freighter n Cp DC ~ 2 Nfld 'passenger or crew member on a coastal vessel' (1905-).
   1 Member of a fishing-crew transported by vessel to his fishing station; esp one sailing to his 'station' or 'room' on the Labrador; STATIONER.
   [1701] 1954 INNIS 109 Captain Arthur Holdsworth from Dartmouth, had brought 236 passengers, 'all or great part of which are byeboat-keepers and under a pretence of being freighters aboard his ship, which is only for some few provisions for their necessary use, he had put and continued them in the most convenient stages. . .' 1871 HOWLEY MS Reminiscences 22 I was aboard the Labradorman coming home and saw the little schooner during a flash of lightening... Our vessel was the William from Brigus filled with freighters coming home after the voyage was over. [1888] 1897 Nfld Law Reports 307 The plaintiff was a hired shareman of one Charles Parsons, a dealer and freighter of the defendant's, and was engaged to proceed with Parsons to the Labrador fishery. 1895 GRENFELL 52 Each Newfoundland vessel brings a number of people called 'freighters.' These are landed at various harbours, where they have left mud huts and boats the previous year, and where they will fish all summer. 1908 TOWNSEND 123 Besides their own crew of five or six men and a woman or girls to cook and help at the splitting tables, the vessels are often burdened with 'freighters,'—fishermen and their families with no schooners of their own. 1936 SMITH 138 On the 12th the Ruby arrived. She discharged the freighters and Labrador gear. 1977 Inuit Land Use 314 The freighters were the men and women who did not own their own schooners, but were left on the shore for the summer months. During this time, they fished for the cod in bays and safer inshore waters, where a small rowboat could be used.
   2 Phr go freighter: to sail as a passenger to one's summer fishing-station.
   1936 SMITH 106 I went freighter again with Mr Jerrett in the schooner.

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