Also 8 stowadore, 9 (Dicts.) stivadore. [a. Sp. estivador, agent-n. f. estivar to stow a cargo: see STEEVE v.2, STIVE v.

1

  A med.L. stivator in the same sense, together with the verb stivare, occurs A.D. 1263 in Mas Latrie Traités de Paix (1868), Docum., 39, 40.]

2

  A workman employed either as overseer or laborer in loading and unloading the cargoes of merchant vessels.

3

1788.  Massachusetts Spy, 10 July, 2/3. Stowadores.

4

1828–32.  Webster, Stevedore, one whose occupation is to stow goods, packages, &c. in a ship’s hold. New York.

5

1850.  Blackw. Mag., July, 54/1. Up mounted four or five … stevedores [Cape Town].

6

1856.  Kane, Arct. Expl., II. xvii. 181. We scrambled off over the ice together, much like a gang of stevedores going to work over a quayful of broken cargo.

7

1870.  Standard, 17 Nov., 6/7. The plaintiff was employed by Kennedy, a stevedore, in unloading the steam ship Sutherland.

8

1899.  F. T. Bullen, Log Sea-waif, 6. The litter of cases, bales, etc., about the deck was fast disappearing under the strenuous exertions of the stevedores.

9

  fig.  1867.  F. H. Ludlow, Little Brother, etc. 257. These stevedores of learning, the schoolmasters.

10

  attrib.  1898.  Daily News, 16 April, 2/7. He was foreman of stevedore labourers.

11

1909.  Suppl. E. Essex Advertiser, 21 Aug., 4/3. One of the largest stevedore contractors.

12