Word.ws English Dictionary

stonewall

Syllables: stone·wallUK/ˈstəʊnwɔːl//ˈstoʊnwɔl/

stonewall noun: an obstruction. Also the alternative form of stone wall.

stonewall: an obstruction
Image: eda, Public domain, via Wikimedia Commons

Noun (1)

stonewall (plural stonewalls)

  1. (idiomatic) An obstruction.
    • That was what was causing the Government to hesitate in bringing down the Bill. There would be so many amendments proposed, and so many stonewalls erected, that much time would be occupied, and, that being so, he felt he must go on with other business first.1899 July 25, Richard John Seddon (Premier of New Zealand), “Old-age Pensions Act”, in New Zealand. Parliamentary Debates. Fourth Session, Thirteenth Parliament. Legislative Council and House of...
    • […] I suddenly realized that here was the opening I had been searching for and perhaps even the possibility of striking a great blow, a blow perhaps powerful enough to shatter her stonewall defence, be it sane or insane.1957 June, George Langelaan, “The Fly”, in Playboy, Chicago, Ill.: Playboy Enterprises, →OCLC; republished as “The Fly”, in Paul Kane and Marie O'Regan, editors, The Mammoth Book of Body Horror...
  2. (idiomatic) A refusal to cooperate.
    • If it was in order to use the word "stonewalling," I would say your stonewall has come to an end; but it is not in order. I would suggest that we bring the proceedings to an end decently, and if the obstruction is not to go on, then I think the proper thing for me to do is to move the ordinary...1923 February 17, William Ferguson Massey (Prime Minister of New Zealand), “Order of Business”, in New Zealand. Parliamentary Debates. First Session, Twenty-first Parliament. Legislative Council and...
    • "Okay," I said sarcastically, while inside wondering what she was picking up on. / "Anyway," she said, sensing my stonewall, "I was just checking out the Pine Needlers' Facebook Page again, and you guys are killing it. Killing it with kindness as they say."2017, Elodia Strain, chapter 15, in The Dating Experiment, Springville, Utah: Sweetwater Books, Cedar Fort, Inc., →ISBN
  3. (historical, idiomatic) An alcoholic drink popular in colonial America, consisting of apple cider (or sometimes applejack) mixed with rum (or sometimes gin or whisky).
    • [W]e are at a loss to "calculate" the ingredients which enter into such mysterious compounds as "apple-jack," "white nose," "stonewall," chain-lightning," "railroad," "rattle-snake," "back-straightener," "corpse-reviver," "moral suasion," "bottomless-pit," "sabbath-calm," etc.1868 March 17, James McGrigor Allan, “Europeans, and Their Descendants in North America”, in Journal of the Anthropological Society of London, volume VI, London: Trübner & Co., 60, Paternoster Row...
    • One highly imaginative account claims the throng told stories through the night in drunken outbursts of wild revelry. As if quoting from a house menu of early American alcoholic drinks, rather than reporting an eyewitness account, this version tells us they "guzzled nobly of punch, of flip, and...2014, John J. Duffy; H. Nicholas Muller, III, “Confused Accounts of Ethan Allen’s Death: Later Accounts Compound the Story”, in Inventing Ethan Allen, Lebanon, N.H.: University Press of New England...

Verb

stonewall (third-person singular simple present stonewalls, present participle stonewalling, simple past and past participle stonewalled)

