Green’s Dictionary of Slang

(US) a red-headed or red-faced person.

1869

A.K. McClure Three Thousand Miles Through the Rocky Mountains 292: Dry up, old (hic) blossom-top.

1. an abrasion on one’s nose.

1825

Globe (London) 7 Mar. 4/3: Mr. Kemp came out the adventure with no other personal damage than a moderate-sized brandy-blossom on the dexter-side of his nose.

2. a red-pimpled nose, the result of excessive drinking of brandy; also the pimples themselves, thus adj. brandy-blossomed (see cite 1861).

1832		Examiner (London) 22 Apr. 12/1: Mrs Rebecca Higgins, a stout matronly-looking female, with a phiz of the genuine brandy blossom.
1841		Port Phillip Patriot and Melbourne Advertiser (Vic.) 22 Nov. 4/4: [used fig.] [S]ome folks had better see the brandy blossoms on their own faces before they find beams in other people’s characters.
1845		Monmouth Democrat (NJ) 2 Jan. 1/3: ’Tis the last brandy blossom/ Which blooms on my face, / With its blue and its purple /To mark my disgrace.
1850		Louisville Dly Courier (KY) 4 July 4/1: The complexion of the face was a cadaverous white, liberally sprinkled [...] with gin and brandy blossoms.
1852		Dublin Wkly Nation 25 Sept. 10/1: Acne rosacca, the malady coarsely translated as ‘brandy blossom’.
1856		Empire (Sydney) 16 Feb. 8/4: [A] tall man, with brandy blossoms on his face.
1860		Democratic Press (Eaton, OH) 27 Dec. 2/1: In our saloons, men with noses tipped with brandy blossoms may be heard discussing on the evils of slavery.
1861		Toowoomba Chron. (Qld) 12 Sept. 4/4: [H]er brandy blossomed ‘conk’ received ou additional tinge of ruby from the potent effects of an extra nobbler.
1864		Launceston Examiner (Tas.) 28 June 7/1: Wanted for the Public Service [...] a number of gentlemen who are not attackec with delirium tremens above once a week [...] They who can present perfect brandy blossoms, and can perform the gin shakes, may reckon upon early employment.
1867		Galaxy Mag. (US) 16 624: She got out at her usual corner, with a small, depraved-looking grocery stuck on the nib of it, like a brandy blossom on a drunkard’s nose.
1870		Adelaide Obs. (SA) 24 Dec. 14/2: ‘[Y]ou brandy-blossomed Dutch barrel’.
1872		New National Era (Wash., DC) 18 July 5/1: They grasp at the contemptible office of drink-mixer [...] while Bardolph noses glow with full-grown brandy blossoms.
1879		Melbourne Punch 6 Nov. 7/2: [H]is proboscis happens to be a very ornamental one, so far as a wealth of carbuncles and brandy blossoms is concerned.
1881		Victorian Exp. (Geraldton, WA) 26 Jan. 3/2: Fancy a gentleman possessing a proboscis coining under the designation of [...] ‘brandy-blossomed’ volunteering the information.
1882		Belfast Morn. News 10 Apr. 4/7: His worshippers carry brandy blossoms on the nose.
1895		Indianapolis Jrnl (IN) 21 Dec. 5/6: His pale, soulful young face, with here and there a brandy blossom on [...] the bridge of a pug nose.
1900		Bulletin (Sydney) 29 Sept. 31/2: Here sits Bandicoot, the broker, eating in a desp’rate hurry, / Scowling at his left-hand neighbor – Cornstalk from the Upper Murray, / Who with brandy-nose empurpled, and with blue lips crackled and dry, / In incipient delirium shoves the eggspoon in his eye.
1902		H. Baumann Londinismen (2nd edn).
1906		Pacific Commercial Advertiser (Honolulu, HI) 1 Dec. 1/4: Peterson is an habitual drunkard [...] with a nose that must have cost a fortune to acquire [...] a genuine, twenty-carat brandy blossom.
1916		Dly Gate City (Keokuk, IA) 13 Mar. 5/2: That blear-eyed, brandy-breathed, blossom nose, blotted face, bulging bodied boozer.

a red nose or blotches resulting from drinking alcohol; also attrib.; adj. gin-blossomed (see cite 1894).

