steersman

plural steersmen

1. nauticalOne who steers a ship or other vessel; the helmsman.

   ‘Stern all!’ and the harpooner tumbles aft and grips the steer oar, and the steersman takes his place in the head of the boat with his keen-edged lance.

   1899 August 28, The Grafton Argus and Clarence River General Advertiser, NSW, page 4, column 2

   2 more examples

   And as for a tiller, the whale-boat never admits of any such effeminacy; and therefore as in gamming a complete boat’s crew must leave the ship, and hence as the boat steerer or harpooneer is of the number, that subordinate is the steersman upon the occasion, and the captain, having no place to sit in, is pulled off to his visit all standing like a pine tree.

   1851 November 14, Herman Melville, chapter 53, in Moby-Dick; or, The Whale, 1st American edition, New York, N.Y.: Harper & Brothers; London: Richard Bentley, →OCLC

   The Indian canoe races were the most exciting of all the Regatta. Ten paddles dipped as one paddle, ten men bent as one man, while the steersman kept time for them with grunting bows.

   1942, Emily Carr, “Regatta”, in The Book of Small, Toronto, Ont.: Oxford University Press, →OCLC

   Synonyms: helmsman, sternsman