Bosun's cosh/starter/persuader

machinist · 5th March 2016, 06:31 AM

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

5th March 2016, 06:31 AM	#8
machinist Member Join Date: Oct 2010 Posts: 93	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 Attached Images