1801		J. Churchill ‘King Caw’ in Poems II 158: Description is baffle’d, when soaring to speak / Of the prominent gin-blossoms, gracing each cheek!
1804		Republican-Jrnl (Darlington, WI) 8 June 8/2: I heard Mr Jones say that pa had the biggest gin blossom in the ward.
1831		Bristol Mercury 19 July 2/6: She shed a profusion of tears [...] the big drops chasing each other through the gin blossoms of her face like pearls playing among rubies.
1841		[S. Warren] Ten-thousand a Year 48: By-and-by Mr Gammon, and Messrs Bloodsuck, (senior and junior,) Mudfint-Woodlouse, Centipede, Ginblossom, Going Gone, Hie Haec Hoc, and others, made their appearance.
1858		E. London Obs. 16 Oct. 3/6: A man with no whiskers and gin blossoms on his nose.
[1863		Criminal Life (NY) 19 Dec. n.p.: A surgical operation performed on her nasal organ to remove those two Juniper berries which now ornament it].
1868		N.O. Republican (LA) 22 Aug. 8/1: They are blooming all over with folly spots, as well soaked topers do with gin-blossoms.
1869		Newcastle Jrnl 24 May 2/6: An elderly female [...] boasting of whole bouquet of gin blossoms on her venerable countenance.
1875		Nat. Republican (DC) 17 Sept. 2/5: As the sun’s rays glanced diagonally across his nose the gin-blossoms bloomed.
1888		Abilene Wkly Reflector (KS) 2 Aug. 4/3: If you see a man with gin-blossom on his nose and a whole gin-boquet [sic] in his breath, the chances are that he is a Democrat.
1888		Bowral Free Press (NSW) 5 Sept. 4/2: [H]is nose was the prettiest gin blossom that ever bloomed on a human.
1892		Irish Society (Dublin) 6 Aug. 713/1: [T]he few moles scattered promiscuonsly over her face, and designated by carping persons ‘gin blossoms,’ might afford reasonable grounds for the suspicion that the lady in question was addicted to the use of spirits.
1894		Newcastle Morn. Herald (NSW) 26 Feb. 4/4: [A] crowd of people whose gin-blossomed countenances showed that they habitually took as little water as possible with their favourite beverage.
1903		Truth (Brisbane) 8 Nov . 3/3: blatant bible-bangers / pimply prayors / [...] [S]mall boys, who seem as yet scarcely able to cultivate rosey gin blossoms.
1920		J. Darier A Textbook of Dermatology 38: This condition [i.e. rosacea] in particular is designated popularly as ‘gin-blossom’.
[1926		Maines & Grant Wise-crack Dict. 9/1: Gin-blossom – Flapper who likes to bloom now and then].
1931		M. Hellinger Moon over Broadway 237: Beautiful blossoms have replaced the gin blossoms.
1937		Dly. Teleg. (Sydney) 21 Dec. 10/4: [T]he Red Head [a former public house] has become a flower shop. Beautiful blossoms have replaced the gin blossoms.
1999		Guardian Rev. 1 Oct. 27: The no-nonsense, gin-blossom-decorated Tommy Lee Jones [...] heads off in pursuit of the real killer.
2001		R.D. Tkachuk Killer Within 80: [...] who was looking straight ahead with a grin pasted under the glossy red slits that were his eyes, the gin-blossom nose vibrant with fresh burgundy hues.

a red face caused by the bursting of blood-vessels through excessive, long-term drinking; also attrib.

[1793		Racing Calendar 346: Grog-blossom, 4a, 43].
1796		Grose Classical Dict. of the Vulgar Tongue (3rd edn) n.p.: grog-blossom. A carbuncle, or pimple in the face, caused by drinking.
1811		Lex. Balatronicum.
1818		M.L. Weems Drunkard’s Looking Glass (1929) 124: A Rose-bud, a Carbuncle, or Grog-blossom on your learned snouts.
1821		‘A Real Paddy’ Real Life in Ireland 74: A fellow of infinite humour, witness the pimples on his nose, vulgarly called grog blossoms.
1823		Morn. Post (London) 13 Oct. 4/1: We may guess by the grog blossoms on your nose!
1831		Sydney Gaz. 25 Jan. 4/1: Renounce / Carbuncle, or grog blossom, no devotion to the bowl.
1835		Hereford Jrnl 16 Dec. 4/5: They kept hailing each other [...] till they made everything out as plain as the grog-blossoms upon Darby’s nose.
1839		Northern Star & Leeds General Advertiser 20 July 1/6: The grog-blossomed nosed landlord.
1843		R.S. Surtees Handley Cross (1854) 502: His snub nose bore some disfiguring marks, called by the florists grog-blossoms.
1847		Bell’s Life in Sydney 6 Mar. 2/6: A dapper little man with a grog-blossoming nose.
1848		Bartlett Dict. Americanisms 280: rum-bud. A grog blossom; the popular name of a redness occasioned by the detestable practice of excessive drinking.
1853		Exeter Flying Post 14 July 6/2: Mr Grogblossom drank rather more than his ususal allowance of hot rum and sugar.
1863		Fife Herald (Scot.) 8 Dec. 2/5: A red face shall be a letter of recommendation; and so many grog-blossoms.
1867		W.H. Smyth Sailor’s Word-Bk (1991) 350: Grog-Blossom. A red confluence on the nose and face of an excessive drinker.
1878		Leicester Chron. 20 Apr. 12/2: Try a few grog-blossoms; they are the things to make a nose gay.
1885		Bulletin (Sydney) 14 Feb. 9/1: Like other princes […] advancing age, while expanding his waist-band and multiplying his grog-blossoms, has left unimpaired his taste in pretty faces.
1888		W. Besant Fifty Years Ago 169: The outward and visible signs of rum were indeed various. First, there was the red and swollen nose, next, the nose beautifully painted with grog-blossoms.
1894		Truth (Sydney) 11 Feb. 1/6: A drunkard is one sort of viticultural machine [...] Likewise, a grog-blossom is a horticultural exhibit.
1895		E. Pugh Street in Suburbia 111: Between you an’ me, the on’y flowers ez I ever noticed that Tony Burrett was fond of was grog-blossoms, an’ I must give ’im credit for cultivatin’ them.
1904		Sun. Times (Perth) 27 Mar. 6/1: Most of ’em are grey-headed and bald, one or two have grog-blossom noses.
1917		‘Taffrail’ Sub 54: He had grog-blossoms on his nose [...] though I never actually saw him the worse for liquor.
1928		V. Palmer Passage 22: The man’s got a grogblossom nose like Corny Lait’s.
1933		‘William Juniper’ True Drunkard’s Delight 248: Grog-blossoms, Pimples achieved by furious drinking.
1979		J. Morrow Confessions of Proinsias O’Toole 27: A pair of startlingly large white ears standing out against his facial grog-blossom like fungus lilies on an ancient monument.
2002		Guardian G2 29 Oct. 15: These, as the result of intemperance, are apt to become affected and the nose reddened. To this the term ‘grog-blossom’ is popularly applied.

