CLOSE-Quarters, certain strong barriers of wood, stretching across a merchant-ship in several places. They are used as places of retreat when a ship is boarded by her adversary, and are therefore fitted with several small loop-holes through which to fire the small arms, and thereby annoy the enemy and defend themselves. They are likewise furnished with several caissons called powder-chests, which are fixed upon the deck, and filled with powder, old-nails, &c. and may be fired at any time from the close-quarters upon the boarders.
We have known an English merchant-ship of 16 Falconer's guns, and properly fitted with close-quarters, defeat the united efforts of three French privateers who boarded her in the last war, after having engaged at some distance nearly a day and a half, with very few intervals of rest. Two of the cruisers were equipped with twelve guns each, and the other with eight. The French sailors were, after boarding, so much exposed to continued fire of musketry and coehorns charged with grenadoes, that a dreadful scene of carnage ensued, in which the decks were soon covered with the dead bodies of the enemy, several of which the boarders, in their hurry to escape, had left behind.