A Springfield model 1822 musket with its principal parts labeled, including lock, stock, and barrel
14 April 2021
Lock, stock, and barrel is a slang expression meaning the whole or entirety of something. The underlying etiology of the phrase is that of a musket, of which the lock (i.e., firing mechanism), stock, and barrel are the principal parts. While one can find combinations of the three words literally referring to firearms going back earlier, the use as a slang phrase arose in North America around the turn of the nineteenth century, and it may in fact be based on an older Scottish adage, although that adage isn’t recorded until the same time.
In early use, the order of the words is stock, lock, and barrel, and the present-day order seems to have become fixed in the mid nineteenth century. The earliest hint that the phrase was in use dates to 16 January 1811, when it appears in the Philadelphia newspaper Aurora for the Country:
In the hands of a company of the United States rifle men, stationed at Fort Columbus he found some arms of a construction most complete, they were of the short pattern of about 2 feet 3 inches from the breach to muzzle, not only handsome to the eye, but the workmanship “stock, lock, and barrel” were excellent; and upon the proof—no weapon could be more easily managed nor more effective.
This is a literal reference to a firearm, but the use of quotation marks around the phrase indicates that the slang sense of whole was already in use and the writer intended both the literal and metaphorical meaning. And indeed, we see a use of the phrase that is utterly divorced from the context of firearms about a month later, in the Middlesex Gazette of 21 February 1811:
The whole of the southern states, including the city of Baltimore, own 344,336 tons and 15[?] ninety-fifths. So that the tonnage of the state of Massachusetts alone, exceeds that of the whole southern states put together, “stock, lock, and barrel,” 118,708 tons and 68 ninety fifths.
The earliest use of the phrase recorded in the Oxford English Dictionary is in a letter by Walter Scott dated 29 October 1817, but this would seem to be a coincidental use, unconnected to the American phrase. In the letter, Scott writes:
I do not believe I should save £100 by retaining Mrs. Redford, by the time she was raised, altered, and beautified, for, like the Highlander’s gun, she wants stock, lock, and barrel, to put here into repair. In the mean time, “the cabin is convenient.”
One needs to know the background to understand the references. Scott is writing about the renovations of his home Abbotsford. “Mrs. Redford” is not a person, but rather the original farmhouse that stood on the property, no doubt so-called after its former tenant. And the “Highlander’s gun” is a reference to a recently published poem by William Jerdan, “The Highlandman’s Pistol,” which opens with the epigraph:
“It wants a new stock, a new lock, and a new barrel, like the Highlandman’s pistol.”—Old Scottish Saying.
It is unlikely, but not impossible, that Scott was aware of the American slang phrase. More likely is that the American phrase is connected to the older Scottish saying—although we have no evidence of the existence of that Scottish saying before the 1817 poem. Jerdan may very well have invented it.
A curious use of lock, stock, and barrel, and one of the first to use that order of words, appears in a letter published in the Connecticut Herald on 20 January 1824. The letter is in the voice of a musket, allegedly used in the American Revolution, that had been on sale for ten dollars. But the phrase’s use is not in the sense of the whole or entirety, rather lock, stock, and barrel is used as a verb meaning to refurbish the weapon:
I appeal to your mercy and judgment to say if this is not wrong—and if you have any pity for my perishing condition, I wish you to represent my case to the General Committee for such relief as the case demands—for I vow, by my caliber and breech-pin, I should never kill a Turk, though you were to new lock, stock, and barrel me.
