A ship with brutal working conditions or run by a cruel captain; a vessel where crew members suffer extreme hardship and mistreatment.
Compound of 'hell' and 'ship,' a term that emerged in maritime vocabulary during the age of sail when such vessels were genuinely notorious and well-known among sailors.
Sailors' horror stories about 'hellships' were so common that they created a maritime subculture—desertion, mutiny, and secret blacklists all tracked which captains ran the worst vessels, making reputation literally a matter of survival.
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