"Stove" is the past participle of "stave", I believe. "Stave" is more or less "smash" or perhaps "beat", so "stove up" is like "beat[en] up". ---------- _Morning Oregonian_ (Portland OR), 8 Jan. 1864: p. 2(?), col. 1: <<We are gone in, stove up, smashed, played out, used up, catawampused -- in fact, whipped.>> ---------- -- Doug Wilson