker multi-part braided hafts about a foot long rather than just the rope we used back then.

i've read somewhere the tales of shanghaiing landlubbers was a bit exaggerated, tho it did occur on occasion. it was more prevalent in merchant ships, but the navy ships were more concerned with getting trained seamen and they actually preferred stopping merchies and 'impressing' trained sailors from them directly. getting tricked into the king's service by a shilling in the base of a mug of ale is essentially a myth, pressing by fraud like that was illegal & recruited men had 24 hrs to change their minds. the normal joining bonus was a fair sum more likely to induce them to stay. i'm sure some desperate captains may have bent the rules as much as they could tho.

as the late 18th & early 19th c. UK navy did not really recognise the US, they were fond of stopping american ships to steal their sailors, many of whom back then had actually been at one time british and quite possibly royal navy deserters, which gave some legitimacy to the practice. this was a major cause of the war of 1812 between the US & the UK, which ended with a treaty somewhat in the UK's favour. it was signed before the famous battle in new orleans (major communications lag) where the pride of europe that defeated nappy was decisively trounced by a handful of militia, pirates, indians and a few regulars. the UK decided it was better to have us as a friend than an enemy after that final slaughter.

p.s. - the baleen hafted 'persuaders' are VERY expensive and rare now as harvesting baleen is frowned on.

[machinist]

I have a great affection for thuggish impact weapons that go thump in the night and have purchased a few of these off the bay and in studying them I feel there is a bit of overlap between tool and weapon similar to the way that fire axes and boarding axes are often easily confused.

In the case of these coshes a more civilian use of these is as a fish club to pacify a caught salmon or cod and if you check the UK specific part of Ebay regularly you will see a lot of old coshes sold as fishing priests (because they gave the last rites to a fish). Some of these really were meant for fishing but others may be sold as a fish club to get past the laws of the UK and the rules of Ebay UK which tend not to be weapon friendly.

I imagine a hundred or two years ago these would have offered a sort pf plausible deniability to a fellow who wished to go armed with the excuse that it was not really a weapon but a bit of tackle.

Without more info we can only guess which one was carried for sport and which was carried as a weapon but I do believe that as a weapon they would have been quite formidable, a tap with one of these will break an arm or crush a skull. I have one of the whalebone ones and it is very heavy and weapon-like.

A couple years ago I saw on a website devoted to identifying mystery objects a soft cosh, without a stick but in which the weight was covered with this same style of maritime knot-work and it was pure thuggish with no doubt it was not for killing fish. I foolishly did not save the photos.

Here is one of my goodies

[kronckew]

nice one, looks like twisted baleen.

sadly the police are less credulous nowadays, outside my residence i'd need a rod, tackle box and probably some fresh flopping about fish to convince a LEO that mine was a fishing priest. probably need some fresh fish slime on the cosh as well. in any case it automatically becomes an offensive weapon if you actually use it to defend yourself. if you are being attacked by a crazed gunman that has killed a dozen or so people before you, the judge might be lenient and reduce your sentence for violating his/her EU given hooman rights to self expression, if you have all the fishy stuff on hand...inside your house you have a better chance of getting away with it, but the felon might sue you.

[drac2k]

You could always break out your cricket bat, right ?

[kronckew]

nah, i find them a bit ungainly. i'd use my hurley. (below)

a deadly oceanic islander weapon discussed at length HERE
i reccommend the video in post no. one.

it's now less than a week away from the islander's traditional celebration where they chew road tar out of pint glasses and dye their sheep green yet again. the rivers in the USA will run green with their blood and even NYC may find their road markings temporarily painted green by official vandals of island descent.

i have a few wooden surprises for anyone entering uninvited. also a number of very sharp hunks of metal they might accidentally get cut on. fatally. not to mention a 29 kilo furry monster with sharp teeth that can run 1.5 times the speed of hussain bolt.[IMG]http://www.vikingsword.com

p.s.- i am an american by the way, my mum & dad were both semi-pro baseball players, so i am quite familiar with the use of baseball bat-like objects.

[LJ]

Just to complicate things further. This was part of a collection of unidentified African items, so because my brain runs in straight lines and bearing in mind the copper wire wrapping, my first thought was it was from southern Africa. And the flexible fibre ... possibly elephant hair. Somebody else commented that it looked like the type of staff carried by an Induna.

Well, if the fibre is baleen, it is unlikely to be southern African ! The ends are not particularly heavy, and I never thought of the item as a cosh, but maybe it is.

A sorry descent, from Induna's staff to fish-killing cosh ... or does anybody have a suggestion as to what else could it be ???

[kronckew]

yes, not a fishing 'priest', but a very expensive (now) twisted whale baleen bosun's 'starter'. it doesn't need to be all that heavy, it's meant to just provide a painful 'reminder' rather than do injury that might limit the recipient's performance. and to serve as a badge of his top rank in the crew. used a bit like a smack on the head by leroy gibbs (NCIS) possibly made on a whaler where it did not also need to serve as a weapon.

worth a lot more than a zulu induna's staff. see my PM.

[LJ]

Many thanks for the suggestion. A "bosun's starter" is certainly a more interesting type of object than a fish basher!

The shaft is flexible and whippy, and I could imagine that it would hurt if you were hit by an end.