hell-bent for leather

Idioms  

1. Moving recklessly fast, as in Out the door she went, hell-bent for leather. The use of hell-bent in the sense of “recklessly determined” dates from the first half of the 1800s. Leather alludes to a horse's saddle and to riding on horseback; this colloquial expression may be an American version of the earlier British army jargon hell for leather, first recorded in 1889.

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Example Sentences

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hell-bent for leather

"I don't necessarily think we're hell-bent for leather to pull troops out regardless of what's happening," the official said.

From Reuters ● Nov. 3, 2011