?1527 L. Andrewe tr. Noble Lyfe Bestes sig. vi Torpido is a fisshe, but who so handeleth hym shalbe lame & defe of lymmes, that he shall fele no thyng.

1590 R. Harvey Plaine Percevall sig. B3^v Like the fish Torpedo, which being towchd, sends her venime alongst line and angle rod, till it cease on the finger, and so mar a fisher for euer.

1603 C. Heydon Def. Iudiciall Astrol. xxiii. 547 Neither doth the Torpedo benumme other things, though it benummeth the fishers hand.

1646 Sir T. Browne Pseudodoxia Epidemica iii. vii. 119 Torpedoes deliver their opium at a distance, and stupifie beyond themselves. View more context for this quotation

1773 Ann. Reg. 1772 136/1 Mr. Walsh touched the back of the torpedo; when all the five persons..felt a shock at the same instant, which differed in nothing from the Leyden experiment.

1815 J. Smith Panorama Sci. & Art II. 253 The torpedo is a flat fish, of the ray tribe, very seldom exceeding twenty inches in length, and twenty pounds in weight... It inhabits the Mediterranean and the North Seas.

1879 E. P. Wright Animal Life 465 The Torpedo (T. vulgaris), is found occasionally on the south coasts of England and Ireland.

a1593 C. Marlowe Edward II (1594) sig. C2^v Faire Queene forbeare to angle for the fish..I meane that vile Torpedo, Gaueston.

1762 O. Goldsmith Life R. Nash 34 He used to call a pen his torpedo, whenever he grasped it, it numbed all his faculties.

c1855 B. S. Hollis Hymn-bk. C'tess Huntingdon's Connecticut Pref. The torpedo of formality had benumbed the churches.

1776 J. Thacher Mil. Jrnl. (1823) 75 Mr. Bushnell gave to his machine the name of American Turtle or Torpedo.

1807 Salmagundi 14 Aug. 260 A Torpedo; by which the stoutest line of battle ship..may be..decomposed[i.e. blown up] in a twinkling.

1807 Admiralty Secretary In-Lett. No. 4353 (P.R.O.) (Sept. 6) A description of the machine invented by Mr. Robert Fulton for exploding under ships' bottoms and by him called the torpedo.

1810 Fulton Torpedo War 4.

1868 Daily News 3 Nov. The particular kind of torpedo used on this occasion is an American invention, which was found very effective in the defence of the harbour of Charleston.

1877 E. H. Knight Pract. Dict. Mech. (at cited word) The drifting torpedo..is carried against the enemy's works or vessels by the current,..the tide, or..the wind... Anchored torpedoes are attached to mooring piles or anchors.

1880 Standard 29 Dec. 6/1 In 1777 a schooner was destroyed in the harbour of New London, Connecticut, by a drifting percussion torpedo.

1916 ‘B. Cable’ Action Front 182 The terrific detonation of an aerial torpedo.

1922 W. Raleigh War in Air I. 467 The hope of using the torpedo, launched from the air, against ships which are sheltered and protected from naval attack, was never long absent from the minds of those who directed the activities of the Royal Naval Air Service.

1932 19th Cent. Feb. 204 Twenty-six flights of torpedo bombers.

1943 Jane's Fighting Ships 1942 5 18 inch torpedoes are used by the torpedo bombers of the Fleet Air Arm.

1786 S. Henley tr. W. Beckford Arabian Tale 173 I will spring mines of serpents and torpedos, from beneath them; and we shall soon see the stand they will make against such an explosion!

1831 T. P. Jones New Conversat. Chem. xix. 197 Those dangerous playthings called torpedoes, which explode when thrown upon the floor, derive this property from some preparation of silver.

1909 Westm. Gaz. 28 July 2/1 The use or abuse of Roman candles, paper-caps, display pieces, small crackers, or..torpedoes.

1877 E. H. Knight Pract. Dict. Mech. (at cited word) Torpedoes for opening the fissures of oil-wells.

1877 E. H. Knight Pract. Dict. Mech. (at cited word) Torpedoes... (Railway). A cartridge placed on a rail to be exploded by a passing train.

1882 A. G. Lock Gold iii. 862 The torpedo is a sloping (upwards) iron plate 4 ft. long, of the same width as the floor of the tom where it is joined to the latter, but narrowing considerably towards the end where it meets a riffle. There is a false bottom similarly perforated in the torpedo, and another in the launder leading away from the riffle... If the torpedo is properly arranged, no gold should be found beyond the riffle.

1929 G. L. Hostetter & T. Q. Beesley It's a Racket! 241 Torpedo, a professional gunman or bomb tosser.

1940 R. Chandler Farewell, my Lovely xxxvi. 239 There's yellow cops and there's yellow torpedoes.

1973 P. Evans Bodyguard Man iii. 24 Ask Al Capone. Mention his torpedoes to most people and they conjure up mental sketches of middle-aged heavyweights.

1971 Go ask Alice (1972) 28 He introduced me to torpedoes on Friday and Speed on Sunday.

1978 M. Russell Daylight Robbery xv. 154 The phial..contained more tablets... He tried to estimate how long..it took a couple of the torpedoes to send him off.

1879 in Webster's Dict. Suppl.

1881 P. Robinson Under Punkah 221 If..an ironclad were to be run down, accidentally torpedoed, or suffer from an explosion.

1898 Westm. Gaz. 1 Apr. 7/2 In action the battleship would have been torpedoed before she could have fired a gun.

1895 W. Harcourt Speech in Commons 18 Feb. The consummate speech..might be described as having torpedoed the amendment.

1899 Folk-Lore Mar. 105 It seems effectually to have torpedoed the enemies' arguments.

1896 Westm. Gaz. 15 Jan. 2/1 In four hours they'd be inside the Isle of Wight, torpedoing away right and left.

1877 Daily News 16 Nov. 5/7 The Russians are supposed to have immediately torpedoed the river in his front and rear.

1890 Sat. Rev. 11 Jan. 29/1 The canard that German officers have been torpedoing the Tagus.