  1. (transitive) To obstruct.
    • Either the thing to be stonewalled must be itself a bad thing, or it must be stonewalled as the only means of preventing some other wrong being committed; obviously, paying the public creditor was no wrong, and the budget, if wrong, could be effectually obstructed by stonewalling the financial...1876 January–October, “Public Affairs”, in The Melbourne Review, volume 1, Melbourne, Vic.: Samuel Mullen, 55 & 57 Collins Street East, →OCLC, page 244
  2. (ambitransitive, informal) To refuse to answer or cooperate, especially in supplying information.
    • At the press conference, the Prime Minister appeared to be stonewalling when asked about tax increases.
    • As he becomes defensive or stonewalls in return, she feels frustrated and angry, and so adds contempt to underscore the strength of her frustration. As her husband finds himself the object of his wife's criticism and contempt, he begins to fall into the innocent-victim or righteous-indignation...1996, Daniel Goleman, “Intimate Enemies”, in Emotional Intelligence: Why It Can Matter More Than IQ, paperback edition, London: Bloomsbury Publishing, →ISBN, part 3 (Emotional Intelligence Applied)...

Adjective

stonewall (not comparable)

  1. (UK) Certain, definite.
    • Fortune favoured the fortunate when Martin Atkinson ignored a stonewall penalty.2007 February 19, Martin Smith, “Fabregas factor helps Blackburn”, in The Daily Telegraph, London, archived from the original on 15 May 2011
    • [Neil] Lennon also pointed to a booking for Niall McGinn for diving as a stonewall penalty to add to his grievances.2011 January 13, Gordon Parks, “Celtic boss Neil Lennon in new blast at referees after ‘offside’ goal sees two more points dropped in SPL title race”, in Daily Record, Glasgow, archived from the...
    Synonyms:
    stone cold

Noun (2) capitalized: Stonewall

Stonewall (plural Stonewalls)

  1. Alternative letter-case form of stonewall (“alcoholic drink”).
    • Try one of the inn's specialties from the old days — a Coow Woow (pronounced coo-woo), a 17th-century drink made with ginger brandy and rum on crushed ice; or a Stonewall, which is a century older — gin and applejack over ice cubes.1974, Ian Keown, Lovers' guide to America, page 85
    • A Stonewall? That's a man's drink, ma'am. It's hard cider—cider wine at about six-and-one-half percent alcohol with rum added. Quite powerful.2001, Bert Osterberg, Silas Cully's Tavern Tales: Stories, Jokes, and Recipes, →ISBN

Proper noun capitalized: Stonewall

Stonewall

  1. (historical) A series of riots in 1969 New York City, beginning with the patrons of the gay bar "The Stonewall Inn" resisting police arrest, which marked the beginning of the militant gay rights movement.
    • Stonewall means fighting back.1979 June, Gay Community News
  2. A nickname of Confederate general Thomas Jonathan Jackson.
  3. A formation in chess (a variation of the Queen's Pawn Game) in which white plays pawns to d4 and several other positions, requiring black to react energetically (see Stonewall Attack).
    • the Stonewall attack, a Stonewall setup, a Stonewall formation
  4. A town in Manitoba, Canada.
  5. A former gold-mining town in California, in the Cuyamaca Mountains.
  6. A town in Louisiana.
  7. A town in Mississippi.
  8. A town in North Carolina.
  9. A town in Oklahoma.
  10. An unincorporated community in Texas.
  11. An unincorporated community in West Virginia.

Also used as

stonewall is also the alternative form of stone wall.

stonewall meaning in Hindi, Tamil, Telugu and Malayalam

stonewall in Hindi

स्टोनवॉल

stonewall in Tamil

ஸ்டோன்வால்

stonewall in Telugu

స్టోన్వాల్

stonewall in Malayalam

സ്റ്റോൺവാൾ
More languagesFewer languages
stonewall in Gujarati
સ્ટોનવોલ
stonewall in Odia
ଷ୍ଟୋନୱାଲ, ଷ୍ଟୋନୱାଲ୍
stonewall in Nepali
स्टोनवाल
stonewall in Tagalog
dedma