a red face caused by the bursting of blood-vessels through excessive, long-term drinking.

1830		Owl (NY) 14 Aug. n.p.: That butcher whose face is covered with rum-blossoms.
1853		Life in Boston & N.Y. (Boston, MA) 8 Oct. n.p.: Tom McD— had better keep out of lager beer cellars. He has rum blossoms on his long nose already.
1870		W.H. Gray Hist. Oregon 116: His face had become thin from the free use of New Orleans brandy [...] showing indications of internal heat in bright red spots, and inclining a little to the rum blossom.
1877		Halifax Courier 10 Nov. 3/4: American jottings. If a man getsa boil on his nose hiks wofe calls it a rum blossom.
1902		Leeds Mercury 19 July 20/2: Red nose [indicates] over-indulgence in alcoholic beverages [...] rum blossom is ne of the most cruel names applied to it.

1. a red face caused by the bursting of blood vessels through excessive long-term drinking.

1840		Knickerbocker (NY) Feb. 137: The appetite for this drink may be discovered by the organ of Toddytiveness, which is situated upon the nose, and is vulgarly known by the name of Toddy-blossom.
1865		Dayton Dly Empire (OH) 23 Mar. 2/1: How to make a nose gay — cultivate toddy blossoms.
1870		Cambria Freeman (Edensburg, PA) 3 Nov. 1/7: Teacher: ‘What have I got on either side of my nose, Johnny?’ ‘Toddy blossom; so father says’.
1874		Bozeman Avant Courier (MT) 7 Aug. 2/1: ‘I can always tell water when I see it,’ remarked toddy blossom the other day. ‘It looks so much like gin’.
1888		Sun (NY) 1 Apr. 14/1: His nose assumed an unaccustomed redness, and a toddy blossom of voluptuous proportions.
1891		Dly Gaz. for Middlesborough 17 Sept. 4/2: ‘You asked me [...] why I entertained a prejudice against water,’ said a gentleman with a toddy-blossom on the end of his nose .
1893		Derry Jrnl 20 Nov. 3/3: The toddy blossom on the nose has been for years an affliction of the amateur inebriate.
1890–1904		Farmer & Henley Sl. and Its Analogues.
1901		Morn. Astorian (OR) 20 Mar. 2/3: Now that alcohol has been officially condemned as a food, the toddy blossom culturists need not despair. They should [...] prove that water is an intoxicant.
1910		Ocala Eve. Star (FL) 17 Sept. 3/4: There are quite a few men [...] who need to Kalsomine their bugles quite often to tone down the toddy blossoms thereon.
1919		Coconino Sun (Flagstaff, AZ) 8 Aug. 11/2: Dear friends, five years ago I was a diseased, rotted wreck [...] a red-nosed ruin [...] blear eyes and toddy blossoms all over me.

2. (US, a drunkard) .

1881

Northern Trib. (Cheboygan, MI) 5 Nov. 3/1: He’s a ‘toddy blossom’ and ‘hangs up his landlord’.

(Aus.) to commit pederasty.

1955

‘No. 35’ Argot in G. Simes DAUS (1993).