From Longman Dictionary of Contemporary Englishmerchantmanmer‧chant‧man /ˈmɜːtʃəntmən $ ˈmɜːr-/ noun (plural merchantmen /-mən/) [countable] old-fashioned TTWa ship used for carrying goods
Examples from the Corpus
merchantman• In 1787 he sailed as a subaltern on a merchantman that was wrecked.• There was a mass of shipping in the port, small skiffs, boats, the huge heavy-bottomed sterns of Hanseatic merchantmen.• Imperial merchantmen traversing the warp would flee at the sighting of one.• Off Corunna, they encountered a huge Levantine merchantman, and exchanged gun salutes with her.• How much further west the Minoan merchantmen sailed remains a matter for speculation: possibly as far as southern Britain.• No damage was caused to any of the warships or merchantmen.• Our cog was a sturdy merchantman escorted by a small man-of-war. 