Examples of stonewall in a sentence

  • Crèspy's patois and Midi twang battled for meaning against my stonewall classroom phrases.1985, Richard Holmes, chapter 1, in Footsteps: Adventures of a Romantic Biographer, London: Hodder & Stoughton, →ISBN; republished London...
  • If it was in order to use the word "stonewalling," I would say your stonewall has come to an end; but it is not in order.1923 February 17, William Ferguson Massey (Prime Minister of New Zealand), “Order of Business”, in New Zealand. Parliamentary Debates....
  • As he becomes defensive or stonewalls in return, she feels frustrated and angry, and so adds contempt to underscore the strength of her frustration.1996, Daniel Goleman, “Intimate Enemies”, in Emotional Intelligence: Why It Can Matter More Than IQ, paperback edition, London: Bloomsbury...
  • It was marked by Kasparov’s increasing anger and frustration at the behaviour of IBM, which stonewalled against his requests for printouts of the machine’s logs of completed games.2017 June 4, John Naughton, “Deep Thinking: Where Machine Intelligence Ends and Human Creativity Begins by Garry Kasparov – review”, in The...

All 12 example sentences with stonewall

Synonyms of stonewall

Forms of stonewall

Noun
pluralstonewalls
pluralStonewalls
Verb
third-person singular presentstonewalls
present participlestonewalling
past participlestonewalled
paststonewalled

Plural of stonewall: stonewalls

Origin of stonewall

From Middle English stonwal, stone wall, stanewalle (“wall made of stone”), from Old English stānweall (“stonewall”), equivalent to stone + wall. The alcoholic drink (sense 3) was perhaps named thus because its effect was as potent as running into a stone wall.

Apparently a corruption of stone cold.

From stone + wall. The drink is so named because its effect is likened to running into a stone wall. The riots take their name from the Stonewall Inn where they began (in the 1840s, the property was called Bonnie's Stone Wall, later renamed to Bonnie's Stonewall Inn, then the Stonewall Inn Restaurant, and then the Stonewall Inn). The Confederate general acquired his nickname after a battle in which, while other troops were in motion, fellow general Barnard E. Bee observed "there stands Jackson like a stone wall" (either resolutely, or unhelpfully). The chess setup is so named because it is a solid formation which is hard to overrun by force, like a stone wall.

Words formed from stonewall

Questions about stonewall

What does stonewall mean?
Stonewall means an obstruction.
What is stonewall in Hindi?
Stonewall in Hindi is स्टोनवॉल. See Stonewall meaning in Hindi.
How do you use stonewall in a sentence?
Crèspy's patois and Midi twang battled for meaning against my stonewall classroom phrases.
What part of speech is stonewall?
Stonewall can be a noun, a verb, an adjective or a proper noun.
How do you pronounce stonewall?
Stonewall is pronounced /ˈstəʊnwɔːl/ (UK).
What is the plural of stonewall?
The plural of stonewall is stonewalls.

Words near stonewall in the dictionary

  1. stonesthrow
  2. Stonestreet
  3. Stonestreets
  4. Stonesy
  5. stonethrowing
  6. stonewall
  7. Stonewall Attack
  8. Stonewall County
  9. stonewalled
  10. stonewaller
  11. stonewallers

Source and license

Adapted from Wiktionary: stonewall (page history and authors); Stonewall (page history and authors); stonewall (Hindi, IndicTrans2 machine translation) (model and license); stonewall (Tamil, IndicTrans2 machine translation) (model and license); stonewall (Telugu, IndicTrans2 machine translation) (model and license); stonewall (Malayalam, IndicTrans2 machine translation) (model and license); stonewall (Gujarati, IndicTrans2 machine translation) (model and license); stonewall (Odia, IndicTrans2 machine translation) (model and license); stonewall (Nepali, IndicTrans2 machine translation) (model and license). Text available under the Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike 4.0 license. Word.ws reformatted the entry and added links. Wiktionary data of 2026-09-02.

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Pronunciation audio from Wikimedia Commons, each file under its own free license: en-us-stonewall.ogg, en-au-stonewall.ogg.

Cite this entry: “stonewall.” Word.ws, https://word.ws/stonewall. Based on Wiktionary, CC BY-SA 4.0.