death grip

Etymology

Definitions

1. 1

   An extremely tight grip.

   • The walker held with a death grip to his stick lest he drop it down the hill.
   • The mysterious bark, though rent and shattered, still held on with a death-grip to the bridge, and the starting and splinting timbers of the latter seemed to shrink and shriek with fear and agony.
2. 2

   A perilous situation or stalemate where failure or death is imminent.

   • The armies came together in a death grip at the bottom of the valley.
   • [O]ne Confederate in the death grip had seized the sharp edge of a huge rock, and with feet held fast in a cleft of the rock above, hung head downwards between the two.
   • They act as skirmishers before the actual battle: and while the hoplites are in the real death-grip they harass the foe as they can, and guard the camp.

The neighborhood