unloosen

"We feel confident," jointly announced the unions and the contractors, "the wage adjustment will unloosen the log jam that has gripped local construction work."

From Time Magazine Archive

They fished them out later from their slimy couch, and found that they had clasped one another so tightly in their mortal agony that it was deemed impious ever to unloosen that embrace.

From Alone by Norman Douglas

Will drink unloosen it?" said the Colonel; "though I dare say thou hast tried that spell at every ale-house on the road.

From Woodstock; or, the Cavalier by Sir Walter Scott

They may hasten a little the advent of that current, they may a little intensify its effect, but they have not the power to either unloosen it or stop it.

From The New York Stock Exchange and Public Opinion Remarks at Annual Dinner, Association of Stock Exchange Brokers, Held at the Astor Hotel, New York, January 24, 1917 by Otto Hermann Kahn

By tongue and deed he strove to unloosen the passions of hell to his own profit!

From The Fur Bringers A Story of the Canadian Northwest by Hulbert Footner