Another curious use is in John Neal’s 1823 Randolph, A Novel. The use appears in a passage in which a character, a Mr. Grenville, is telling of his visit to the armory at Harper’s Ferry, Virginia (now West Virginia). But interspersed with his discussion of the firearms manufacturing techniques there, is his account of trying to swim in the Shenandoah River there. “Jefferson’s Rock” is a well-known rock formation overlooking the river at Harper’s Ferry:
“O, speaking of General Harper," said Mr. Grenville, “that reminds me of Harper's Ferry—ever there?—I was—always mention it—travelling for pleasure—went to the armoury—some notion of being comfortable—thought it was about time to begin to think about getting married—after a wife—know of any? Manage to make the pot boil, may be. Jefferson's rock's mighty dangerous—names carved to the brink—most curious thing—like to a'been washed away in a—hem—mill race. “Durst thou Cassius,” said I, leap with me, &c.—and in I went—Lord!—it took my breath away—scarified me—whizzed and whirled me about, like soap-suds in a gutter. I would'nt recommend to you to bathe in a mill race (you will recollect that women only were present) bad place to learn to swim in—ahem—the most curious thing that I saw, was a turning lathe—just invented—turns gun-stocks whole—“lock, stock and barrel”—‘Twas’nt exactly the wisest thing that ever was done, I confess;—I might have been drowned—but I never lose my presence of mind, at such moments, I mean—nay, women themselves do not—there was an iron mould made in the shape of a gun-stock—upon this, a number of instruments were graduated; corresponding exactly with others, above—ahem—those at the top had edges—those below had none—the wheel revolved, the chips flew, and out came a gun-stock!—ahem—wonderful contrivance very curious indeed—revolutions are naturally in a circle—you would think it difficult to turn an oval—a hectagon—a square—but this machine does more—all at once; many ovals—capable of universal application—very simple, the principle! What a people we are! for invention, and improvement!—emphatically our national character.
Neal is using the phrase in the context of firearms, but again, his placing it in quotation marks indicates that he is aware of the metaphorical sense.
And by 1829 we see the familiar order of words and the metaphorical sense unrelated to firearms. From the Yankee; and Boston Literary Gazette of July 1829:
You complained a moment ago, that you had no money. Come, Sir, fix your own price for your horse- and-sleigh, and if you are not very extravagant, I'll buy them of you——
One hundred and fifty dollars, if you dare?
No—but I will say one hundred, if you dare.
One-twenty-five, and they are yours, lock, stock and barrel, as they stand.
Done—there's your money.
But the order of words was still variable, as we can see from Thomas Chandler Haliburton’s 1838 novel The Clockmaker:
Yes, a horse like “Old Clay” is worth the whole seed, breed and generation of them Amherst beasts put together. He’s a horse, every inch of him, stock, lock, and barrel, is old Clay.
After about 1840, the order of lock, stock, and barrel becomes the fixed idiom.
So, despite the first citation in the OED being from a famous British writer, the phrase would appear to be North American in origin—although perhaps based on an older, unattested, Scottish adage. In many ways, lock, stock, and barrel follows the standard path from literal to metaphorical to idiom. At first it refers the parts of a gun, then to the entirety of something, and then fossilizes into a fixed idiom. But its history also diverts into any number of tempting side paths.
Sources:
“Facts—Stubborn Facts.” Middlesex Gazette (Middletown, Connecticut), 21 February 1811, 3. Readex: America’s Historical Newspapers.
Haliburton, Thomas Chandler. The Clockmaker: or The Sayings and Doings of Samuel Slick of Slickville, fourth edition, London: Richard Bentley, 1838, 176. HathiTrust Digital Archive.
Jerdan, William. “The Highlandman’s Pistol.” Morning Post (London), 1 March 1817, 4. Gale Primary Sources.
Letter. Connecticut Herald (New Haven), 20 January 1824, 3. Readex: America’s Historical Newspapers.
“Live Yankees.” The Yankee; and Boston Literary Gazette, July 1829, 36. HathiTrust Digital Archive.
“Military Establishment.” Aurora for the Country (Philadelphia), 16 January 1811, 2. Readex: America’s Historical Newspapers.
Neal, John. Randolph, A Novel, vol. 1 of 2. Baltimore?: 1823, 241. HathiTrust Digital Archive.
Oxford English Dictionary, third edition, March 2021, s. v. lock, n.2.
Scott, Walter. Letter to Daniel Terry, 29 October 1817. The Letters of Sir Walter Scott, vol 5 of 12. H. J. C. Grierson, et al., eds. London: Constable and Co., 1933, 4.
Tréguer, Pascal. “Origin of ‘Lock, Stock and Barrel’ (i.e. ‘Completely’).” Wordhistories.net, 18 March 2018.
Image credit: Anonymous, 2011. Public domain image.