tenderfuls

Noun

tenderful (plural tenderfuls or tendersful)

1. A quantity that a tender (railroad car behind the engine) holds.
   • With a tenderful of splendid coal, 231 was going up like an engine possessed, exhaust ringing out clear in the frosty air and a great column of sparks shooting to the moonlit sky, while all down the curving line behind us you could see the little fires springing up.1940, D.L. Smith, “More Glasgow & South Western Nights' Entertainments”, in The Railway Magazine, volume 86
2. The quantity that a tender (ship that functions as a mobile base) holds.
   • A dreary year for the Squadron, this 1819, when officers and men fell sick by the shipload and were sent home by the tenderful, when Lemon Valley Hospital was supplemented by the one at High Peak, when Court-Martials were held at the rate of one a fortnight, burials thrice a week, and surveys on...1912, George Leo de St. M. Watson, Sir Robert Thomas Wilson, A Polish Exile with Napoleon, page 276

See all 3 meanings of tenderful