Sentence:  It was so cold and so wretched that a sort of desperate gaiety infected all of them , like people stormbound or shipwrecked or <WSD>caught</WSD> in some other freak of circumstance so that time stood still and minor anxieties fell away and the only important thing was to cling together and survive . 
Meaning of the word marked with <WSD> tags:  capture as if by hunting, snaring, or trapping