Definition of "impressment"

impressment

/ɪmˈpɹɛsmənt/

noun
countable and uncountable, plural impressments
1. The act of seizing for public use; impressing into public service.
  Quotations
  owing to the immense number of our sailors, and the extent of our commerce, we were enabled by impressment and other means, to fit out and man a powerful fleet in a few weeks
  1808 February 3, Hansard
  Although it was a warm day, she seemed to think of nothing but the fire. I fancied she was jealous even of the saucepan on it; and I have reason to know that she took its impressment into the service of boiling my egg and broiling my bacon, in dudgeon […]
  1849 May – 1850 November, Charles Dickens, “I am sent away from Home”, in The Personal History of David Copperfield, London: Bradbury & Evans, […], published 1850
  A month later the governors of six more states, meeting in conference, enigmatically urged the impressment of slaves for “the public service as may be required.”
  1988, James McPherson, Battle Cry of Freedom, Oxford, published 2004, page 833
  […] in years when need was pressing, […] the government would order the construction of extra ships at specified points on the shores of the Black Sea and Mediterranean, and the impressment of craftsmen to do the work.
  2002, Colin Imber, chapter 8, in The Ottoman Empire, 1300-1650: The Structure of Power, Palgrave Macmillan, page 294