Green’s Dictionary of Slang

(Aus./US) a servant girl.

1856		Life in Boston & N.Y. (Boston, MA) 22 Nov. n.p.: Plenty of Bridgets, rum and drunken men were present .
1857		Venus’ Miscellany (NY) 31 Jan. n.p.: We are rather short as regards toast makers, having none but Bridget, and she burns and spoils more than she makes.
c.1864		‘My Own Darling Kate’ in Rakish Rhymer (1917) 149: I’ve caught crabs from the ‘shrubs’ round the high German c—ts, / Caught the ‘fire’ from the Bridgets so nate.
1866		Night Side of N.Y. 83: His hat is [...] so shiny that it looks as if Bridget had mistaken it for a joint of a stovepipe, and ‘done it over’ with black-lead.
1869		Melbourne Punch 10 June 179/1: The men seem devoid of flunkeyism, and the woman of servant-gal-ism. Jeames would not suit the views of the resident gentry—Bridget would not be half natty enough.
1882		Nat. Police Gaz. (NY) 15 Apr. 2/1: Who will wash Beecher’s shirts when the Chinese have gone? Draw it mild on Bridget, you shiftless old man.
1885		Bulletin (Sydney) 22 Aug. 10/4: Mothers are not quite so vulgar as to rear their own children in this enlightened age. The party who agitates the cradle, and forms a youngster’s character now, is the slab-sided, fiery-headed Bridget [...] who sees more of a child in one week than its high-toned Ma does in one year.
1891		Bird o’ Freedom (Sydney) 7 Mar. 2/2: ‘How old are you, Bridget?’ asked a lady of her Irish maid-of-all-work.
1894		Mirror of Life 10 Mar. 7/1: Bridget: ‘Indade, mum, I must be lavin’ you.’ Mistress: ‘Why, Bridget, what is the matter? What doesn’t suit?’.
1902		Bulletin (Sydney) 26 Jul. 13/2: Part of the moral is that every girl, if she has to go into the domestic circle, should go there as Bridget Murphy, pot-walloper, with plenty of sass for the missus, instead of as a poor, trembling Miss Smith, lady-help.
1920		Capt. Billy’s Whiz Bang Oct. 9: Bridget failed to get up one morning [...] Instead she yelled downstairs that she was ‘pretty sick.’ Mr. Smith promptly summoned his family doctor who gave the ‘sick’ servant a thorough examination.
1923		O.O. McIntyre New York Day by Day 31 Aug. [synd. col.] Louis XV conferred the cordon bleu on Madame DuBarry’s Bridget.